Jets vs. Rams: What to Take from New York's First Preseason Game

The New York Jets kicked off a new era in their franchise on Friday against the Rams. Hopefully ten years from now we will still have this Sanchez/Ryan era together. As of right now, everything is looking good. I'm going to be spotlighting what us fans should take out of the Jets first preseason game.


The Bad:
Vernon Gholston- It's almost like Gholston's afraid to hit. He had one nice play where he had a QB pressure, but one play in multiple series' does not get the job done. It seemed like he had a magnet in his pads to blockers, because he was stuck to them the whole game. If he wasn't making so much money and a former 6th overall pick, he would be on the outside looking in on even making the roster.

Dwight Lowery- After an impressive camp, Lowery just folded on game day. He gave up multiple catches and got beat for a 50 yard completion. As if his corner play wasn't poor enough, he also had a fumble when returning a punt. There is now talk about moving Lowery to safety because he is just too slow to play corner.

Paul Raymond- Raymond was on the Jets practice squad last season and was fighting to be there again, but his performance in the first preseason game was so bad that he was cut the very next day. Along with having no catches, despite being on the field a good amount in the second half, he also muffed a punt that cost the Jets the win.


The Good:
The Wide Receivers- All I have to say is wow. This group really surprised me. All throughout camp they had a lot about drops and were very inconsistent, but they were great in this game. All six receivers that have a shot of making the final roster (Jerricho Cotchery, Chansi Stuckey, David Clowney, Brad Smith, Wallace Wright, and Britt Davis) had at least one catch by the eight minute mark in the second quarter.

That impresses me. The routes were crisp, their hands were great, their separation was pretty good, they were a real surprise for me.

David Clowney- Yes he falls under the receivers, but he deserves his own. He had 3 catches for 103 yards and a TD in the game. Mark Sanchez's first pass thrown was a 48 yard bomb to Clowney. Later in the game he caught another deep pass in which he has the corner and safety beat by 10 yards. His other catch was in traffic over the middle.

Clowney just won the second WR job with this game. Stuckey's gonna be used like the Pats use Welker. He'll be moved around a lot for mismatches and used in the slot. Clowney is the deep threat that the Jets have lacked for a very long time. Clowney has 4.24 speed and he has game speed to go along with that track speed.

His main problem has been hands and route running, but both of them have improved this year. Last year he tore up the preseason before breaking a collarbone week three of preseason, so hopefully that doesn't happen again.


The Great:
David Harris- If Harris stays healthy this year, he'll make the Pro Bowl. His rookie year he set all kinds of tackle records as a rookie including 24 in his first game. He followed that up with 17, 15, and 19. Last year he got a groin injury in preseason and wasn't the same. He missed five games with the groin and with an ankle sprain so his production wasn't as good.

Now in his third year he looks MUCH faster than ever before. He's always the Jets most sure tackler, and this year he's gonna be playing a role in Rex Ryan's D that puts up the most tackle stats. He'll have a better statistical season than Bart Scott, and the fans look at stats, so Harris should book his ticket to Hawaii.

Secondary Blitzes- The very first defensive play of the game, the Jets brought Calvin Pace, followed by Jim Leonhard, and three guys got in clean for an easy sack. They also had a corner blitz by Donald Strickland for a sack and Kerry Rhodes blitzed and forced a sack.

We only used it three times just to give the fans a taste of what the season will be like. But the taste they gave us worked three out of three times and all three were easy sacks. This is definitely something that Jets fans are not used to.

Brian Schottenheimer- The old Schotty is back! Last year watching Jets games with my Dad, we could call out whether it was a run or pass and which side of the field it was going to at least 90 percent of the time. If we could do that, imagine how easy it was for NFL coordinators. It was the most predictable offense in the NFL.

I was hoping that was because he was trapped under Mangini because of Favre, like Schotty said. Well now we know that the 2006 Schottenheimer is back. I loved his play calling this game. The first pass for Sanchez, he calls a deep pass to David Clowney.

Also the Jets ran a reverse to Brad Smith which went for 28 yards before Smith was tripped up by the ankles by the last guy between Smith and the endzone. The whole game I was very impressed with the play calling.

Dustin Keller- Looking at the 2009 Dustin Keller, I almost didn't recognize him. He is so much bigger, stronger, and faster than his rookie season last year.

In the game he had three catches (one from Clemens, two from Sanchez), but he was getting wide open, breaking tackles, everything. He looks 100 times bigger, faster, stronger, and better than he did last year.

I am guaranteeing this, Dustin Keller is going to lead the Jets in receptions and he'll have a minimum of 75 catches.

-Other greats were Calvin Pace who looked much better than last year, the Jets are going to really miss him in the 1st four games. The two safeties, Jim Leonhard and Kerry Rhodes, also did a good job, especially blitzing. Shonn Greene was also impressive, rushing for 45 yards on nine carries behind no offensive line.


The Excellent:
Mark Sanchez- What a pleasant surprise Sanchez was! I wasn't expecting much from him in his first preseason game, but he looked in control of the game. The first pass of his career he did a perfect job of looking off the safety and holding him there, then he threw a perfectly placed deep pass to David Clowney along the sideline.

Many people say he won this starting job after one pass. But Sanchez didn't stop there. He then hit Dustin Keller twice with passes that were right on the money on his way to leading a TD drive in his only series.

Rex Ryan- Rex is the perfect coach for this team. He is also the best thing to happen to this Jets team. The Jets look a lot more hungry, less methodical, faster, more creative, etc, this season. You can tell all the players want to play for Rex also. This is a whole new team with a real positive outlook on this season.

The first string Defense- The first string D only gave up three points in three series and those three points were because of Clemens fumbling. After the fumble, the Rams actually lost yards on that series.

The whole defense dominated. The blitzing was awesome, everyone was getting in clean. The tackling was much better, it was four or five guys swarming to the ball to bring the carrier down instead of the normal one or two.

The speed and intensity of the D was very high as well. And the best part, they were this dominant without their two best defensive players, Darrelle Revis and Kris Jenkins.

Overall Performance- The Jets looked much better than I expected. The running game did nothing, but I expected that with Alan Faneca, Nick Mangold, and Damien Woody all not playing.

This Jets team will be a Jets team that nobody is used to. They will be a completely different team from years past. Whether they do well or not there is one this for sure, these Jets will not disappoint in the excitement category this year.