SAN THE MAN! If Mark Sanchez performs like he did Sunday against the Bills, Tim Tebow and plans for the Wildcat should take a back seat and let the Jets quarterback lead the way, writes Steve Serby. (NY Post: Charles Wenzelberg)
It takes a special breed to stand in there as the New York quarterback. They don’t ask just anyone to shoot a panty-hose commercial, or host Saturday Night Live. Life hasn’t exactly been a bowl of cherries for the Jets quarterbacks who have followed Joe Namath, and it is Mark Sanchez who rides the roller coaster now.
It came too easy for him, back-to-back AFC Championship Games in his first two seasons, and then heaven became hell, and here came Tim Tebow, only because Peyton Manning didn’t want to try to become the first Jets quarterback since Namath to win a Super Bowl.
But suddenly come the first signs Sanchez is weathering the wicked New York storm. Because there he was last night at a meet-and-greet at Breitling Boutique, where he seemed to make time stand still posing for picture after picture with curiosity-seekers and well-wishers alongside a pair of Flight Crew cheerleaders, graciously signing autographs, the sizzling hot quarterback of the 1-0 Jets. Broadway Mark Sanchez, near the corner of Fifth Avenue.
“I feel confident,” Sanchez told The Post. “It feels like a short three years now, but [I’ve] been through a lifetime of emotions with the team. I’ve been through throwing an interception on the first drive, I’ve been through having bad things written about the team and franchise in the paper. I’ve been through that. It’s not that big of a deal. I think guys see that, guys see that I don’t really react to it anymore, there’s nothing really to worry about, except put your head down and keep working so hopefully it’s a good example for them, but sure, I feel great. I feel comfortable. I’m just comfortable in the guys around me.”
If Sanchez can somehow continue to play like this, if Austin Howard can somehow play like this, if Sanchez can somehow make the leap in his fourth season that Eli Manning and Tom Brady made, then Rex Ryan and Tony Sparano and the Jets should consider turning Tebow’s Wildcat into the Mildcat.
Now that the rest of the NFL is forced to prepare for Tebow’s Wildcat, there is no need for Ryan and Sparano to force feed it into the game plan, especially in those instances when Sanchez has the hot hand.
I understand how easy it is to become seduced by the Pray Hey Kid and all the intangibles he brings with him from Florida and from Denver.
But please, do not run the risk of disrupting Sanchez’s rhythm, because your team is going only as far as he can take it.
For example: Sanchez had driven the Jets from his 20 to the Buffalo 12 when Tebow was summoned to replace him on second-and-6. Tebow ran the ball for no gain, and the boobirds welcomed him to New York and New Jersey. Sanchez returned to throw a 5-yard completion to Jeremy Kerley. Field goal.
I asked Ryan yesterday if he was worried Sanchez could have his rhythm disrupted by the Wildcat in these type of circumstances.
“No. With Tim coming in, some of the Wildcat stuff that we do, I don’t believe that disrupts the rhythm of Mark,” the head coach of the undefeated Jets said.
We’ll agree to disagreeon that one.
Here’s something else that needs to change in the transition from the Wildcat to the Mildcat:
Stop splitting Sanchez wide, which makes him vulnerable to cheap-shot thuggery by bad-tempered corners or safeties. The first time Sanchez lined up as a Wildcat wide receiver, rookie Stephon Gilmore flung him to the ground. It makes absolutely no sense to expose your starting quarterback to potential injury. You know Eva Longoria hates that. Think Gisele Bundchen liked Brady’s bloody nose? At least the second time Sanchez split wide, he didn’t wind up on his back.
After all the offseason installation, you do not suddenly scrap the Wildcat just because it is a colossal flop on opening day. That would be knee-jerk folly.
But After watching Tebow throw, it should be clear the Jets will only go as far as Sanchez can take them.
“When he has time to throw the football,” Ryan said, “he can be as good as anybody.”
If that were truly the case, Tebow would be in Jacksonville, and the Jets’ braintrust wouldn’t have felt compelled to invite the Wildcat to graze on Woody Johnson’s farm in the first place. The Jets’ belief in Sanchez regressed when he regressed at the end of last season.
But either Tebow has lit a fire under Sanchez or Sanchez has lit a fire under Sanchez. There are only 32 jobs like this, and only two jobs like this in New York. Sanchez apparently won’t relinquish his without a fight.
“Just saw that confidence, and I saw it in the pregame like I’m not so sure I ever saw that before,” Ryan said. “I’ve seen him have some great pregames, but wow, he was bouncing around, and he was zipping it. I sensed that he was really feeling it, and he certainly played that way.
“I think he’s got a great grasp of this system even though it’s a brand new system. He knows opponents now. He knows what it takes to play in this league, and he’s taken off.
“I said when he came in as a rookie that one of these days he was gonna be a strength of our team,” Ryan said. “I think when you look at it now, he’s certainly playing that way.”
No one should be under any illusion Sanchez can grow into a Manning or Brady. Sanchez — 53.8, 54.8, 56.7 over his first three seasons — must get his completion percentage over 60 percent. But at the very least, it has to be considered progress he seems to be stepping up as the Jets’ leader.
“It’s the fourth year, they know that he’s working as hard as anybody, he’s studying more than anybody, his teammates recognize that,” Ryan said. “I think that makes it easier for him to lead.”
All of a sudden, it’s good to be Mark Sanchez again.