Tannenbaum Miscalculates Team's Quarterback Situation

Mike Tannenbaum loves to be bold when it comes to making moves for the Jets.

He has done that in his first few years as the Jets general manager, whether it's tampering to get an elite receiver or making a trade to get that big name to run an offense.

A good example of that came in the NFL Draft this year when Tannenbaum made a trade with Eric Mangini's Browns that moved the Jets up in the draft, and that's where he used that pick to draft Mark Sanchez.

It was a brilliant move since the Jets selected a quarterback they can build around for the next 10 years.

With that said, one wonders if it was a right move to have Sanchez start right away.

No one questioned that in September when the team played well to the point Sanchez was called the Sanchise.

But now, it's easy for everyone to question it.

Fans should have tempered their excitement by realizing that rookies go through slumps. The Jets also always seem to be under Murphy's Law which everything always goes wrong for them going back to their star-crossed history.

That's the case with Sanchez these last few weeks, and one wonders why the Jets failed to get a competent quarterback that could give them a chance to succeed while the rookie quarterback learned slowly on the job.

A guy like Jon Kitna or Derek Anderson would have made sense. Either one could have been handy in today's Jets' 34-13 loss to the Patriots.

The Patriots did okay, but the game could have been winnable for the Jets with a competent quarterback. The Jets knew what it was like to have that quarterback last year with Brett Favre, but the team's failures took the life out of him in the end and the team was happy to see him move on.

Sanchez played horrible for the entire game. He threw four interceptions, increasing  his total to 16 interceptions this season. Sanchez also failed to move his team to  Patriots' territory.

Rex Ryan should have made a quarterback change in the middle of the third quarter for the sake of creating a spark for his struggling team. Kellen Clemens may not be the answer, but it can't get any worse.

Ryan owed it to the team to see what Clemens can do in this type of situation.

It says something about the lack of depth the Jets posses at quarterback when the Jets head coach settled on Sanchez instead of Clemens and Erik Ainge in training camp.

This falls on Tannenbaum for not giving Sanchez an opportunity to earn his starting job. Someone needed to push the former USC quarterback, and that's why Mr. T should have worked hard to find that quarterback that would keep this team afloat when a rookie goes through his struggles.

If the team was going to contend for a playoff spot, then maybe Clemens would be the way to go.  Now, Ryan has no choice but to let his beleaguered quarterback figure out how to overcome his struggles.

The Jets need to hope that Sanchez does not completely lose his confidence for the rest of his career.

It's doubtful this will happen to a guy with his arm, physique, and football intelligence. But if that ever happens, the Jets will have no one to blame but themselves for putting  the kid in a position to fail.