I Had To Turn It Off When

"Yeah, I was in some of the offensive meetings," the defensive specialist said. "It's French class. I will say this: It's a lot different, the verbiage and everything else. I wanted to recognize more of the calls and understand it. There's a system that I put in with our quarterbacks and with Mark in particular, just for him to understand what we need, what we can have and what we can't have. We'll see how it works. I believe it will work. He did an outstanding job today, doing some of the things we're asking him to do."

It's so nice of New York Jets head coach Rex Ryan to realize that his QB turning the ball over 3, 4 or 5 times a game is not good for his football team. Ryan is now going to take a more active role in the offense. Maybe he'll even yell at his rookie QB once in a while for making a stupid mistake. Maybe.

Overweight, balding and aging Jets fans who haven't tasted the Super Bowl since 1969 really don't want to hear how all these turnovers are actually good for Mark Sanchez because he will only "learn from his mistakes" and "he will get better with time." After 40 years of futility, the team's fans really don't want to hear how everything is going to get better next year.

After all, this was a team that was 8-3 last year before losing 4 out of their last 5 to go 9-7. The Jets seem to have built a "now" team except for one position - the most important one - and that's QB.

I ask you, if back-up QB, Kellen Clemens, couldn't find his way onto the field to spell Sanchez in any of these pitiful games that he was having, then what the hell is he doing on the team? Isn't it the role of the second-string QB to come into a game in case of injury but also to give a struggling starter a break and see if his team responds? Have you seen Clemens warming up on the sidelines once this year?

Is Ryan worried that by benching Sanchez he will bruise his ego? Well, that's too bad. He'll get over it. And to save one rookie's ego, you have the rest of the team go down with his sinking ship?

Ryan keeps saying that Sanchez is playing because "he gives us the best chance to win."Really? Does Ryan and the rest of the Jets organization think that Clemens would have turned the ball over as many times as this kid has? All I know is that after Sanchez threw his first of four interceptions in last week's game against the Patriots, my brother-in-law who is a long-suffering Jets fan, spoke for every New York fan out there when he said, "This kid is killing us."

Unfortunately, Ryan is the last one to know.

Read more of Steve Scafa at the original "I Had To Turn It Off When" blog.