FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — Geno Smith walked into the belly of the Bill Belichick-Tom Brady beast Thursday night, and before he did, a cautionary tale had unfolded about the life💯 of the NFL quarterback, and more specifically, the life of a Rex Ryan quarterback.
Because no matter what you came to think of Mark Sanchez as a quarterback, he deserved better♛ than this.
It was never day-to-day for Sanchez, who indeed does have a labral tear and shoulder surgery in his future. It was doctor-to-doctor. And now, year-to-year and, at worst, career-t💖o-career.
It is ending badly, Sanchez for once in his Jets life ripping off his puppet strings and telling the NFL Network, “I won the competition, no doubt,” and vowing to continue rehabbing so he can return this ꦯseason… which woulಌd be as the backup.
Better he should read the handwritin♛g on the green-and-white wall.
🅰It is a sad story of betrayal, one that began with miscalculation and ended with the kind of misjudgment that gets head co𒀰aches fired.
There is blꦺood on Rex Ryan’s hands here, because of an inexcusable brain cramp that cost Sanchez the starting job no one wanted him to keep — placing him in harm’s way behind offensive linemen named Tom, Dick and Harry in the fourth quarter of the Snoopy Bowl, apparently the new standard of excellence for the Jets 45 year🥀s after Super Bowl III.
For two years, Sanchez and Ryan were tied at the hip. Sanchez was the quarterback Ryan so desperately craved before the 2009 NFL Draft after Brett Favre “retired.” Sanchez was the quarterback who won a rigged quart💃erback competition with Kellen Clemens that summer.
There was the usual Jet turbulence along the way: the rookie quarterback wolfing down a hot dog on the sidelines in Oakland, assessing a performance while reading from hand-written notes in a postgame press conference, wristband color codes instructing him when to be conservative and when to be ultra-conservative, a five-in🍌terception game that no one suspected would be a harbinger of things to come.
But what Ryan loved about his Sanchise, what New York came to love about him, was the bigger the game, the better he pla🅺yed, and lo and behold, the Jets made it to AFC Championship games in Indianapolis and Pittsburgh back-to-back. Ryan became the toast of the town, wrote a book, appeared in an Adam Sandler movie and branded the Jets as the Giants’ big brother.
Sanchez was coddled, enabled, and to his detriment, he never stopped playing the part of the good soldier, all the way to the bitter end. When Ryan tweaked Sanchez by giving fossil Mark Brunell some practice reps, Sanchez wanted to fight Ryan, he later revealed. The Santonio Holmes trad🐟e with the Steelers for a fifth-round pick was a heist in 2010 — until the Je꧙ts showed him the money, until Ryan named him offensive captain. Ryan and general manager Mike Tannenbaum signed Plaxico Burress out of jail, welcomed washed-up Derrick Mason at the expense of old reliable Jerricho Cotchery, because with a quarterback like Sanchez, who needed Ground & Pound anymore?
Sanche♋z regressed, however, and the 2011 season ended in disgr𝔍ace with Holmes disrupting the huddle and teammates accusing him of quitting.
But Tim Tebow would fix all that, yessir. Because you can never have too much Tebow. Just watch how Tony Sparano, the replacement for Brian Schott🌺enheimer — one scapegoat down, one to go — would employ that wildcat! Welcome to Tebowmania, Sanchise!
Holmes (foot) went down early. Tight end Dustin Keller was rarely on the field. Rookie Stephen Hill wasn’t Megatron. Shonn Greene didn’t scare defensive coordinators. And Sanchez couldn’t stop giving the ball away. The buttfumble on Thanksgiving night sealed his fate. He had lost New York and he even had lost Ryan, lucky t🌊o retain his job, saddled with a tattoo on his right arm of his wife wearing a Sanchez jersey.
New GM John Idzik drafted Smith in the second round, and you knew it was over for Sanchez, sooner rather than later. At best, he would start the 2013 season and serve as the saꦺcrificial lamb until Smith was ready. The organization gave you the feeling the quarterback competition would have been extended into eternity until Smith was deemed ready.
Then came the Snoopy Bowl against the Giants. So Wed🧜nesday, as Smith furiously studied the playbook and watched tape of the Patriots defense, Sanchez was having his shoulder examined in Gulf Breeze, Fla., by Dr. James Andrews.
Sanchez should do himself a favor and have the surgery. He won’t be a Jet next season. He wo🌞n’t be the starter anymore now. He ♊needs a change of scenery, because he can never resurrect his career here. He became the pariah quarterback to Jets fans, if not his own organization. There is no excusing his 52 turnovers in two seasons. No one can possibly blame the Jets for wanting to turn the page on Sanchez. If he wasn’t guaranteed $8.25 million this season, Sanchez would have been gone. If David Garrard hadn’t hobbled off into the sunset, Sanchez would have been gone. But he deserved better than to have it end the way it did.