Rex Ryan and Eric Smith discussed the all out blitz gone wrong that resulted in Tim Tebow's game losing touchdown on Thursday night.
Smith:
"It's one of those things like, if I would have had to do it all over again, I'd be like 'screw covering the tight end' and run up the field. But that's because I (now) know what he was going to do."
I'm not really sure what Smith is talking about here. Watch the play embedded below. Does it look like Smith is making any effort to defend a tight end? Does it not look like he is just flying up the field like a mad man? There is no hesitation here. He shot up the field. Smith was the outside man. He took too sharp of an angle and failed to set the edge. That is where the play failed.
At any rate, the team keeps telling us how high his football IQ is, but here he seems to have not been able to diagnose correctly what was happening.
Ryan:
"That's definitely unfair, I mean Eric's played well," Ryan said. He's played well for us. In fact, he's played more plays than anyone else we got on this team. If anything, we've asked him to play too much.
Rex's loyalty to his players should be appreciated. There is a such thing as too much loyalty, though. The Jets can pretend Smith's play is not an issue, but it is a huge problem. He has given up more yardage in coverage than any safety in the league. He committed a terrible penalty against the Patriots last week that led to a touchdown before the half. He took a horrible path to the quarterback on this play. It feels like every time you turn around, he is getting beaten on something.
Smitty is a great guy to have in subpackages, but they are going to continue to be burned if they keep insisting on using him as a full time player. He is not athletic enough to match up with good receiving tight ends and is adding to a list of unintelligent plays on the field