Bills blunders gift wrap victory for Jets

JETS 28
BILLS 24

Here is what the optimistic Jets fan, who likes to wear blinders while driving, will say Monday morning when he wakes up from his hangover. "Yo man, Mark Sanchez threw four touchdowns, he's amazing!"

Here is the reality.

In spite of throwing four touchdowns, Mark Sanchez was truly awful as the New York Jets offense barley mustered 318 total yards, and Sanchez threw for only 180 yards and completed only 17 of 35 passes, which is less than 50 percent competed. He was bad; truly awful, as he under-threw, overthrew, and threw behind his wide receivers for a better part of the afternoon; but the big reason the New York Jets won this game had more to do with one bone-headed play after another by the Buffalo Bills, who clearly should have won this game going away.

After the Bills grabbed a 14-7 lead, thanks to a Mark Sanchez interception, that he threw right into the hands of Drayton Florence, the Bills did two incredibly stupid things in a row.

First, Stevie Johnson who caught a five yard touchdown pass from Ryan Fitzpatrick to give the Bills the seven point lead, decided to do a touchdown dance, mocking Plaxico Burress shooting himself in the leg. While some have taken heavy offense to it, it wasn't like Ndamukong Shu stepping on someone's body.

However, the dance did hurt the Bills. It was a 15 yard penalty assessed on the kickoff, meaning that the Jets would have a chance to make a solid return on the kickoff. Then an even more idiotic thing happened, when Bills kicker Dave Rayner muffed the kick-off Charlie Brown-stlye, giving the Jets the football at the Bills 36 yard line.

The Jets took fool advantage, as Sanchez drilled a 14-yard touchdown pass to Plaxico Burress to tie the game. If only the Bills kicked the ball off correctly, this touchdown probably wouldn't have happened.

Sanchez was playing really badly up to this point throwing incompletions all over the place, and whenever he tried to zip it to his receivers the ball ended up in double and triple coverage. It was a truly poor effort by Sanchez, one of the worst performances I have seen from someone who still managed to throw four touchdowns. How bad is the Bills defense, you think?

Early in the third quarter, Sanchez had his best drive of the day. He completed a 22 yard shot to Dustin Keller to move the ball to the Bills 34, then hit Joe McKnight for 12 more yards to the Bills 21. Finally, Sanchez found Dustin Keller wide open in the end zone for the touchdown to give the Jets a 21-14 lead.

Then, the comedy of errors returned for the Jets. The Jets defense and special teams, which had been horrid all season long, continued their mediocre ways. Starting with Antonio Cromartie who muffed a punt return giving the Bills the football at the Jets 36 yard line. On the next play, Fitzpatrick found Brad Smith for a 36 yard touchdown. The ex-Jet, caught the ball when it bounced off the shoulder of Cromartie, and walked right into the end zone for the score to tie it.

Fitzpatrick was tearing apart the Jets secondary. He threw for 264 yards, and three touchdowns. Every pass he completed, whether it be David Nelson, Scott Chandler, or even Stevie Johnson, they were wide open on each completion. It was a miracle for the Jets that the Bills didn't blow them out of the building with this areal assault.

Fast forward to the fourth quarter, and Fitzpatrick orchestrated a solid 14 play 62 yard drive, converting three huge third downs with passes to David Nelson and Scott Chandler to get Buffalo into field goal range for Rayner, who booted it through the up rights to give the Bills a 24-21 lead.

It appeared that Buffalo was well on their way to victory after the Jets went three-and-out on their next possession, but the Jets defense finally made a stand thanks to a sack of Fitzpatrick by David Harris to give New York the ball back.

In a drive that was eerily reminiscent of the Jets game winning drive against Houston a year earlier, Gang Green drove the football down the field for the go-ahead score in the final minutes. Key passes on the drive included a 14 yard completion to Burress to move the ball into Buffalo territory, a 12 yard competion to Patrick Turner to move the ball to the Bills 35, and an 18 yard completion to Burress to move the ball to the Bills 18. The final Burress catch was all on Burress. Sanchez threw behind Burress, but the lanky wide out bailed out his quarterback by making a terrific catch down the sideline. If he didn't catch it, the game would have probably ended right there.

Two plays later, Sanchez found Santonio Holmes in the corner of the end zone, like the Houston game, for the go-ahead touchdown. For 50 minutes the Bills defense flustered Sanchez, but when it really mattered, they couldn't stop a quarterback who was struggling all afternoon. Terrible job by the Bills defense.

Buffalo had one last shot though. Fitzpatrick connected with Nelson for 18 yards to the Bills 45, then hit Chandler for 11 more to move it into Jets territory with 40 seconds to go. After a penalty on the Jets, Fitzpatrick scrambled for 15 yards to the Jets 27, and Buffalo was in business. Then on the next play, Fitzpatrick found that Johnson split the coverage up the middle, and was wide open. He hit him right in stride, but Johnson bobbled and dropped what would have been a sure touchdown for the Bills.

Johnson, who humiliated himself earlier in the game, cost his team a chance to win the ball game late, and the Jets escaped a poor effort against a struggling divisional rival.