Bowles' message to Jets: Finish, finish, finish, finish

[gmf1369]

FLORHAM PARK, N.J. -- New York Jets coach Todd Bowles has sounded like a broken record this week. It's his strategy to fix what is bordering on a fatal flaw.

His team can't close.

In a league in which so many games are decided in the fourth quarter, Bowles has repeatedly impressed on his players the importance of never letting up in practice. He hopes it will translate to games.

"Any time you up, you need to finish," Jets nose tackle Steve McLendon told ESPN, adding that Bowles has "been talking about it all week: Finish, finish, finish, finish."

"That's all we want do this week. Go out and play four quarters of football and finish."

The 3-4 Jets host the Atlanta Falcons on Sunday at MetLife Stadium, painfully aware of how much better their record could be.

They were dead-even at halftime with the New England Patriots two weeks ago before dropping a 24-17 decision. That loss was exacerbated by a controversial call that negated a touchdown by tight end Austin Seferian-Jenkins.

Last week the Jets held a 14-point fourth-quarter lead on the Miami Dolphinsonly to lose, 31-28, on a last-second field goal.

"Bottom line is we've just got to find a way and do better as far as closing games out," defensive tackle Kony Ealy said. "When you got a team like that down, there's no reason why it should be a game for them to come back and win.

"It's us having an overall attitude to go out there and kill, not just be satisfied with being up. We've got to learn how to keep our poise and go out there and grind it all the way to the last seconds on the clock."

Bowles has made that the theme this week.

"He understands we're grown men," McLendon said. "Once he said it, you just take upon yourself as a professional athlete to get the job down.

"When it gets to the last period of practice, it has to be just like the first period -- got to be fast, crisp and you have to finish."

Or as Bowles has said all week: Finish, finish, finish, finish.

 

[NewMFS62]

Message to Bowles:
That would be a lot easier if you were capable of making in-game adjustments to your game plan, sparky.
Later

 

[SackExchange]

It's not adjustments that are killing them. It's players making mistakes. Josh McCown throwing a bad pick against the Dolphins isn't necessarily tied to adjustments. And Jeremy Kerley coughing up a punt in the fourth quarter absolutely isn't about adjustments.

 

[butterscotch]

It's not adjustments that are killing them. It's players making mistakes. Josh McCown throwing a bad pick against the Dolphins isn't necessarily tied to adjustments. And Jeremy Kerley coughing up a punt in the fourth quarter absolutely isn't about adjustments.

I agree SE this team needs more talent

 

[Old#15]

Bottom line is that the team is playing much better than anyone would have expected, except perhaps within the lockerroom. Just about every talking head was convinced that the NYJ had the worst personnel in the league and would be lucky to win 3 games all year. I think some credit is due to the HC and a fledgling OC. They clearly have done a n awful lot with very little. My only complaint is that we are not doing it with one of the young QBs. Bowles and MM need to figure out if we have anything of value in the two kid QBs.

 

[jetgreen13]

Bottom line is that the team is playing much better than anyone would have expected, except perhaps within the lockerroom. Just about every talking head was convinced that the NYJ had the worst personnel in the league and would be lucky to win 3 games all year. I think some credit is due to the HC and a fledgling OC. They clearly have done a n awful lot with very little. My only complaint is that we are not doing it with one of the young QBs. Bowles and MM need to figure out if we have anything of value in the two kid QBs.

bowles was asked about the young QBs at today's presser & said something like:

i saw what petty & hackenberg could do this summer.. mccown is my QB..

as far as maccagnan, what difference does what he thinks about the young QBs make?? he could theoretically try to convince woody's brother to force bowles to play one, or both of the kids.. but i'm sure you know as well as i do, bowles doesn't answer to him..

 

[jets82]

The Jets aren’t going to finish, finish, finish, finish until they get a real franchise QB, QB, QB, QB and hopefully a young one. Any HC that doesn’t realize that needs to be fired immediately. Yes there have been teams that have won a SB without a franchise QB but they are few and far between. With that said, those teams also had everything else to an extent that it made up for not having that QB. The Jets obviously don’t have that luxury, either way.

 

[SackExchange]

Bottom line is that the team is playing much better than anyone would have expected, except perhaps within the lockerroom. Just about every talking head was convinced that the NYJ had the worst personnel in the league and would be lucky to win 3 games all year. I think some credit is due to the HC and a fledgling OC. They clearly have done a n awful lot with very little. My only complaint is that we are not doing it with one of the young QBs. Bowles and MM need to figure out if we have anything of value in the two kid QBs.

I think he should get credit for the team doing much better than almost anyone expected. The team is not a playoff team. The roster has been stripped down, and it's been handed over to the kids. Say what you want, the kids have been playing a lot better than anticipated, and Bowles should get credit for that.

The team is still raw and doesn't really know how to win down the stretch, which falls in part on Bowles, as well. But Bowles has this roster playing a lot better than anyone thought they would. Three of their losses, they outplayed their opponents for the majority of the game. To me, the ideal season was for young personnel to step up, for the team to play tough, competitive football, and still manage to land a good draft pick. That is basically exactly what has happened in the first half of the year.

But Jets fans being Jets fans, it's terrible for them. Bowles has to be fired - and inevitably, once he was replaced, there would be calls for his replacement to be fired.

 

[LIJETFAN]

I agree with Old15 and Sack. If this team manages to win 5 or 6 games this year, Bowles did a great job. This was a complete roster overhaul. And this team has been very competitive in every game. I saw the remarks by Forte about Morton. I understand his point but in my opinion Morton has done a very credible job game planning and calling plays. It's his fist season with a young roster, he's doing well. I think this game fell on the players. The New England game, well,there were a lot of factors, including the officials. Miami seemed like a collapse across the board. Despite their record, I am enjoying watching this team compete. They need to grow a bit, and these games are growing pains. We can hope that they will learn from these experiences for next season and beyond. This team is young, and they have some talent to work with going forward. I've seen growth this year from the WRs, the LBs and the secondary. And the o-line has been solid.

So, yes I think Bowles has actually done a solid job this year so far. And until someone shows me that we are going to get a can't miss coach with a championship pedigree, I'm not willing to call for Bowles to be fired. Based on this year's performance alone he deserves more time.

 

[Elias]

We start off the games hot and then we falter down the stretch. Maybe our coaches are not good in game managers. It needs to be fixed. It's the he reason why the jets are losing. Yes the players are making mistakes but something tells me that they are getting away from what made them take the lead in the first place.

 

[TebowCan'tThrow]

The Jets aren’t going to finish, finish, finish, finish until they get a real franchise QB, QB, QB, QB and hopefully a young one. Any HC that doesn’t realize that needs to be fired immediately. Yes there have been teams that have won a SB without a franchise QB but they are few and far between. With that said, those teams also had everything else to an extent that it made up for not having that QB. The Jets obviously don’t have that luxury, either way.

Sure would be nice to have a QB that has the most TD's by a rookie QB in the history of NFL through 7 games. I know he wouldn't have the same stats here, but watching our safeties still getting smoked by TE's really pisses me off. We passed on a true franchise QB because a few experts said Watson had flaws instead of looking at his leadership. Like Dak, he is going to be great and his HC told us we would regret it. So to me this whole front office and CS should be fired for completely blowing it with Hack and then passing on Watson. Oh and BTW, we have wasted 8 games on McCown. And we will waste 8 more because Bowles says he saw our young QB's in pre season. Well we have seen your shitty coaching for 3 years. GTFO!!

 

[Mainejet]

It's not adjustments that are killing them. It's players making mistakes. Josh McCown throwing a bad pick against the Dolphins isn't necessarily tied to adjustments. And Jeremy Kerley coughing up a punt in the fourth quarter absolutely isn't about adjustments.

Disagreed. If our incompetent HC knew how to play strategy, maybe the Jets would have prevented the Dolphins from erasing a 14 point deficit in the 4th quarter? Then maybe our journeyman QB's mistake wouldn't have mattered?

We KNOW what McCown is. It's never going to change. You should EXPECT the HC to know how to pick up the slack, especially when Toilet knows better than all of us what McCown is.

 

[jets82]

Sure would be nice to have a QB that has the most TD's by a rookie QB in the history of NFL through 7 games. I know he wouldn't have the same stats here, but watching our safeties still getting smoked by TE's really pisses me off. We passed on a true franchise QB because a few experts said Watson had flaws instead of looking at his leadership. Like Dak, he is going to be great and his HC told us we would regret it. So to me this whole front office and CS should be fired for completely blowing it with Hack and then passing on Watson. Oh and BTW, we have wasted 8 games on McCown. And we will waste 8 more because Bowles says he saw our young QB's in pre season. Well we have seen your shitty coaching for 3 years. GTFO!!

Lol, tell em how you really feel!!! Seriously I agree with you 1000 percent. This is why I haven’t watched a game yet this year and I won’t as long McCown is playing. Besides that, I won’t be putting much stock into the Jets period until they get a young franchise QB.

 

[SackExchange]

Disagreed. If our incompetent HC knew how to play strategy, maybe the Jets would have prevented the Dolphins from erasing a 14 point deficit in the 4th quarter? Then maybe our journeyman QB's mistake wouldn't have mattered?

We KNOW what McCown is. It's never going to change. You should EXPECT the HC to know how to pick up the slack, especially when Toilet knows better than all of us what McCown is.

He definitely should have told Kerley not to fumble there. It's an awful job by Toilet if he told Kerley to fumble.

 

[johnjet]

It would seem that the Jets have more talent and desire than any of us probably realized at the start of the season. Bowles saying finish-finish-finish should be sent to all coaches. They call the conservative call plays that slow progress, and need to learn to finish-finish-finish.

 

[Mainejet]

I can't believe all of the satisfaction in this thread? You act as if it's unheard of from the Jets to be 4-5? Big hairy ass deal if the Jets have turned out to be better than everyone thought. Big hairy ass deal if the truth be told they are arriving at MEDIOCRITY. That black hole of endless teams that can never seem to climb out of that label. Like a bunch of crabs in a bucket.

I was happy to see the Jets turn out to be better than everyone, including myself, thought. That's great. ABOUT A MONTH AGO! I don't give a shit about mediocrity from this team when everyone thought they'd be 0-16. I'm over that.

I want this team to move FORWARD. I want this team to be the very best it can be. Losing 3 games in a row because our HC does not know how to make in game strategic adjustments is NOT my idea of SATISFACTION. The Jets should have won all of those games.

I also think this team can make the playoffs if they start to realize who they are, what they're capable of, and that nobody except for themselves is standing in their way. In fact, for all of those people who believe this team is not a playoff team? Don't talk to me. I don't need to hear this satisfaction crap like somehow it's a great thing that this team is .500 meanwhile firmly believing that this is not a team that's ready to make the playoffs or even god forbid MAKE A STATEMENT......

 

[SackExchange]

I can't believe all of the satisfaction in this thread? You act as if it's unheard of from the Jets to be 4-5? Big hairy ass deal if the Jets have turned out to be better than everyone thought. Big hairy ass deal if the truth be told they are arriving at MEDIOCRITY. That black hole of endless teams that can never seem to climb out of that label. Like a bunch of crabs in a bucket.

I was happy to see the Jets turn out to be better than everyone, including myself, thought. That's great. ABOUT A MONTH AGO! I don't give a shit about mediocrity from this team when everyone thought they'd be 0-16. I'm over that.

I want this team to move FORWARD. I want this team to be the very best it can be. Losing 3 games in a row because our HC does not know how to make in game strategic adjustments is NOT my idea of SATISFACTION. The Jets should have won all of those games.

I also think this team can make the playoffs if they start to realize who they are, what they're capable of, and that nobody except for themselves is standing in their way. In fact, for all of those people who believe this team is not a playoff team? Don't talk to me. I don't need to hear this satisfaction crap like somehow it's a great thing that this team is .500 meanwhile firmly believing that this is not a team that's ready to make the playoffs or even god forbid MAKE A STATEMENT......

In all fairness, some people on this very board talked about this being the worst NFL roster in the past decade, if not more.

 

[forevergreen]

Just FYI, the Jets are currently tied with the ravens at 9th in the AFC. 8-8 is very realistic, playoffs are a real possibility depending how they play in november and december. I am a long time Bowles hater. However....I am really coming around. What they have done this year is astonishing. Not talking about wins, but about culture. They have created a winning culture in this organization. Its a culture where guys play football because its fun.

Losers LOSE because they run to win the race, Winners WIN because they just love to run.

For years we have been losers. Always wanting to beat the Pats, always eyeing the SB. We would sacrifice culture just to get there. Well Bowles and Mac just changed the narrative, and they managed to do it with professional players which is ridiculously hard to do. What we have here is a winning culture. Yes, we dont have a ton of talent and Yes we dont have a franchise QB, but we have something more valuable for the long term....a winning culture.

Teams with bad quarterbacks can win SB's even in the modern error if you have talent in the rest of the team and a winning culture. I think this season has given us a solid foundation. Even if we dont have a franchise going into next season, if we fit the other positions in the draft and insert Petty in 2018 we have a real shot at playoffs and the SB in my opinion. Petty is atleast as talented as Sanchez and we almost did it in spite of him.....but our culture is better now.

If we cant get Cousins in 2018, I say upgrade the o-line, add a CB, and insert Petty.

In the meantime lets enjoy the ride and see where this team can take us. I certainly agree with Bowles in one area - this team has another gear it can play at. I think the mini-bye and the bye back to back will help heal us enough to get us there. Then we will see what our loaded defense can really do, I think the Bills game was just a glimpse.

 

[forevergreen]

BTW I think the defense dancing on the field - is a glimpse at the unity and culture of fun, they talk about having in the locker room we never get to see.