NFL Monday Night Must-Win Game: Yes New York Jets Fans, It's That Time Already

It was not supposed to be like this.

Even if you didn't like the Jets or their head coach Rex Ryan, the New York Jets were not supposed to get to their first Monday Night game of the season in Week 6 and face a "must win" situation. 

That's exactly where they are though.

A loss on Monday Night to the Miami Dolphins would drop the New York Jets to a record of 2-4. This would be a major problem because even if the two teams they currently trail in the AFC East were to lose this weekend, the Jets would still be two full games behind two teams.

Add in the fact that they are already 0-1 in a head-to-head matchup with one of those two teams, the New England Patriots, and this Monday Night's game against the Miami Dolphins has gone from a game that most people thought the Jets would win easily when the season started, to a game that the Jets must win or else face a tremendous uphill battle just to reach the postseason.

Let's be clear though. The Jets probably will win this game.

There aren't too many teams in the NFL in the midst of more hopeless seasons than the 0-4 Miami Dolphins. Quarterback Chad Henne was at best a questionable NFL starter when the season began. His season-ending injury means that the Dolphins will be going with Matt Moore as the starting quarterback—at least until they can pull off a trade.

This is a Dolphins team that seems destined for a truly forgettable season, unless they end up 0-16, in which case they will be remembered for all the wrong reasons. With such a long and hopeless season staring this team in the face, their opponents must be cautious not to fall prey to taking the Dolphins for granted.

Any win over a divisional opponent or a playoff team could serve as this season's highlight. Teams like the Jets and Patriots must be especially wary of this. Even with the Jets on a losing streak, the teams they have lost to are all solid teams—Oakland, Baltimore and New England all on the road.

That's a tough schedule for anyone, but the Jets must have thought they'd win at the very least one of those three games. 

What could possibly lead to a Dolphins win over the Jets on Monday? They need only to look in the mirror.

Only the Jets can beat the Jets this coming Monday, and much to their fans' dismay the team appears hard at work setting the stage for a potential embarrassment.

It's not just that the Jets are in the midst of a three game losing streak. It's that the "team" aspect of this Jets team seems to be splintering before our very eyes.

Sometimes teams have internal problems and still rally around each other come game day. We'll all find out if that's the path the Jets are going to follow this Monday.

One thing is certain: This team has some internal problems and their coach—who seems to be in the middle of the quietest regular season week of his career—can clearly sense the crisis that swirls around him. 

When Rex Ryan took over the Jets, he took full advantage of the long tradition of losing, and got the team to rally around their perennial underdog label. That label is gone now and in it's place are these annoying little things called expectations: same game, many of the same players and coaches, but a different set of standards.

It's all the same and yet it all seems a bit foreign to these Jets.

They are a team of flamboyant and flashy players with a number of outspoken players. The Jets have been waging a war as of late not against their opponents but against each other. 

The receivers blame the offensive line and the offensive line thinks the receivers should shut up. The young quarterback supposedly being groomed as a future star sounds and looks like a child caught in a custody battle.

Does he love Mommy or Daddy more?

Is Sanchez aligned with the receivers he depends on to run the routes and catch the passes, or the big offensive linemen who he depends on to protect him from his real football enemies— the 300-plus pound defensive lineman who are looking to throw him to the ground on every play? 

It's a situation that demands leadership, and so far this week the Jets and their fans have not seen much of it from their normally outspoken coach Rex Ryan. In fact, no one really knows what's going on with this Jets team right now.

Are the problems rooted in the players they have or those they lost in the offseason? Gone are Jerricho Cotchery, Kris Jenkins, Damien Woody, Shaun Ellis and Tony Richardson. 

The argument could be made that those players were all past their primes, or demanded too much money. That may be true, but it's also clear that those players may have held more in the way of leadership internally than most people on the outside ever knew.

Can that leadership be replaced? Yes it can, but the time where that must happen is growing nearer and nearer. Can the Jets get not just their on-field play in order to salvage this season, but also fill the clear leadership void in the locker room? 

We're going to find out a lot about the Jets this Monday and the Jets may learn a lot about themselves as well.