Positive, it’s doable these two performs won't have mattered in the long term. The Bengals are the defending Tremendous Bowl runners-up, in spite of everything, and so they walked into MetLife Stadium salty and targeted, sitting 0-2, smarting after back-to-back losses to Pittsburgh and Dallas, understanding the steep odds in opposition to groups who begin 0-3 making the playoffs.
And the Bengals principally did as they happy Sunday afternoon at MetLife, routing the Jets 27-12, muffling the thrill the followers had introduced into the constructing with them after final week’s gorgeous comeback win in Cleveland.
Nonetheless …
Two bookend penalties, in both half, confirmed why the Jets — who've intriguing items on either side of the ball — are nonetheless a flawed complete product. Each of them have been pointless roughness penalties, which means each of them have been avoidable — which is one other means of claiming that each of them have been inexcusable.
First quarter: The Jets had simply sliced the Bengals’ result in a thin level, 7-6, and the protection had risen up and stopped Cincinnati, forcing Joe Burrow out of the pocket on third down, forcing an incompletion, halting the Bengals’ offensive machine. This could have been an enormous assertion.
As a substitute, there was a flag. John Franklin-Myers pushed Burrow after he launched the ball, then compounded the error by falling, all 289 kilos of him touchdown on Burrow. Possibly that’s an inconsequential play in 1975. However everybody is aware of it isn’t 1975; it’s 2022. You possibly can’t try this. Three performs later, Burrow hit Tyler Boyd for 56 yards and a 14-6 lead.
“We have been each stunned they known as that,” Franklin-Myers stated, earlier than conceding: “It’s a bang-bang play. However I've to be higher than that.”
“If it’s ticky-tack or not,” Jets coach Robert Saleh stated, “he doesn’t have to do this.”
Nonetheless, to the Jets’ credit score, they have been nonetheless inside two scores of the Bengals two quarters later, 27-12. They have been deep in Cincinnati territory. The group was engaged …
(… and all over the place else, Jets followers have been seized with fury as the CBS feed merely disappeared. Nearly 54 years after the Heidi Recreation, the Jets have been mini-Heidi-ed. And perhaps it speaks to a special day that Jets followers have been really offended when the feed went down, as an alternative of grateful …)
After which Corey Davis, after being focused by a Joe Flacco move that was incomplete, began arguing with Bengals security Eli Apple. That may have been high quality. However then Davis raised his hand … and right here got here one other flag. There went one other 15 yards. And there, for all sensible functions, was the sport.
“It’s two guys jawing forwards and backwards,” Saleh stated. “If he retains his palms down, nothing would’ve occurred. However he grabbed their participant’s helmet.”
After which, as if to summarize the day: “He’s bought to be smarter.”
Mentioned Davis: “It hurts.”
Once more, this was about greater than two performs. Flacco ran for his life many of the day, which re-emphasized the necessity for the Jets’ crying want for competent offensive line play and in addition impressed some cries for Mike White and his youthful, extra cellular legs. The Jets had Burrow on the run a bunch, too, however might by no means fairly get him for an enormous loss. And the secondary stored getting burned.
It isn’t shedding to the Bengals that’s the pity. It’s how they misplaced to the Bengals.
The Bengals are higher than the Jets. It’s exhausting to argue in any other case, however these Jets are additionally higher than final yr’s Jets, higher than the Jets of current classic. They've higher gamers. They've extra playmakers. They're nonetheless brief once they play a crew just like the Bengals — once more, defending AFC champs — so they should depend on conserving errors to a minimal.
“We nonetheless had our alternatives,” Saleh stated.
They did. There's sufficient right here — particularly if Zach Wilson is ready to hit the bottom working, which could occur as early as subsequent week in Pittsburgh — to count on higher than the Jets have proven us in years. They'll win some video games this yr if they will honor that — and, frankly, if the coaches can drill into them the significance of sustaining their composure.
They didn’t try this Sunday. Possibly it wouldn’t have mattered. Possibly the Bengals, determined for victory, bursting with urgency, have been going to make their means again to the airport with a win, even with out the assistance.
Nonetheless … it could’ve been good to search out out.
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