D-D-Dirty Sanchez and the Jets

I have no idea what I did to draw the ire of the New York Jets organization, but they are making it their personal mission to make me look like an idiot this winter.

For the second week in a row, a Jets unfathomable victory stopped me from posting a 3-1 record in my playoff picks. As it is, I am 4-4 heading into the conference championships next weekend.

New York certainly has some tremendous momentum heading into the AFC championship. Plus, they’ve been on the receiving of a number of fortuitous breaks that makes me think otherworldly forces are at play in their recent success.

As we all know, “destiny has never won a gold medal” and “with five seconds left, destiny panics”, but there is something (fate?) that is helping the Jets along in this improbable playoff run.

New York shouldn’t have been in the playoffs in the first place. They had to win the final two games of the regular season against the 14-0 Colts and the Cincinnati Bengals just to be considered for a playoff spot.

What happened?

Indy took a dive by playing their second string quarterback in the last twenty minutes of the game, allowing the New York to squeak out a come from behind victory. It’s not like New York even played that well. The Colts QB, Curtis Painter, laid an egg of epic proportions. He literally looked he had never played the game of football before. I wouldn’t trust the guy to parallel park my car, let alone run an NFL offence.

Then, the Bengals tanked the regular season finale, barely putting up a fight in a dominating Jets victory. Even with both of those cheap victories, New York still needed some other AFC teams to lose so the Jets could leapfrog them in the standings. Of course that happened, and the Jets earned a wildcard playoff berth against those same Bengals.

The Jets played well in their playoff victory over the Cincinnati, but they were aided by two field goal misses by Cincinnati’s kicker. And the misses weren’t even close or from an imposing distance. They were two complete shanks from a distance regularly eclipsed by ten year olds girls in the NFL’s Punt, Pass and Kick competition.

The same script was written against the Chargers last night. San Diego’s kicker, Nate Kaeding, missed THREE field goals. How is that possible? That is fifteen points that New York’s playoff opponents have left off the board in two games.

Is the Jets field goal defensive unit that intimidating? If I was Matt Stover, the Colts kicker, I would have trouble sleeping all week. What is it about the Jets that makes kickers even bigger pussies and head cases than normal?

Dirty Sanchez played worse than he did against the Bengals, but still found a way to lead his team to victory. Say what you want about the kid (he sucks), but he flat out wins football games. In his first postseason, he has already won more playoff games than Joe Namath did in his entire career (Wow. How overrated was Broadway Joe?).

Jets head coach, Rex Ryan, has supreme confidence in his team that borders on outright arrogance. That attitude has obviously rubbed off on his charges as New York is playing with the swagger of a Super Bowl contender. Some media members have derided Ryan for being too cocky.

Who gives a shit? I think that’s a great attitude. He’s not disparaging other teams and he’s instilling a belief in his team that they can do the impossible. And so far, they have.