When last the Jets saw Peyton Manning and the Colts, their defense was getting run off the field in the second half.
Pass after pass found wide open Colts receivers nominally guarded by members of the Jets secondary not named Darrelle Revis. Those passes were delivered by a cool, calm and collected Manning who felt little to no pressure in the pocket from Jets pass rushers who couldn't find their way to the promised land. It added up to a 30-17 Jets loss and ushered in an offseason of big change.
Mike Tannenbaum engineered the deaprture of Lito Sheppard, Donald Strickland and Kerry Rhodes from that secondary. Marques Douglas was dumped off the defensive line. Antonio Cromartie came from the Chargers in a trade, Kyle Wilson got drafted in the first round and Brodney Pool and Jason Taylor were brought to town as free agents. The idea behind the moves was very clear: Get good enough on defense to hold off quarterbacks like Manning and Tom Brady and advance to the Super Bowl.
The results from the regular season were unimpressive. The defense wasn't as good as the one from the 2009 season. Cromartie had moments of brilliance and moments when he looked no better than any guy you could pick up off the street. Pool couldn't cleanly beat out Eric Smith, Wilson was a bust and the secondary remains just as vulnerable to the guys who live off Revis Island as they were last year.
Outside of his safety against the Steelers, Taylor was even worse than the defensive backs. He, like every pass rusher on the team, is invisible most of the time and he doesn't even add the run help that guys like Bart Scott and David Harris give the team. It was a gamble to expect no downturn from a player his age, but Taylor fell off a cliff.
Yet the Jets still find themselves in the playoffs, which means there's still time for these guys to make Tannenbaum look as smart for putting the team's fate in their hands as he looks for grabbing Santonio Holmes and LaDainian Tomlinson for the offense. For all their struggles down the stretch, the Jets offense took steps forward this season.
The defense went the other direction. That doesn't bode well for Rex Ryan, but it bodes even less well for Tannenbaum. For year's he's been willing to make bold moves to fill holes, real or imagined, but they've often worked out about as poorly as the moves he made this season. His job isn't at any risk, but his reputation is another matter.
U.S. & World
A good game against the Colts, though, and it becomes 17 weeks of training for the desired payoff.
Josh Alper is a writer living in New York City and is a contributor to FanHouse.com and ProFootballTalk.com in addition to his duties for NBCNewYork.com. You can follow him on Twitter.
