JACKSONVILLE – You are giddy. You might even be thinking of Denver, and plotting: “Well, if the Giants can beat the Broncos then the Jets …” Because you just know the Jets won’t lose Sunday. The week off only made you more sure.
And all you know about the Jacksonville Jaguars is their quarterback Mark Brunell has a bum ankle and they beat the lousy, bandaged Patriots to get here. You fully expect them to fold in the cold. You know a team from the sticks part of Florida can’t handle the Ghettolands.
Now, back to reality …
Take them lightly and they will score 40 on you. The threat the Jags pose to the Jets is real. And it comes in the form of an offense that is due for a bombing. Injuries and the discovery of a running game kept their scoring down this season. But all signs point to the end zone now.
Brunell took all of his reps in practice again yesterday. He’s telling coach Tom Coughlin to throw his ankle to the wind and open up the playbook. Against New England, the Jags used maybe a chapter, foregoing all the plays that take Brunell out of the pocket and call for his wonderfully fleet feet.
And if Brunell is truly 100 percent like he says?
The Jags are like the car: sleek, stylish and scary. “I don’t think our offense has hit on all cylinders,” said defensive tackle John Jurkovic, who likes to keep tabs on the other side of the ball. “When it is, I think it’s one of the best in the league – as good as Denver, as good as Minnesota.”
How do you argue?
Brunell, the two-time Pro Bowler, missed three full games and most of another and still threw for 2,600 yards and 20 touchdowns. He compiled the fourth-best quarterback rating in the AFC, but you don’t need a crock stat like that to show you how good he is when healthy.
And he has more weapons than an Iraqi fortress. Wide receivers Jimmy Smith and Keenan McCardell (that’s Ma-car-DELL) combined for more than 2,000 yards and 14 scoring catches.
Imagine, the Cowboys and the Eagles once cut Jimmy Smith. But that was right after Smith got a terrible infection following an appendectomy in 1993. He nearly died. He spent three months at home because he couldn’t control his bladder. He got bed sores and blood clots and lost 30 pounds. Since then, he’s been to the Pro Bowl twice.
That story was almost as frightening as the one Fred Taylor can tell. The rookie has given the Jags something they have never had: a running game. And Taylor has gotten something that people in his hometown of Belle Glades – a poor swamp town in the Florida Everglades – don’t get: out. In Belle Glades, which has the nation’s highest per capita rate of AIDS cases, Taylor was born to a 15-year-old mother. Yes, like Randy Moss, he got into trouble at home and at college (University of Florida).
But, yes, like Moss, Taylor is his conference’s top rookie. Smith went so far to call him the backbone of the offense.
“We’re not a complete offense without Fred,” Brunell said of his 1,223-yard rusher. “He’s made the difference for us.”
“This is when you need a running game,” Coughlin said. “When the weather turns in December and January and you have to play up north.”
However, Taylor, who gained 165 yards last week against the Patriots, has never played in a game below the 48 degrees it was at Vanderbilt once. The only time he ever saw snow in his life was on a recruiting trip to Michigan. “I don’t like the cold,” he said. “But when you’re out there playing, it doesn’t bother you.”
He guesses.
But you know the Jersey cold won’t bother monster tackles Tony Boselli and Leon Searcy. Little stops them from providing protection for Brunell or holes for Taylor.
You see? There are no holes on this offense. About the only thing that has worked on them this year is the blitz, which Denver and Pittsburgh used to grease victories. Smith said the Jags need a big play early to hush the crowd. Then they need to mix in Taylor.
“We haven’t played our best football game yet,” Smith said. “Hopefully, this is the week.”