Two hours and 40 minutes in the hot sun wasn’t enough — not after this practice.
When an underwhelming workout was over Wednesday, the Jets ran sprints — punishment for what coach Todd Bowles described as a “sloppy” day — one full of penalties, dropped passes, missed blocks and a lack of focus. Even worse, it came after an off day. There were no excuses given.
“We weren’t ready,” wide receiver Quincy Enunwa said. “It’s frustrating as hell. I can’t lie about that. I know I was frustrated. … I hate to say we’re young because we’re all smart enough to know you’re coming off an off day, you have to come in with laser focus.”
As is his way, Bowles downplayed his disappointment.
“We’re trying to get in shape,” he said about the post-practice sprints.
But this was the first time in camp the Jets have run after practice, and multiple players, led by Enunwa, said it was a poor showing that warranted the extra running.
“Everybody was [upset],” Enunwa said.
“I think as a team we were sloppy. You expect that [at times in training camp], but you [have] to pick it up a little bit,” Bowles said. “They practiced hard. We have to practice smart. They did some good things on offense in individual [drills], they did some good things on defense in the team period. We’ll watch some film, try to get better tomorrow.”
The offense was especially poor. The offensive line allowed constant pressure. There were dropped passes all over the field, two apiece by starting wide receivers Robby Anderson and Enunwa, and the quarterback trio of Josh McCown, Christian Hackenberg and Bryce Petty hardly distinguished themselves, frequently missing open targets. Players ran laps for committing penalties most of the afternoon.
“You got to learn from today, and know next time you got to really focus,” said Enunwa, who said he thought a lot of his teammates weren’t prepared because they “probably relaxed” on the off day.
Though the defense looked good by comparison, producing 10 sacks in 11-on-11 team drills, defensive tackle Leonard Williams didn’t praise his unit either.
“[It] was a little more down than days we’ve been having,” Williams said.
Bowles attributed the high sack totals to working on some new blocking packages with different players, not necessarily a dominant day from the defense. Enunwa echoed Bowles, saying Thursday was a big install day for the offense.
“Coach Bowles said we had a sluggish day, and I agree,” Williams said. “We learn from our mistakes. After our next off day, we’ll know to start faster. It just wasn’t up to our standards.”
Several Jets said they hoped this practice would be a lesson learned — about how to properly use an off day, and how to respond when facing adversity. Still, for a young team with several positions up for grabs, and a group predicted to be one of the worst teams in the league, it was eye-opening. This was just the fifth practice of camp.
“It wasn’t as productive as we needed it to be. It wasn’t efficient,” offensive tackle Kelvin Beachum said. “There were too many wasted plays, too many penalties on both sides of the ball. We can’t have that if we want to be the team that we’re out to be.
“You have those dog days, but you have to find a way to push through it. We didn’t do that today. We have to find a way to make it right, find a way to bring everybody together and really get practice on par and in the right direction like it needs to be for us to win games on a consistent basis.”
— Additional reporting by Brian Costello