Can the Jets Rebound in 2013?
The 2012 season for the New York Jets wasn’t just disappointing, it was downright pathetic. The amount of terrible front office decisions and poor player performances was almost unfathomable, especially for a team so highly-touted coming into the season. But, the great thing about sports is there’s always next year and if the Jets can rebound in 2013, then most of their loyal fans will forget this season ever happened.
And as expected, the franchise is already starting to sweep the nightmares of 2012 under the rug. Last year’s general manager and the ringleader of all that was wrong with the team, Mike Tannenbaum, is out and he’s been recently replaced by John Idzik, who had plenty of success in Seattle this past year. Idzik has already showed he deals with problems head on and in a personal way, contacting Darrelle Revis this week after trade rumors involving the star corner back surfaced.
“I reached out to Darrelle, and I made sure he knew exactly where we were coming from and that this is my first day on the job and our message to everyone was, ‘Give us a chance to get to know each other and introduce ourselves to each other,’ ” Idzik said Friday in an interview with NBC’s Pro Football Talk, via ESPN.com.
Obviously, Revis is one guy the Jets will need next year, but as we all know, defensive wasn’t the biggest issue with the Jets last season. In fact, it was New York’s ineptitude on offense that led to the atrocious record at the end of the year, so how do you fix something that is still so very broken?
Cromartie is sticking by Sanchez
Many will argue that Mark Sanchez was to blame for the Jets’ struggles, but many of his teammates still support him, including Antonio Cromartie, who recently came to his defense saying that the team needs better support players around him.
“If he has good, veteran players around him — ones that know how to practice and compete at a high level every day — then you’ll have a better quarterback,” Cromartie told NFL.com on Friday. “But when you don’t have a supporting cast around him, you’re going to get an average or below-average quarterback. That’s what we got. He needs a better supporting cast. That’s something the new GM (Idzik) has to look at and evaluate as he’s looking at the roster. He needs to get Mark some help.”
Like him or not, Sanchez’s contract extension last season almost guarantees he’ll be the starter again in 2013, so the team will have to find a way to win with him. They’ll have to start by protecting Sanchez better. He was among the league leaders with eight fumbles lost last season, and obviously that means he’s getting hit way too often.
The Jets will also need much more production out of their receiving core and they should get it if guys come back healthy. Santonio Holmes missing 13 weeks and Dustin Keller missing eight games certainly didn’t help, leaving Sanchez with Braylon Edwards as one of his top targets. And Edwards had just 18 catches on the season with one touchdown.
So can the Jets rebound? Sure. Crazier things have happened, but it will take a lot of work and a lot of things going right. Of course, it all starts with the front office and the guys they can bring in to help what is at the moment, a damaged squad.
