Day-to-day has become two months.
The Jets placed quarterback Mark Sanchez on injured reserve-designated for return, which will keep him out a minimum of eight weeks, the team announced on Saturday.
The maligned fifth-year signal-caller injured his right shoulder in the Jets’ third preseason game against the Giants — a setback which paved the way for rookie Geno Smith to start the team’s first two games. Rather than have season-ending surgery, Sanchez has tried to rehab the injury. The Jets, meanwhile, have maintained Sanchez was “day-to-day,” until now.
“Doing this is in keeping with our primary goal of giving Mark every chance to return to practice and play this season,” Jets general manager John Idzik, who previously told reporters Sanchez would not go on IR, said on a conference call on Saturday. “He’s able to stay with the team, rehab and treat the injury with the team, do everything with the exception of practicing and playing [in games].”
Sanchez is eligible to return for the Week 11 game against the Bills in Buffalo and get back on the practice field two weeks before that. He was in Los Angeles on Saturday to meet with a third doctor, The Post learned, before a decision was made about going on IR.
Sanchez said an ESPN report saying he needs surgery is inaccurate, and it’s “laughable” there is a notion he is wasting time and should just go under the knife. He wasn’t willing to reveal the extent of the injury, though it is believed to be a partial tear of his labrum. Sanchez said all the doctors he has met with, including noted surgeon Dr. James Andrews, are in agreement with his plan of rehabbing the injury.
“All I can say is I feel great, I’m constantly improving,” he said. “I’ll be back as soon as I can, as soon as short-term IR is over.”
Idzik danced around questions concerning Sanchez’s future with the Jets, the team’s plans the rest of the year at the quarterback position and if it were a mistake to put Sanchez in harm’s way with the backup offensive line in the Giants preseason game.
Idzik wouldn’t name Smith the starting quarterback the rest of the year, only for next Sunday at MetLife Stadium against the Bills, and said he is too focused on 2013 to worry about Sanchez’s role on the team for 2014, or anyone else’s, for that matter.
Teams are only allowed to place one player on short-term IR, and Idzik said they chose Sanchez because “He’s a quarterback. He’s a very important player to our team.”
Sanchez said he is on the same page with everyone in the organization, from coach Rex Ryan to Idzik to owner Woody Johnson, who has seemed to blame Sanchez for the injury.
“I wish he hadn’t gotten hurt, but you got to protect yourself, too,” Johnson said recently.
Sanchez said he doesn’t hold grudges, and wants to remain a Jet.
“Absolutely, I’ve been a Jet since Day 1, and I don’t plan on doing anything else,” he said.
He is more focused on helping Smith, in addition to backups Matt Simms and Brady Quinn, and getting healthy than worrying about where he will be at this time next year.
“The most important thing is the Buffalo game, and in my personal world I’m trying to get my shoulder right,” Sanchez said. “Those are the only things I think about.”
In Sanchez’s absence, Smith has started the Jets’ first two games to uneven results. He has thrown four interceptions and just one touchdown pass, but has shown glimpses of promise in leading the team to a 1-1 record.
On Thursday, Sanchez told the NFL Network on the field at Gillette Stadium, “I won the competition. There’s no doubt.”
Sanchez declined to rehash those comments on the conference call, only saying it was what he has stated from the beginning of the quarterback competition, that he believes in himself as the starter.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we get there,” Sanchez said, when asked if he should be the starter when he’s healthy. “I’m going to do everything I can to play, like I always have. I’m expecting to be the starter, I always have.”
— Additional reporting by Brian Costello