Not only did the Jets get demolished in every aspect of the game last night, they also suffered an unfortunate loss in losing S James Ihedigbo to a high ankle sprain. "Digs" is expected to be out for 2-3 weeks to recover.
The problem here, is with SS Jim Leonhard on I-R, the Jets are now razor-thin at that position. SS Eric Smith has shown how bad he can be in coverage, as he was straight-up embarrassed on a couple of plays and looked completely lost at times.
Jenny Vrentas earlier reported about SS Keith Fitzhugh turning down an offer from Gang Green. Fitzhugh was previously released by the Jets on September 3.
Interesting: Jets reached out to S Keith Fitzhugh an hour ago. Turned them down to stick w/secure job w/railroad to provide for family. #nyj
John mentions some possible candidates for the position in the above post (here).
But the issue remains.... as none of the aforementioned players excel in COVERAGE. That's what the Jets need. Unfortunately, consistent and capable safeties are hard to find, especially this late in the season.
I would like to see the Jets have CB Dwight Lowery make the switch to SS over going out and bringing in these two. It's tough to learn a new position on the fly, and they'll be some missed tackles along the way, but he's the best candidate of what we have and he can cover better than the others.
This will be a recurring problem throughout the duration of the 2010-11 Jets season. It's hard to see this getting any better any time soon. FS Brodney Pool has been a big letdown in coverage also, and has quietly had a pretty terrible, ineffective season thus far.
Hopefully Rex and Pettine can scheme well enough to mask this weakness. Which really means, they need to get pressure on opposing quarterbacks.