It isn’t easy for a man who goes 6-foot-2, 225 pounds to disappear into his business suit, but that sure looked to be Mark Sanchez’s plan late yesterday afternoon, hustling out the stadium door, a few steps behind Woody Johnson, happy to let the owner run interference for him.
Dragging a roller bag behind him, his head down, Sanchez was practically at the door before anyone realized who he was.
“Mark!” yelled a beautiful woman wearing a green No. 6 jersey. “At least I still love you!”
If that was any consolation to Sanchez, he didn’t show it, ducking out the door, heading toward the players’ parking lot, vanishing from MetLife Stadium in a way the 65,000 or so Jets fans who’d made the pilgrimage yesterday would like to see permanently, judging on much of the editorializing that trailed Sanchez across this blightful 7-6 victory over the Cardinals.
“Just not my day,” Sanchez had said earlier, and if you were looking for deeper, more meaningful self-analysis than that, you were going to have to look elsewhere.
Sanchez’s first pass attempt was picked off. So were two of his next seven. By the time he was yanked, it was as much a move of mercy as punishment.
“I didn’t throw it well,” Sanchez said.
No, he didn’t, and by the end the people were chanting for Greg McElroy as if he were Douglas MacArthur, they wildly cheered when McElroy pulled a helmet over his head, then went ballistic when Sanchez swapped his helmet for a cap, a clipboard and an earpiece.
And then, of course, McElroy promptly drove the Jets 69 yards in 10 plays, charged the crowd again when he put his head down and drew a late-hit call, and sent it into orbit with a 1-yard flip pass to Jeff Cumberland for the team’s only points of the day.
Through all of this, Sanchez charted plays and made sure his stoic glare couldn’t be misinterpreted for pouting. Later, at Sanchez’s locker, Rex Ryan put an arm around his shoulder, locked in a long, intense conversation.
“Keep your head up,” was the message Ryan copped to.
The best way for that to happen, of course, is for Ryan to announce as quickly as possible that Sanchez will start again next weekend in Jacksonville. That might be a wildly unpopular decision — McElroy surely would be declared the people’s choice to play next week with Tim Tebow backing him up — but it’s really the only decision Ryan can make.
Look: Nobody is going to diminish what McElroy did yesterday. His teammates admitted his presence focused them, anchored them, maybe sharpened their concentration. Blocks seemed crisper, runs harder. Stephen Hill, who’s dropped more Sanchez calls than AT&T this year, suddenly had sticky fingers when McElroy threw his way. In a depressing season, McElroy was a welcome beacon of hope.
But if that’s how it’s going to be, if McElroy or his old SEC rival Tim Tebow is named the starter next week, if Sanchez is put on clipboard duty permanently, then what the Jets will be announcing is something other than a quarterback switch. It will be a declaration that one era is ending and another beginning — one the men currently in charge may never see.
Is Sanchez salvageable? That’s the hard question the Jets need to ask themselves now. If you have reached the point where you speak of him in the past tense then by all means: Go with the righty/lefty Crimson Tide/Gators combo of McElroy and Tebow.
But if you still cling to the belief that Sanchez is a work-in-progress and not an abject failure — if it wasn’t an accident that McElroy, the third-stringer, wasn’t even active until yesterday — you keep giving him the ball and hope he works through his issues. The Jets have an awful lot invested in Sanchez through next year. For him to become dead weight — and dead cap money — would be a significant blow.
“We all still love Mark,” guard Matt Slauson said. “And we still believe in him.”
That was certainly a stronger endorsement than Ryan was willing to give, the coach unwilling to repeat his mantra that Sanchez gives the Jets the best chance to beat the Jaguars next week. Maybe he’s a doubter, too. Maybe he’s as charmed as the fans by McElroy’s victory yesterday.
But he shouldn’t forget the 35 wins Sanchez already has in the bank, either. Not unless he’s prepared to lose him forever.
mike.vaccaro@nypost.com