Dolphins 31 Jets 28: South Beach Collapse

The Jets lost their second straight game today, falling to the Dolphins 31-28 in Miami. The Jets squandered a 14 point fourth quarter lead to fall 3-4. What happened in today’s game? Let’s discuss it.

The Bad

Buster Skrine: You might be hard-pressed to find a less-effective performance of an NFL player at any position all season than Skrine’s today. Pro Football Focus put 7 catches for 117 yards and 3 touchdowns on the cornerback. He also committed three penalties. The Dolphins clearly knew which matchup they wanted to target, and they exploited it. I am not even sure you can evaluate the other corners in this game because of how content Miami was to attack Skrine.

The McCown Interception: In any situation, that is a terrible interception. Josh McCown passed up open targets to make a terrible throw to a covered receiver. Given the score and time, it was about as bad of a play as you will ever see.

Darron Lee: Lee had his moments, particularly against the run, but late in the game he seemed to be the guy beaten on critical Miami passing plays if it wasn’t Skrine. He has some responsibility for the game-tying touchdown pass. He also wiped out two of his own big plays with silly personal foul penalties.

Wesley Johnson: It looked to me like the center had another less than stellar game. He single-handedly ended one drive by taking a pair of penalties.

Brian Winters: I thought Ndamukong Suh really gave the Jets fits. I understand this isn’t an easy matchup, but Winters is now a highly paid guard. You pay a premium for a free agent to hold his own in games like this.

The Good

Muhammad Wilkerson: It was nice to see flashes of the old Wilkerson out there. I counted three pressures of the quarterback along with an interception and some nice hustle plays. It has been too long since we have seen him be a force.

Jamal Adams: I thought this was a nice bounceback game for Adams. He made the deflection on the blitz that turned into the Wilkerson interception. He added a sack, a pressure, and 6 tackles, some of which were important, to his stat sheet.

Marcus Maye: What impresses me about Maye is how he is always in the right spot. He added another interception to his total today to go with 7 tackles.

Demario Davis: It was a relatively quiet day, but his sack in the fourth quarter would have been one of the plays of the game had the Jets won.

Matt Forte: I’m not sure how many of these performances Forte has in him given his lack of speed, but he still is crafty enough to read blocks and gain yardage when he has room to operate. It was a nice 82 yard day from scrimmage.

Bilal Powell: Powell was showing few signs of injury while adding 83 yards from scrimmage.

Josh McCown: I noted the terrible interception at an even worse time up top. I stand by my previous statements that I think McCown’s presence on this team accomplishes nothing. I don’t need to see him start going forward. But I’m evaluating one full game here. McCown was probably getting too much credit when this team was winning, and people were dismissing his flirtations with catastrophe. Today he probably will get too much blame for one mistake in a very productive effort. If you had told me going into this game that McCown would account for 4 touchdowns and a single turnover, I would have taken it. It should have been enough to win. He never should have been in a position to throw that interception.

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The Jets once again need to dust themselves off because the Atlanta Falcons are coming next week.