Last week in this space, we doubled down on good things because both the Jets and Giants played so well in their victories.
We're going to have to flip the script this time around. If last Sunday was the best day of the football season, this Sunday was surely the worst as both of our local squads failed to meet the challenge in front of them while slumping to a costly loss.
The Jets' loss was worse than the one the Giants suffered at the hands of the 49ers. The Jets were at home against a divisional rival and they wound up getting blown out while the Giants at least had a chance to tie the game in the final minutes.
Both were bad, though, and the ramifications of both could wind up being felt well into the future this season. Both teams have much rougher roads to the playoffs and, should they get there, killer paths to the Super Bowl as a result of the losses in Week 10.
GOOD: The best thing about this weekend is that it was Week 10 and not Week 17. With seven games left to play, it is too soon to write anything in ink and both teams have plenty of time to turn things back their way.
BAD: Everyone is focused on Mario Manningham's route running on Eli Manning's second backbreaking interception, but a bad route doesn't explain why Manning was forcing a ball into an area where five 49ers defenders were waiting. There were a lot of moments Sunday when Manning looked like the irrational quarterback of past seasons, which isn't a development that's particularly welcome for a team that won't win if he makes mistakes.
UGLY: Where to start with the ugliness for the Jets? How about the fact that the team showed up woefully unprepared and acted confused before almost every single snap on both sides of the ball. It is impossible to understand how that can happen halfway through the season in a game of that magnitude.
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BAD: Nick Folk's missed field goal on the first drive of the game doesn't loom large when you lose by 21 points, but it is impossible to shake the butterfly effect of that miss on the rest of the game. Maybe making that kick doesn't change the outcome of the game, but maybe it sets the Jets on a course where they don't make every mistake in the book.
UGLY: Alex Smith is likely overly maligned by the football public, but that doesn't make it okay that he shredded the Giants defense all day long. The worst of it came on Vernon Davis' 31-yard touchdown when either Greg Jones or Antrel Rolle decided not to do their job and let the Niners tight end roam free for a huge play.
GOOD, BAD and UGLY: Manningham caught another attractive touchdown in the second half, but two mistakes loomed larger on Sunday. He made a bad read on what wound up as an interception -- something that has been a problem throughout his career -- and he should have caught a pass that would have been a touchdown despite being a bit overthrown on the final drive of the game.
BAD: The Giants got fooled by an onside kick and Steve Weatherford hit a shanktastic 27-yard punt. One day, the Giants will have special teams that aren't a complete embarrassment.
UGLY: Rex Ryan called Mark Sanchez's timeout with 17 seconds left on the play clock late in the second quarter the stupidest play in the history of football. It was plenty bad, but let's get a little perspective: The Jets made five or six worse plays on Sunday night and it wouldn't have mattered if the defense hadn't rolled over and played dead when the Patriots got the ball back.
GOOD: The Jets play again Thursday, which means that we won't have to dwell on this debacle for too long. There's less reason to feel confident about their chances to stop Tim Tebow and the Broncos, but this team desperately needs to wash the Patriots game out of their memories.
BAD: The Cowboys played their best game of the season on Sunday, completely dominating a Bills team that gave the Giants a very hard time. The schedule favors Dallas in the weeks to come and next week's Eagles game feels like one that Philly will actually show up for after making a mess of themselves against Arizona last week.
UGLY: Nothing is uglier than another year with the Patriots on top of the AFC East, but that's just what the Jets all but guaranteed with their "effort" on Sunday night. Humiliation is a bit too kind a word for what went down and the loss will (and should) hang over their heads for a long, long time as a reminder of how little Ryan has accomplished in the fight for supremacy in the AFC.
Josh Alper is a writer living in New York City. You can follow him on Twitter and he is also a contributor to Pro Football Talk.
