Mark Sanchez doesn’t have to be Tom Brady for the Jets to beat Brady and the Patriots Sunday in New England.
He has, after all, done something Brady hasn’t done the last two years by simply being himself — lead his team to the AFC Championship Game.
Yes, it’s true, Sanchez looked small last Sunday night in Baltimore and he needs to play big at Gillette Stadium, Brady’s house, where the Patriots have won 29 consecutive regular-season games with Brady starting.
If he doesn’t, the Jets’ spiral from 2-0 and Super Bowl bound will continue and they will be in the throes of a full crisis with a three-game road losing streak and a 2-3 record, and will be two-plus games behind the Patriots in the AFC East.
But Sanchez doesn’t need to produce Brady numbers for the Jets to win. He simply needs to play the solid, efficient, low-mistake football he has played against them in the Jets’ three wins the last two seasons.
If you have any question about how much the Jets’ success against the Patriots is tied to Sanchez’s performance, check these numbers out:
* In the Jets’ three wins over the Patriots in the last two seasons, Sanchez has completed 71.4 percent of his passes and thrown seven touchdowns and no interceptions.
* In the two losses during that span, Sanchez’s completion percentage is 46.3 percent and he has thrown one touchdown and seven interceptions.
There were plenty of reasons Sanchez looked overwhelmed and overmatched in Baltimore, beginning with the porous offensive line.
The Jets’ offensive line, which expects to have starting center Nick Mangold back after he missed two games with a sprained ankle, never gave Sanchez a chance and the result was his 11-for-35 performance with four turnovers leading to 24 points scored by the Ravens.
That, in turn, has resulted in the what-have-you-done-for-me-lately sports radio culture to lash out at Sanchez this week, with fans dismissing him as if he has never won a big game for the Jets and will never amount to anything.
Former Giants quarterback Phil Simms, who will call the Jets-Patriots game for CBS on Sunday, is confounded about the flood of negativity that follows Sanchez.
“He’s been in two AFC Championship games in his first two years,” Simms said yesterday. “I’m amazed there are certain guys in the NFL — like Sanchez — that take so much heat. I don’t get it. If I’d have gone to championship game my first two years, my God, I’d have probably said, ‘Here’s my contract. I need more.’
“The offseason talk perpetuates the story,” Simms added. “It’s ‘Can Mark Sanchez make the next step?’ Or, ‘He needs to raise his completion percentage.’ What do we want? After Michael Vick threw an interception on the last drive when [the Eagles] could have beaten the Packers [in the playoffs last year], I didn’t hear one word about how Michael Vick didn’t do it in the clutch.
“If Sanchez did that, the nation would be trying to run him out of New York.”
Simms said of the Ravens game: “To look at that game and to make any judgment about his ability is absurd. He had no chance. He went 11 for 35 and when it was over I went, ‘Hell, I don’t know how he hit 11.’ ”
Jets veteran backup Mark Brunell, who’s an invaluable sounding board for Sanchez, said: “If he goes out and has the game we expect him to have against the Patriots and we win the game, then all this stuff that’s being said right now is completely forgotten and he’s the greatest thing since sliced bread.”
Sanchez is not a put-the-team-on-his-shoulders-and-carry-it type of quarterback the way Brady can be. Because he’s probably never going to lead the NFL in all the flashy statistics and be one of the highest-rated quarterbacks in the league, Sanchez is always going to fight the fluctuating perception of how good he really is.
Another win over the Patriots Sunday will give you a pretty good idea about that — regardless of what the stat sheet tells you. That’s all that should matter.