NFL

Victory would validate brash talkin’ from Rex

You want to know why Rex Ryan is good for the Jets, good for football, good for New York City? You want to know why we need his kind of outlook, approach, philosophy and feistiness to work — specifically, why we need it all to work this Sunday, when the Jets face the Bengals with a playoff berth hanging in the balance?

Well, there are a lot of reasons.

Here’s one. Here’s Braylon Edwards, speaking about the concerns of Jets fans who are so often wary of prosperity, who are always waiting for the other shoe to slam down on top of them like an anvil falling from atop the Chrysler Building:

“We won’t lose this game,” Edwards said yesterday as matter-of-factly as if he were saying, “I wear No. 17 on the front of my uniform jersey.”

“We want it too bad. You can just talk to guys and get a feel. If you listen to Rex’s conviction when he talks to us, guys are serious about winning this game.”

Think about that for a second. Forget that Edwards all but delivered a guarantee straight out of the Namath-Messier-Ewing template. Look who he cites as one of the very inspirations for feeling that way: Rex Ryan himself.

Think about the way 99.879 percent of coaches everywhere would respond to such easy bulletin-board fodder. Good Lord, just think what the veins on Eric Mangini’s neck would look like if someone had said this quote this time last year, or even how red-faced Tom Coughlin would get if one of his Giants decided to do it.

But this is who Ryan is, who he’s been from the start, when he was talking about shaking President Obama’s hand with a Super Bowl ring on his finger, how he said in various ways he wouldn’t kow-tow to Bill Belichick, how he coaxed and goaded fans to come out and be loud, how he cried when things went poorly, how he crowed when things went well . . .

And, not for nothing, he looks like he might really be a hell of a coach, too.

“You can see how much it means to him to be the coach of this team,” said Bart Scott, who played for Ryan in Baltimore and followed him to New York. “You can tell how much he appreciates having a chance to coach us, and to coach here. He’s a genuine guy, man. You want to play for a guy like that.”

They must play for him Sunday, and play hard, and qualify for the playoffs, because coaches must be reminded that they are allowed to be human, that they’re allowed to have opinions, to laugh and cry and crack jokes and exude confidence. There was a time, not so long ago, when New York was overrun by coaches and managers who not only reveled in the job, but in all the job entailed.

In one corner of town you had Pat Riley, looking like he just stepped off the Armani truck. You had Bill Parcells conducting must-see press conferences, and Joe Torre telling stories about Spahnnie and Gibby and Knucksy, and Bobby Valentine explaining arcane baseball strategy, even Byron Scott leading with his chin over in Jersey. And here’s the thing: Yeah, they all might have been interesting guys, but they all won, too. A lot.

Suddenly, it seems blander is better. Jerry Manuel and Joe Girardi are exceedingly pleasant men. So is Mike D’Antoni, and Tom Coughlin, though it’s unlikely either tells a lot of knock-knock jokes. And they are all . . . well, they’re all sort of beige.

Ryan? He’s anti-beige. He’s loud, he’s proud. He has a gut that looks like he’d be familiar with a tailgate gathering, a self-confidence that all but bellows “New Bleepin’ York!” There are a lot of reasons to hope the dominoes keep falling properly for the Jets. Justifying Rex Ryan’s ways may not be the biggest one. But it’s a good one.

michael.vaccaro@nypost.com