On Sanchez and third downs...
Oh, I know, it was interesting. It was like we were better at third-and-long than we were at third-and-short. That doesn’t happen too often. But it just tells you also about the protection we have. He was able to focus, get his drops, get his reads downfield, and threw accurately. So not bad for a couple of rookies today, him and myself.
On hitting Texans QB Matt Schaub...
Well, we knew we weren’t going to be able to sack him. He was one of the hardest quarterbacks to sack last year. I think we only got him twice. But we had a lot of hits on the quarterback, knocked him around a little bit. And no quarterback likes to get hit. He’s a good quarterback and he took some shots a lot of guys would have tapped out on. He’s a tough guy.
On Sanchez’s poise after throwing the interception...
Oh, yeah, that was big-time. Yeah, absolutely. You know what we’ve been saying about this young man, you know we think he’s special. That was his first start against an outstanding opponent at home. They got a couple of elite players on defense. I thought he did well."
On what message he wants to send about the Jets...
Same one I’ve been sending since the day I got here. You know I believe in this football team, I believe in the coaches we have, I believe in the players we have, and I believe in the support staff. And I’ve been saying it all along, just nobody wanted to listen.
An interesting last note. Perhaps Rex was crazy like a fox in the offseason. When the rest of the league was bashing him for all of his talk, he was bringing unity to his locker room, creating an us against the world mentality. It's about time for the Jets to do something like that. I think we're all tired of taking shots from the rest of the league on and off the field.