On Purpose and T-Shirts

What more can be said about Sunday? Everything’s pretty much been said. The cagey guys wind up picking the favorites, either Green Bay or the Steelers, and maybe half of the remainder (the non-cagey ones) find some reason to bet on the other two, the Bears and Jets.

Current Vegas Lines for both are 3 ½ points, interesting if only because the Bears are home dogs. That means Vegas thinks the Pack is actually a TD better than the Bears. But they’ll play harder and smarter because they’re home. So they won’t lose by the full touchdown but they’ll still manage to just lose.

Vegas figures the Jets and Steelers are dead even, but since the Steelers get turned on by terrible towels and what-not, they figure the Steelers will be able to eke one out with a field goal (and more) to spare.

Talk about oversimplifying! All I know is that there’re about 90 players sitting home and an equal number recovering from a plane ride to either Chicago or Pittsburgh. (Anybody who’s driven to Pittsburgh knows it’s a 7-hour ride). And they’re all thinking individually about what they’re going to do in this game.

The better players will be thinking about the game. Guys like Polamalu, for one example, will be thinking about the talent on the other side, what they’re likely to run, and what he can do to stop it.

Polamalu’s probably visualizing doing it, whatever it might be. For him, a fumble recovery, an interception, a big run stuff on a crucial third and one….it’s all in a day’s work. He’ll want to look fearsome in his uniform and maybe even wonder how his hair will fall over his shoulder pads.

As for the run-of-the-mill players, some of them will be thinking of the same kinds of things Polamalu thinks about. They’ll be the difference-makers in a game such as the AFC Championship Game. The others, the players thinking about their next back flip, for example, they’ll be the ones making the big mistake. At best they’ll be invisible.

Oh, there are always one or two who are so super-talented that it really doesn’t matter what they think about. They’ll somehow manage on athletic ability alone, that plus a huge concern for their future value as players.

And that might be the biggest motivator of them all. The Jets have several players in the same boat too, and they’ve all been pretty great….Holmes, Edwards and Taylor to just name a few.

I really don’t imagine that any players worry about the team’s legacy. If they did though, they’d know the Jets are tied with the Browns for the worst record in AFC Championship Games at 0-3. They’d know that the Jets are tied with the Chiefs for longest period of futility in this game, currently 41 years. They’d know the Steelers have the most appearances in this game and the most wins.

That and a couple of bucks will get them on the subway.

I don’t think any of that history would motivate me, whether I were on the good Steeler end or the horrible Jets end. Each team’s roster changes a million times over the years and each player, if he’s smart, will just worry about his particular team on this particular day, and the fellow lining up across from him.

It hasn’t mattered so far that even some of the Jets core players really don’t have contracts extending beyond this year. For example, Nick Mangold, David Harris and D’Brickashaw Ferguson could conceivably be gone next year.

But it hasn’t affected those players in a bad way. That much is for sure. Mangold has been eating people up, Harris made that key interception of Brady and D’Brickashaw just keeps on D’Stroying some pretty big and pretty fast people.

No matter what happens this Sunday, Jets fans shouldn’t count on any repeat performances. This Jets team becomes pretty moribund without LaDainian, D’Brickashaw, Mangold, Santonio, Braylon, Jason Taylor and David Harris.

Just don’t buy the tee-shirt(s). Except for Sanchez, Shonn Greene maybe, Cotchery (and I only mention him for that magnificent run and hop for about 65 total yards after it looked as if the Patriots were coming back) and perhaps a guy like Shaun Ellis, who also seemed to be growing out of Brady’s hip this past Sunday, there won’t be many tees that hold their present value.

Does any of this stuff matter? I don’t know but it might even be “advantage Jets”. If there has ever been a team assembled to win one particular game, it is this group.

I’d think that situation lends itself toward narrowing everyone’s focus, all these great players on loan, LaDainian Tomlinson, Jason Taylor, Santonio Holmes, Antonio Cromartie, Braylon Edwards…..it’d sure be a shame to squander their hopes for making it to a Super Bowl.

The Jets couldn’t cover last year, they picked up Cromartie; their receivers didn’t get open, they got Edwards and Holmes; they didn’t make enough big plays, enter Jason Taylor; and they had trouble scoring touchdowns, enter LaDainian, a regular scoring machine. Just ask any fantasy player.

Some of these Jets may have had enough money and just wanted a shot at a ring. Some of them screwed up in other venues and needed a chance to re-establish their value. They don’t necessarily see any future dollars coming in, not unless they can win just one more game.

Just one more game will get them into view on an even larger stage, the Super Bowl in Big D. Can you imagine? I’m quite sure these Jets do.

This game, unlike the Colts and Patriots victories, won’t be decided by any particularly brainy game plan. Both these coaches are too smart and too experienced to blow the game on strategy alone. If the plan isn’t working, they’re experienced enough to just change it. And quickly.

No, this game will hinge on motivation and purpose. And these Jets’ have had theirs clearly defined….for quite some time.