NFL

JETS STINK, BUT SURVIVE LOWLY CHIEFS

No disrespect intended, but the Jets stunk today.

Yes, even in a 28-24 comeback victory over the lowly Chiefs at Giants Stadium, they stunk. You know it. They know it. The Chiefs know it. We all know it.

How ironic that this putrid performance came against their former head coach, Herman Edwards, who’s known best for his infamous “You-play-to-win-the-game” passion rant in 2002 when he was coaching the Jets. Because the Jets spent an alarming portion of this game seemingly playing to lose the game against Edwards’ depleted Chiefs.

Sure, the Jets are now 4-3 and sure they’ll be playing the 5-2 Bills Sunday in Buffalo for a possible chance to finish the day with a share of first place in the AFC East. But, blindly thinking like that is masking the litany of problems that nearly cost the Jets a win.

“We’ve got to respect everybody,” Jets LB David Bowens said. “It just seemed like we didn’t give them any respect. I don’t know if it was their record (1-5 entering the game) or what, but whatever it was we just came out flat.

“We didn’t play the way we practiced. We practiced hard all week.”

The Jets survived this mess when Brett Favre (28-40, 290 yards, 2 TDs, 3 INTs) connected with Laveranues Coles on a 15-yard TD pass with a minute remaining in the game. That means they were life-and-death to the end, losing to a Chiefs team that was playing with its third-string QB, Tyler Thigpen, and down to its third-string RB, Kolby Smith.

Why? Because Favre threw three interceptions, one of which was returned 91 yards for a TD that gave the Chiefs a 24-21 lead with 7:48 remaining in the game. Because their defense could not contain Thigpen, who lit them up for 280 passing yards and 2 TDs and ran for another 20. Because their offensive coordinator, Brian Schottenheimer, inexplicably continues to outsmart himself – flat-out refusing to ride Thomas Jones and establish the run against a Chiefs’ run defense that entered the game ranked 32nd (that’s last) in the NFL.

It was as if Schottenheimer woke up in a cold sweat this morning and thought he saw Dick Butkus, Jack Lambert and Jack Ham playing linebacker for the Chiefs and abandoned the running game. Jones was coming off of a 159-yard rushing day last Sunday against the Raiders, his career-high as a Jet, and was second in the AFC in rushing yards. Yet there he was with only five carries in the first half.

Inexcusable.

Play to win the game.

When several players on offense were asked about this freaky strategy, the question was met with a lot of eye rolling and shrugged shoulders.

“Believe me, we’re thinking the same thing you’re thinking,” one player said.

“I know the stats,” Jets RT Damien Woody said. “We look at them just like you guys do.”

Apparently, Schottenheimer, who isn’t permitted to talk to reporters after games, doesn’t look at them.

When Eric Mangini was asked about the lack of commitment to the running game, he said vaguely, “We looked at different things we liked and went with those things. We thought we had real good opportunities in the passing game.”

In the end, though, the Jets gave the Chiefs real good opportunities with their passing game. On the positive side, there were some terrific individual performances that allowed the Jets to survive themselves.

Leon Washington scored on a 60-yard run and 18-yard catch and his 37-yard punt return set up the game-winning TD. Laveranues Coles, fresh off a concussion last week, caught the game-winning TD. Jerricho Cotchery, nursing a shoulder injury all week, caught 9 passes for 102 yards. But this game should never have been the stress fest it became.

“Ideally, we don’t want to make it that close against a team like that,” Jets LB Calvin Pace said. “We’ve got to play so much better than that to get where we want to be. I’m very dissatisfied, because when you’ve got the players you’ve got to do better than that. That game against that team should have never come down to the last drive.

“We’ve got to get that mentality that it doesn’t have to always be close. We don’t have to keep having these ESPN Classic games.”

This is how Jets’ S Kerry Rhodes assessed the day: “It was very bad, very ugly, but the outcome was good.”