So this is what it looks like when the best player on the field, best player on the Jets roster, is fully engaged, fully challenged, treated as a football player and not a museum piece. So many weeks, you can go whole quarters, whole halves, and never hear an announcer say the words “Darrelle Revis.”
Not this time. Not this week.
“I knew what was coming,” Revis said. “When you have a great receiver and a great cornerback, the ball’s going to be thrown that way. That’s how it’s supposed to be.”
So Matt Moore, kid quarterback, started throwing toward his best player, Brandon Marshall, even though Revis was covering him on almost every down.
Third Miami play from scrimmage? Moore to Marshall for 8 yards, just shy of the first-down stick, Revis on the coverage.
Second-and-five on their next possession? Moore to Marshall for 20 yards, Revis on the coverage, Marshall maybe getting away with a shove, a star’s non-call. It shouldn’t be surprising; Revis Island exists because quarterbacks go out of their way not to throw Revis’ way. Matt Moore threw his way.
Good for him.
Bad for him.
“They wanted to attack him,” Jets guard Brandon Moore would say later. “But you run a risk when you do that.”
Revis saved a touchdown when Matt Moore searched out Marshall at the end of that drive. Moore was unbowed. The Jets fumbled the kickoff after Dan Carpenter’s field goal put the Dolphins up 3-0. Miami was set up. Third-and-seven at the Jets’ 15, Revis bumped Marshall, slowed him, and Marshall seemed sluggish getting back in the play.
Moore looked for him anyway.
Revis, at the goal line, may have added an extra nudge. He also got a star’s non-call. And suddenly he also had a football in his hands. And something else.
Suddenly, Revis had the Jets’ season in his hands. Suddenly, a MetLife Stadium crowd of 78,912, all of them more ornery than Lewis Black, all of them fearful the woeful Dolphins were fixing to bury the Jets a little deeper in the muck, rose and screamed and whistled and roared. It wasn’t going to be 6-0 Dolphins, wasn’t going to be 10-0 Dolphins.
It was about to be 7-3 Jets on the way to 24-6, on the way to a victory that doesn’t elevate near as much as a loss would have decimated, but will do just fine for now. All because Revis, engaged and challenged, targeted in a way he’s almost never targeted, made a play when the Jets were desperate for a play.
“You’re taught to head for the nearest sideline when you pick one off,” Revis said. “But I looked up, saw there were a couple of Dolphins heading for the sidelines, so I made a move inside. And when I did, you could’ve driven an 18-wheeler the rest of the way.”
He backpedaled the last few steps, crossed his arms, drank in the adulation of a mob that was frantic for something to feel good about. If he could have looked under his teammates’ facemasks, under their jerseys, he would’ve seen something else, too: instant gratitude.
“That play boosted our confidence,” LaDainian Tomlinson said. “It made everyone relax.”
“He made them pay,” Brandon Moore said.
Sure, we can talk about the Dolphins, about how brutal they looked behind their backup quarterback, about how terrible their defense is, about how they have clearly entered themselves into the league-wide sweepstakes for Andrew Luck. They are now 0-5 on merit.
But they will win a few games this year. And if they get to 10-0 last night, there’s no underestimating how dark the place loomed where the Jets were headed. In the opening minutes of the season, it was Tony Romo who decided to sample the accommodations on Revis Island, and Revis picked him off and set up a game-winning field goal.
Now it was Matt Moore’s turn.
“It was kind of a feel thing,” Moore said. “I felt comfortable going there.”
Revis, grateful for the workout, returned the favor the best way he knew how: one game-changing interception, one game-clinching one. One season-saving performance by the best player on the field, shedding mothballs and grabbing footballs.
Quite a night. Quite a player.
michael.vaccaro@nypost.com