The Jets won their second straight game Sunday, a 42-34 defeat of the Colts that got them back to .500 at 3-3. Here are some thoughts and observations about the game:
1. Before Sunday’s game, I was talking to someone about Sam Darnold, and I remarked he has not had that awful rookie performance yet. He has had some games in which he was not great, but he has not imploded. It still might happen, but the most impressive thing to me about Darnold is we are six games into his career and he has not had a terrible game.
You expect rookies to have really bad days. Think back to the last two Jets rookie starting quarterbacks. Mark Sanchez started off 3-0 and then had a nightmare game in New Orleans with three interceptions, a fumble and four sacks. He followed that up two weeks later with five interceptions against the Bills. Geno Smith did not even wait as long as Sanchez. He had three interceptions in his second game on a rainy night in New England. Two weeks after that he had two interceptions and two fumbles in Tennessee.
But the biggest difference I see between Darnold and those two is his poise. You could see when Sanchez or Smith got shaken by a defense. They allowed one mistake to turn into another and then another. Darnold has shown the ability to shake off mistakes and move on to the next play. We saw it on his first professional play. He threw a pick-six to the Lions and then brushed it off. On Sunday, he made a bad throw to Robby Anderson that Malik Hooker intercepted, but he recovered from it and played a clean game the rest of the day.
If Darnold was a baseball player, I think he would make a great closer. I spent some time covering the Yankees before I got on the Jets beat. So many things about Mariano Rivera were remarkable, but nothing more than his ability to put a bad performance behind him. That (and OK, the cutter) separated him from the hundreds of other closers who lost confidence after a blown save.
If Darnold can be the Jets’ version of Rivera, the team will be in really good shape for a long time.
2. The main theme in Sunday’s postgame locker room was that the Jets had grown up, that this was a game they would not have won last year. Forgive me if I need to see a little more evidence of this maturity than a two-game winning streak, but I did see some things Sunday that have been missing from recent Jets teams.
The defense made a statement in the first half by holding the Colts to field goals after two Jets turnovers. In the past, the Darnold interception and Quincy Enunwa fumble could have led to touchdowns for the Colts that would produce a huge momentum swing their way. Instead, the defense held (including stopping them on first-and-goal from the 1) and kept points off the scoreboard and prevented the Colts from gaining momentum.
The next thing was the Jets scoring at the end of the first half and at the beginning of the second half. How many times have we seen opponents do that to the Jets through the years, particularly the Patriots? The Jets did it, and they opened up a 17-point lead early in the second half by doing it.
Then in the fourth quarter, the Colts cut the lead to 33-27 and everyone at MetLife was thinking, “This could be bad.” The Jets got the ball, and the first play was a 10-yard sack of Darnold, pushing them back to their own 15. It felt like it would be a wasted series. Instead, Darnold hit Jermaine Kearse for a 21-yard gain and a first down on second-and-20 that neutralized any damage done by the sack. They would end up kicking a field goal on the drive.
In the past, the Jets would have folded in that situation. On Sunday, they stood up. Is it a sign this team has matured? It could be. But I’d like to see more of it before I pronounce this team all grown up.
3. Entering this season, the Jets defense had allowed 400 yards 10 times in three seasons under coach Todd Bowles. The unit has done it three times in the last three weeks. The takeaways covered up some bad defense Sunday, and it is going to bite them at some point if they can’t fix it.
You can throw out the Broncos’ 436-yard performance last week, if you’d like. Many of those yards came late when the Jets were in soft coverage, protecting a lead. But the 503 the Jaguars hung on them two weeks ago and the 428 they gave up to the Colts were real defensive letdowns.
The Jets can’t count on forcing four turnovers every week, so they’d better clean things up.
4. I praised general manager Mike Maccagnan for some of his offseason additions last week. He looked good again Sunday with kicker Jason Myers accounting for 24 points with a franchise-record seven field goals and three extra points. Maccagnan claimed Myers in August, when the Seahawks cut him. The Jets were in a bad spot because Cairo Santos, whom they signed in the winter, had been injured and unable to kick at all in the preseason. Maccagnan took a flier on Myers, who struggled with the Jaguars last year, and it has paid off. Myers has missed one field goal this season and is tied for league lead with 32 touchbacks on kickoffs.
Revealing stat: The Jets controlled the ball for 37 minutes, 2 seconds. Even though many of their drives ended in field goals, the Jets did a great job controlling the ball and keeping Andrew Luck on the sideline.
Surprising snap count: Neal Sterling returned to the lineup Sunday after missing the last three games because of a concussion. The Jets threw him right in there. He played 36 of the offensive snaps (51 percent), the most of any tight end.
Game ball: There were some strong individual performances Sunday, but how can you not go with Myers? A kicker going 7-for-7 is huge. Give it up for the kicker from Marist.
