Well the deserved hangover from a well-played game in Pittsburgh has worn off, and now it's time to start talking about the Jets next game against the newly crowned NFC North champs, the Chicago Bears. A team that played in the elements last night, and looked very good doing it, lambasting the Minnesota Vikings 40-14 in a game that wasn't even as close as the score indicates. A couple of quick hits on the Bears:
1) They're road warriors, just like the Jets. Which actually bodes well for Sanchez and company because they're a very pedestrian 4-3 at home.
2) When they lose, it's because their quarterback gets back into that gunslinger mentality. In wins, Jay Cutler has 19 TDs and 6 INTs. In losses, those numbers switch to 1 and 7 respectively. His QB rating is a night and day difference of 106.7 and 52.6 in wins and losses.
3) This Bears defense is built on stopping the run (3rd best run defense) and bending but not breaking on the pass (14th pass defense). They mainly employ zone coverages, and their base pass defense is a Tampa 2. This will be a much better pass defense than last week in Pittsburgh where they were missing their game breaker.
4) The receiving corps is like a poor man's version of the Philadelphia Eagles. Knox and Hester are both absolute burners. This does present the opportunity for the big play, but personally I'll take that over a predictable and surgically precise passing offense such as the Patriots any day. With Cromartie and Revis, the Jets definitely have the horses to keep up in a track meet, but if they do get beat deep, there's no question Cutler has the arm strength to get it to them.
And a few questions for the Jets.
1) Can the pass rush get to Jay Cutler?
It's become apparent that the Jets defensive line doesn't get much pressure at all, but this may be the worst pass blocking offensive line they've faced all year. Offensive coordinator Mike Martz has put a lot more short 3 step drops into the game plan to help combat their deficiencies, but that doesn't change the fact that Cutler has been sacked an amazing 44 times this year. Cutler does have a tendency to hold onto the ball too long, so with some good coverage by Cromartie, Revis, and Coleman, maybe they can force Cutler into some sacks and bad decisions.
2) Will the Bears acknowledge Greg Olsen's existence?
Similar to Dustin Keller, Olsen had a strong start to the season and has been almost completely silent since. Olsen is the EXACT type of player that gives this defense fits without Jim Leonhard. A tall, strong, fast tight end is a chess piece that we don't have a counter for. Hernandez and Gronkowski killed us, the resurgent Todd Heap had 6 catches for 72 yards in week 1, even Joel Dreesen had 106 yards and a TD. Scott is not great in pass coverage, Harris is usually worse. Dwight Lowery maybe? The best thing is to just hope that Mike Martz forgets about Olsen, as he has done for the past four weeks, or else the defense could be in for a long day of mismatches.
3) Can Sanchez figure out the Bears' zone coverages?
For the most part, the Bears prefer to matchup in a zone defense on passing plays. Whether it be the Tampa 2, which is what they're most associated with, or a Cover 3, they like to throw sophisticated zone packages at a QB and give up paper cuts instead of risking the big play. Some quarterbacks have cracked the safe this year (See Brady, Tom), but it will take patience going through his progressions for Sanchez to find the pockets of space that are naturally there in any zone defense. From what I saw, the game plan was heavily simplified by Schottenheimer to quick drops and rollouts to pick up short gains. That west coast style of passing attack would be a perfect fit against this defense which is prone to giving up 5-6 yard gains through the air.
4) Can the Jets run it?
As I mentioned before, this is the 3rd ranked rushing defense in the NFL. We are supposedly a "ground and pound team", and for the first time in about a month we proved it this past Sunday. Even though the team only ran the ball 23 times total, LT showed what he can do when he gets some holes and had 11 carries for 49 yards. This is absolutely key to keeping pressure off of the quarterback, being able to sell the play action, and making sure the run/pass balance is where you want it. Mark my words, if Mark Sanchez throws more than 30 passes in this game, I don't see us winning. So hopefully Schotty sticks with the run, and hopefully the O-line is able to execute like last week.
More coming later in the week.
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