Maybe Santonio Holmes was distracted by the Flight Crew cheerleaders dressed in scandalous Santa outfits. Maybe it was karmic payback for his outrageous celebrations of first-down catches even when his team is behind.
Maybe the football was slippery from the driving rainstorm that drowned the swamps of Jersey. Maybe Holmes was just due to play the goat after serving as hero so many times this season.
Whatever the reason, Holmes let the Jets’ best chance for a touchdown yesterday slip through his usually reliable hands when he was wide open in the end zone late in the second quarter and Mark Sanchez made his best throw of the game to put the ball right on the money.
“There is no explanation for it,” Holmes said. “Unexcusable. No excuses. Dropped the ball. Simple as that. I’ll make up for it next time.”
Nick Folk’s 35-yard field goal on the next play cut the Dolphins’ lead to 10-3 with 4:33 left in the second quarter, and the 78,948 drenched fans at New Meadowlands Stadium settled back into their seats, silently acknowledging their team with Super Bowl aspirations was floundering.
The silence turned to boos as the rest of Dolphins 10, Jets 6 played out.
Three plays before Holmes’ bungle, he made his first catch of the afternoon for a first down, which he celebrated despite trailing 10-0 at home to the third-place Dolphins (7-6) with the Jets’ (9-4) offense in the midst of its seventh straight quarter without a touchdown.
By game’s end, the Jets had failed to score an offensive touchdown in nine straight quarters, and saw their record at home drop to a troubling 4-3.
“I know ‘Tone will be the first guy in the building ready to work [this] week,” Sanchez said. “He’s a fighter. He’s a winner.”
Holmes, who served a four-game suspension to open the season for violating the NFL’s substance abuse policy, finished with two receptions for 57 yards. He did little in his punt-return duties to make up for the crushing gaffe. He returned three punts for an average of 10.7 yards with a long of 14 yards.
Holmes has made several clutch catches this season, including game-winning touchdown grabs in back-to-back games against the Browns and Texans in November.
“It’s not an easy game,” LaDainian Tomlinson said. “I bet that won’t happen again to him.”