Geno Smith doesn’t believe his Jets career — or even his days as the team’s starting quarterback — are over.
Speaking to reporters the day after the Jets’ season ended in abject disappointment, Smith made it clear he isn’t looking to go elsewhere, and was defiant when it was suggested he may not have a chance to regain his role as the starter after backing up Ryan Fitzpatrick this season.
“I guess if you’re saying I don’t have an opportunity here, I don’t believe that,” the 25-year-old quarterback said Monday. “We don’t know what’s going to transpire, we don’t know what’s going to happen. We’ll have to wait and see.”
Smith, after all, was the starter when training camp opened, before the locker room fight with former teammate IK Enemkpali in which his jaw was broken. He reiterated Monday he has no regrets about the incident, stemming from a $600 debt Smith refused to pay.
Fitzpatrick took Smith’s job while he was out, and went on to have a dream season, throwing a franchise-record 31 touchdown passes, before his three fourth-quarter interceptions undermined the Jets’ playoff hopes in Sunday’s 22-17 loss to the Bills. Smith appeared in one game, replacing an injured Fitzpatrick in a Nov. 1 loss to the Raiders, and produced uneven results.
“I think I did my best to handle it the best way possible, being that I didn’t play probably for the first time since I was 8 years old,” said Smith, the team’s second-round pick in the 2013 draft. “I want to be out there. We all do. But I used things as my motivation, as fuel to my fire. Everything I’ve went through, everything that’s been said, I listen to it, I hear it, and I use it.”
But the former West Virginia star said he grew by watching Fitzpatrick excel, by working with offensive coordinator Chan Gailey and quarterbacks coach Kevin Patullo, by taking a step back after playing his first two years.
“For me, I think it really made me a better player,” he said. “I learned a lot about how to support guys, how to influence guys, from a different role. How to be less about myself and more about the team. I learned a lot about Xs and Os.”
Smith said though he may return next year as the backup, “we always get the opportunity to compete.” Jets coach Todd Bowles, while complimentary of Smith, said if Fitzpatrick — a free-agent-to-be — returns, he would be the starter.
“I believe in myself. I believe in my ability,” Smith said. “I think the experience that I gained this year, in the mental developmental part of that, is going to grow and continue to grow.
“I’m not going to change the way I go about things, because I’ve always worked hard and I’ve always had the right mindset. I’m going to continue to do that, but work 10 times harder because I have 10 times more motivation.”