Opening Statement…
You have to give credit to Green Bay. They did an outstanding job. They’re a good football team. They were better than we were today. I thought our defense was outstanding. We held them to 14 percent on third-down conversions. We just didn’t get it done as a team. We had a couple of costly interceptions, and that’s all I’ll say about it. I thought Mark (Sanchez) wasn’t throwing the ball very effectively in the first half. I thought he threw it much better in the second half, but we just couldn’t catch it. That’s uncharacteristic of this football team to drop some balls. It’s just frustrating. Nick (Folk) missed a field goal that he’s been making in his sleep. We just weren’t good enough today.
On the Jets using their second challenge in the second quarter…
Obviously, you want to keep your challenges, but I felt confident in both of the calls. I talked to Brad (Smith) about the first one and he clearly thought he was down. When you look at the video, it was ruled a fumble on the play, and we probably shouldn’t have challenged that one because it was too hard to tell, but we felt good about it. On the interception, I clearly thought our receiver had possession of the football, or if worse comes to worse, it’d duel possession, which is the offensive player’s football when they’re on the ground. That happened twice, and I never had another opportunity to challenge it. I don’t see what would have been different if I had challenged the Dustin Keller one because it was the exact same thing.
On if the Jets had won the second challenge…
We were definitely going to punt. That would have been a huge difference. Instead of getting the ball on the 40-yard line, they’re getting it on the 10. It makes a huge difference.
On the fake punt by Jets P Steve Weatherford…
We knew what they were doing. They were caving that side down. This was something that Steve did on his own. I don’t think he realized we’d just been sacked. We told him before that it needed to be a manageable situation, not fourth-and-20 or whatever it was. As he was running, I was trying to make sure he knew where the first down marker was. I don’t think he was clear on that.
On whether Weatherford called the audible on his own…
He does it on his own. He’s a great athlete. He did it last year against Miami, but in that situation, it probably would have been wiser to punt.
On whether Jets CB Darrelle Revis was ready to go today…
Yes. Sure was.
On Sanchez…
The kid started throwing the ball the way he’s capable of in the second half, we just weren’t catching it. I don’t know what the stats say, but he put some balls in there on the money, and we’ve got to catch them. One of them would have been a touchdown on a crossing route, (even though) the ball could have been a little higher. I just never thought he was on the mark in the first half, but I thought he clearly picked his game up in the second half.
On Jets inability to run the ball despite injuries to Green Bay’s defense…
Every team’s hurt. I don’t know who they had out, but we had Kris Jenkins out. We’ve played without Revis…everybody’s hurt. That’s a good football team. They play well on defense. You have to give them credit. They do a nice job. Dom Capers is an excellent coach, so we’ll give them credit, but it might have been a different outcome if we had caught a few of those balls we dropped.
On whether there was a ‘rust factor’ coming out of the bye week…
There’s no rust. Write whatever you want, that’s fine. When you lose, you can say what you want. We were fresher and healthier than we’ve ever been, we just never got it done. That’s a good football team. That’s a great offense over there, and our defense pretty much handled them. We certainly were ready to play on defense. I thought we were ready to play on offense, but it never worked out that way.
On not kicking a field goal trailing 6-0 late in the fourth quarter…
No. I thought we had a better chance of converting on the fourth down. It was just one play. You convert on that or worse comes to worse, we get the ball back because I had a lot of confidence that our defense would shut them down like they’d been doing all day.
On throwing into the end zone on third down late in the fourth…
You just try to throw it to the guy that’s open. Apparently, that’s who he thought was open.
On why the Jets receivers had so many drops…
They are professionals. We have been catching the ball in practice in a lot windier conditions. It was disappointing. We have some outstanding receivers. For whatever reason, it just wasn’t our day.
On what he said to the team after the game …
We let one get away from us. I thought we were in a great position with the way that our defense played to win this football game. We just never got it done. This is a resilient group. We’ll get it together and focus on next week’s opponent. We’ll learn from this week and head on to next week’s opponent.
On if he wished he had saved a challenge for play that resulted in Keller’s turnover…
It was a very similar play to what happened with the Jerricho (Cotchery) one before. It was almost identical. I’m sure that would have been Green Bay’s ball, anyway.
On if it’s acceptable to have ‘a bad day at the office’ during a 16-week season…
Yeah, pretty much. It’s just that with this football team, you have to win the close ones. We’ve been doing that. We played a good football team. Obviously, Green Bay is one of the top teams in the NFC, but they’re playing at our place, and we have to win these games. I don’t care who we play - if you play at our place, we should win. That was disappointing. I thought our fans gave a great effort. They left a little early, but that was our fault, not theirs.
On penalties …
I was pretty upset. I’ll have to look at the film closely to see why it wasn’t more balanced and why it was one-sided. We had a second-and-two situation and our center gets called for holding on a toss, and he was. He was holding. We have to be smart. Nick‘s (Mangold) a great player. We don’t need to hold. That dude’s not going to make the tackle. We only needed two yards. That was a huge play in the game. Little things like that…you know, a false start. It was bothersome, to say the least.
On whether a non-conference loss softens the blow…
I don’t feel like it’s a soft blow right now. I wish we could play it again, but there are no do-overs in this league.
On if there were any injuries …
Not that I’m aware of.
On the Jets running game …
It was ineffective. Like I said, you have to give them credit. They stopped us. I would have liked to have seen our balance be a little more run than pass, but we were in a situation where we were playing from behind a lot.