THERE is absolutely no chance that Bill Belichick will let complacency seep into his CIA compound, and he’s masterfully using Spygate as a means to whip his players into a How-Dare-They-Question-Our-Legacy frenzy, and the sweet smell of a championship and the right arm of Tom Brady has transformed Randy Moss into a model citizen/unstoppable nuclear weapon. The Pats are in a league of their own even without Richard Seymour and Rodney Harrison.
But even as Belichick inevitably recoils at annoying mentions of a possible Perfect Season, even as long-suffering Jet fans and realistic experts wonder if it will take a catastrophic Brady injury to derail the New England Express, Eric Mangini and the Jets are not about to abandon their sights at the division title and settle for any AFC wild-card berth.
“If you’re an athlete,” Laveranues Coles was saying yesterday, “that’s quitting.”
They may not be the best 1-2 team in football, but they conceded nothing to anyone a year ago, when they were presumed to be doormats, and they concede nothing now.
“Look at the weapons on this team, I mean the names, and the people,” Coles said. “We’ve been in just about every game we played except for the first one [against the Patriots]. Because they’ve beaten everybody so badly, everybody thinks they’re probably the best team in football, the New England Patriots, so . . . We got a good team. People respect us. You watch us on film; we play physical, play hard . . . you gotta respect the fact that we’re a solid football team.”
What will make the Jets a tougher out, once Gang Green figures out how to stop a screen pass and sack the quarterback, is Thomas Jones.
“It helps open things up in the passing game for us with him running the ball the way he has; they won’t be able to sit in two-safety defenses all the time,” Coles said.
Moss has been the single best offseason acquisition in the NFL. If Jones can close the gap on Moss, if Jones can help make Chad Pennington’s play-action game deadlier, the Jets can close the gap on the Patriots.
“I thought we did well the second half, the offensive linemen wore ’em down and gave us some creases to run through, me and Leon [Washington]; the receivers did a really good job of blocking downfield getting some of their defensive backs blocked to give us some more room,” Jones said.
He was 19-92 rushing in the second half against the Dolphins, and 25-110 overall, and if he can get 1,200 yards without the help of Pete Kendall, the Jets will have every right to consider themselves a legitimate playoff team. Mangini seems content on allowing Washington [7-18 rushing] to kill the body and watch the head die at Jones’ sweet feet.
“That’s been my history. I get stronger the more carries I get over the course of the game, but I’m not one of the coaches, I don’t make those decisions,” Jones said.
He is a 215-pound weather-proof tank who can get you the tough inside yards with a hop-step that enables him to cut on a dime, and he can turn the corner on you as well. After two pedestrian weeks against the Pats and Ravens, Jones was feeling it against the Fish and the force of his will infected his new teammates.
“You start to get a feel for the game, and you get a feel for how the defense is playing, and then you’re able to kind of instinctively do some more things,” Jones said.
The Jets pounded the ball 11 straight times on the ground to open the second half, and Jones was playing smash-mouth on eight of those occasions.
“It helps to wear the defense down and gives the offensive line to kinda get in a groove just as well as it does for the running backs to help us get in a groove,” Jones said.
He even trotted out a nasty stiff-arm. “I saw the corner coming up on me, and I ran out of room to give him a move on the sideline, so I really was trying to protect myself in case he went to my legs,” Jones said.
Legs that never will stop chasing the Patriots.