MIAMI – It is much too early to start talking about any Miracles in the Meadowlands, because these will always be the unfathomable, maddening Jets until proven otherwise.
But there was Aaron Glenn yesterday looking like Herm Edwards running into the end zone 23 years ago today against Joe Pisarcik and the Giants, and then there was Victor Green looking like Edwards running into the end zone, and all of a sudden as if by magic these Undisputed, First-Place Jets are running as fast as anyone in the AFC Back to the Future, back to the glorious day 32 long years ago when they were kings.
Go ahead and scoff. These are the Jets, we understand. Their ignominious graveyard is littered with corpses of collapses past. But understand this: if the offense ever arrives, if they keep believing – in themselves and in Edwards – they could be the last AFC team standing on the first Sunday of February.
The Jets strutted into Pro Player Stadium yesterday, ripped the glasses off Miami noses and then stomped on them, and when it was over, one Jet fan wearing No. 80 was arm-in-arm with another wearing No. 19 and a green contingent serenaded the hometown cheerleaders with “J-E-T-S, Jets, Jets, Jets.”
When it was over, they had driven every ounce of spirit and self-esteem out of the Dolphins and swaggered out of Pro Player Stadium as Jolly Green Jets.
“We got a tremendous amount of heart,” Wayne Chrebet said, “and a tremendous amount of talent. And we feel like we’re all brothers right now; there’s no egos on this team. Everybody’s willing to do whatever it takes even if it doesn’t benefit them. And I think that’s what makes a championship team.”
All the Road Warrior Jets did on Fish Fry Sunday, in a convincing 24-0 victory, was announce themselves, at the very least, as Beasts of the AFC East.
All the Road Warrior Jets did on Fish Fry Sunday was perpetuate The Curse for the eighth straight time and turn their rivals into 0lphins.
Oh, Vinny Testaverde threw a TD pass to Laveranues Coles and managed a mistake-free game, and Tom Tupa and Chris Hayes twice combined on special teams to pin the 0lphins inside their 5, but this was mostly about a defense that proudly calls itself The Mean Green Shreking Crew.
Except for John Abraham, they don’t get to the quarterback the way the Sack Exchange did, but they have this knack of taking the ball from the other team (league-high 33 times, five yesterday) and giving it to their offense. Or scoring touchdowns themselves. Over the past four weeks, The Mean Green Shreking Crew has yielded 28 points.
“These guys are playing as good as any defense I’ve been around and played with in my 15 years,” Testaverde said.
Green has been a Jet since 1993. Glenn has been a Jet since 1994. Green has played for six head coaches. Glenn has played for five.
They have won one playoff game, three years ago against the Jaguars, on the way to the AFC championship heartbreak. They were heroes yesterday. Glenn made it 7-0 when James McKnight bobbled a pass and he snatched it out of mid-air.
“When the ball is in the air, I try to be the offensive player,” Glenn said.
Green made it 21-0 when he batted a Fiedler pass in the flat to himself and sprinted 63 yards to nirvana.
“You bet against me, you’re gonna lose,” Green said.
The 0lphins were dead. “You could see all the wind just go out of them,” DT Steve Martin said.
Laugh at Shrek at your own peril. Defense wins championships.
