As frustrating as this season has been to watch at times, one things is certain, Todd Bowles' players have his back. It has been easy to think that coming off two disheartening losses to the Panthers and Buccaneers would mean that Bowles would find himself firmly on the hot seat. But as has been the case all year, the players never got the memo that they are supposed to lose.
After falling behind 14-0, the Jets dominated the line of scrimmage against Kansas City, amassing nearly 500 yards of offense, while maintaining possession of the football for 42 minutes. Even the Jets defense was dreadful on Sunday afternoon, the offense made up for it and found a way to get a win against a team that still has a legitimate chance at the postseason.
Josh McCown was brilliant yet again for the Jets. The 38-year old veteran quarterback was 26 of 36 for 331 yards with a passing touchdown and two rushing touchdowns. He was pin-point accurate when he needed to be, and put the team on his shoulders when it needed it the most. Perhaps the best examples of McCown's leadership Sunday came early in the game with the Jets down 14-0. He engineered two long scoring drives, with a couple of big completions to Jermaine Kearse and Matt Forte mixed in, to help tie the game at 14.
Later with the Jets trailing by a point 31-30, he calmly lead the Jets on a 14-play 75-yard drive, and even used his legs on a couple of occasions to avoid some pressures to by time for his receivers. He was just awesome on Sunday.
Jermaine Kearse and Robbie Anderson: Both wide outs were excellent on Sunday for the Jets. Kearse had 157 yards receiving on nine catches, while Anderson had 107 yards receiving on eight catches. They picked apart a Chiefs secondary that added Darrelle Revis two weeks ago. By the way, Revis was a total non-factor in his return to the MetLife Stadium.
Jets Defense: Defensively, the Jets really struggled. They allowed too many big plays to Kansas City, especially through the air. Giving up two touchdowns on just six plays in the opening minutes of the ballgame certainly didn't help things for Gang Green. The D didn't get any better, as Alex Smith was allowed to do whatever he wanted. Heck, Smith even dashed down the sideline for a 70-yard run to the Jets 16 to set up a field goal to give the Chiefs a brief 17-14 lead.
What made matters worse for the Jets is the fact that everytime they had a lead, the defense gave it up. Leading 24-17 with 5:13 to go in the third quarter, the Jets surrendered a 79-yard touchdown pass from Smith to Tyrek Hill to tie the game at 24. Fast forward to the fourth quarter, after New York chewed up chunks of time to score two field goals to take a 30-24 lead, the defense gave it right back to Kansas City. Tyrek Hill had his second touchdown of the day on a 40-yard bomb from Alex Smith to give KC a 31-30 lead.
Were it not for a couple of overthrows by Smith, the Jets defense was prepared to give up the game winning score after when Smith hit Hill again for 40 yards to the Jets 19 with just seconds to play. In short it was a really bad day for the defense. Perhaps the fact that Muhammod Wilkerson, benched in the first quarter and Darron Lee, suspended by the team, had something to do with the units awful play on Sunday.Chiefs mistakes: The soul reason the Jets won this game was because the Chiefs did something the Jets have been experts in all season, blow the game with stupid mistakes. The entire afternoon was chuck-full of them for Kansas City. First there was the missed field goal by Harrison Butker, who almost never misses, then there was the total implosion by the Chiefs defense in the fourth quarter.
Let me preface by saying that at one point the Jets held the football for over 16 minutes, compared to just a minute and a half by Kansas City in the second half, and the Chiefs were still able to hold the Jets to two field goals. Leading the Jets 31-30, all KC had to do was either force the Jets to kick another field, or stop them entirely and they would have had plenty of time to win the game.
But, nooooooo.
The Jets failed to get the ball into the end zone on three tries from the Chiefs seven-yard line and settled for a Chandler Catanzaro field goal with 3:58 to go in the game. It would have been 33-31 Jets, and with nearly four minutes left in the game. There certainly a good chance Kansas City would find a way to send the Jets to their eighth loss of the year. However, the Catanzaro field goal was waved off by officials after the Chiefs were called for unnecessary roughness. How does unnecessary roughness get called on a field goal? Don't know, but it did.
The Jets got the football back, this time at the Chiefs one-yard line, and still couldn't punch it in. So the Chiefs decided on third and goal, after McCown threw an incompletion, to draw a holding call on the play giving the Jets another fresh set of downs. Justin Peters infamously picked up the flag and chucked it into the stands drawing another penalty, and was promptly kicked out of the game.
The Jets would finally plow in for a touchdown on McCown's second quarterback sneak of the day to give the Jets a 38-31 lead.
Todd Bowles: This was not a good day for Bowles defense which gave up 474 yards to a Chiefs offense that had disappeared for the past six weeks, but he gets a pass because his players bailed him out all day. The Jets have been in a lot of tight games this year, and had chances to win a number of them. Getting this one against the Chiefs is especially sweet and a nice building block for this team.
Next: The Jets head to Denver to take on the Broncos. Who the Broncos quarterback will be is anyone's guess, but the Jets better be ready for a fight, the Broncos are due for a victory at some point.
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