Zach Wilson got another start for the injured Mike White on a windy, cold, rainy night at MetLife Stadium, and in the end, his line looked a lot like the one he put up against the Patriots last month that got him benched: 9-for-18, 92 yards, one interception.
Only this time, instead of playing the whole game, Wilson was relieved by Chris Streveler in the third quarter, a move head coach Robert Saleh said was initially “meant to be a change-up,” but “one thing led to another” and Wilson didn’t take another snap.
So what does Wilson attribute the bad night to?
"I just felt like I couldn’t get any rhythm out there, just trying to find some confidence and something to get us going, a little spark, and couldn’t get anything tonight," he said. "I had opportunities and I have to connect on those. I’m sure coaches will detail it when we watch it back, but I have to put my head down and just try to be better for these guys. That was my message to them out there, is that I’m trying to give it everything I’ve got and laying it out there for them, but it’s not good enough. I have to put them in a better position.”
“I wish I had an answer for why we didn’t get in rhythm, but it’s something we need to figure out,” was tight end Tyler Conklin’s blunt assessment.
Saleh said a lot of things went wrong, from pass protection “not being as good as we wanted” to the lack of a run game (seven yards when Wilson left the game), but ultimately put it on starting with the coaches – and he did say he felt that Wilson was continually improving since the benching after the Pats game, up through this week of practices.
“I feel like he had gotten better, but obviously, we have to show it on the field,” Saleh said. “Like I said, it’s a collective thing that starts with coaching, but it wasn’t close to good enough today.”
Unfortunately, the best the Jets got was an opening drive that lost three yards but still got a field goal, and it went downhill from there, fans booing vociferously every time the offense came off the field and chanting “We Want Streveler” and “We Want Flacco” at various times.
Wilson heard it all…and he doesn’t blame them.
"It is (frustrating), but I don’t blame them. We have a very passionate fan base and they are here to watch us score touchdowns and we are not scoring touchdowns,” Wilson said. “We’re not getting first downs, we’re not moving the ball...of course they are going to be frustrated.”
Conklin, in his postgame interview with Jeane Coakley of SNY, reiterated Saleh’s answer about Streveler taking over as looking for a spark that kept going, and then said that the team keeps telling Wilson that they “have his back.”
“I try to keep telling him that we all have his back, and I just feel for him at times, because the fans can be brutal,” the tight end said. “They don’t understand what he’s going through as a player, so we all try to make sure he knows we’re there for him and we care about him, and he’s going to be fine. He’s a young player at the beginning of his story, and I don’t think anyone played well today. So he’ll be fine.”
Whomever takes the blame or the brunt of the vitriol, the fact is that the Jets are 7-8, and depending on what happens the rest of this weekend, they could be in a dormie position where they need to win out and hope for quite a few other results to go their way to sneak into the playoffs.
Two games for the season, and two games to write the ending to what was, six weeks ago, one hell of a story – but for Saleh, right now, it’s one game at a time.
“It's not about playoffs right now, it's not. We played four consecutive teams that are in the hunt for the playoffs and we battled three of them,” Saleh said. “I'm just really disappointed with this showing today. But, right now, it’s about getting off this mat and trying to find a way to put together a football game.”
They have 10 days to do it before they head to Seattle on New Year’s Day and then Miami on Jan. 8, and the players, to a man, are still keeping the faith.
“How do we want our story to end? We’re 7-8 and we have two games to finish with a winning record,” said Conklin. “I don’t know how the playoff picture looks like, but if we win the next two, who knows what could happen.”
Follow Lou DiPietro on Twitter: @LouDiPietroWFAN
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