FLORHAM PARK, N.J. (AP) -Braylon Edwards has a unique perspective on the New York Jets’ slide to 4-4 following a 3-0 start.
Traded to New York days after the team’s first loss, the wide receiver brings an outsider’s view when he’s watched some video of those first three games.
“The only thing that really changed – it looked like they were having a lot of fun,” Edwards said Monday as the Jets returned from their bye-week break. “Those first three games, they came out on a mission to prove, ‘We are somebody. Everybody counted the Jets out; we’re going to show you guys.’
“That’s what I could see that the attitude has slipped a little bit.”
It’s only natural, he added.
“People don’t get talked about or they’re under the radar, and they’re out to prove,” Edwards said. “And once they’ve proved it, people start building them up.”
Now they’re tearing them down. The Jets emerge from their bye at the season’s midway point right back where they started: as many wins as losses, counted out, under the radar.
‘ll need to recapture that early-season attitude to have any chance of making the playoffs.
“I was watching the games yesterday sitting at home, and watching everyone play, you realize that you still have a lot of season left,” receiver Jerricho Cotchery said. “You realize that with the kind of team we have, we can play with anybody in this league. I was just anxious to get back to work today.”
Edwards believes 10 wins would get the Jets in. That means going at least 6-2 against a remaining schedule coach Rex Ryan calls “brutal.”
It includes games at New England and Indianapolis, plus home matchups against Cincinnati and Atlanta. Those four opponents are a combined 25-7.
Like Cotchery, Ryan still believes the Jets can beat any team in the league, an assertion backed up by their earlier victory over the Patriots. His biggest concern about his club is one that’s encouraging yet maddening for any coach: The Jets just need to improve on the little things.
“A play here, a play there,” said running back Thomas Jones. “A penalty or a mistake here or there cost us the game. The good thing is those are mistakes you can correct.”
Ryan and his family went to Fort Lauderdale to relax during the break. He joked that he picked the destination because nobody would expect the Jets coach to vacation there after two losses to the Dolphins.
To Ryan, a guy who earned a shot at his first head coaching job because of his fearsome defenses as the coordinator in Baltimore, something’s a little off with the Jets’ defense even though they rank near the top of the league statistically.
It’s about the instinct and aggression that separate the good units from the great ones.
It’s the defender seeing where the back is lined up and immediately knowing what to do.
“It’s going to be a run. I don’t care what the call is. It’s going to be a run,” Ryan said. “So tighten up and play the run. Those are the little things, that you’re not just playing out of a book, you’re playing defense and playing football.”
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