Hackett’s Revenge
Last July, Denver Broncos coach Sean Peyton derided his predecessor Nathaniel Hackett—now offensive coordinator for the New York Jets—for performing “one of the worst coaching jobs in the history of the NFL”.
Last Tuesday, days before the Jets were to face off with the Broncos at Mile High Stadium, Jets coach Robert Saleh dismissed the comments as old news. “That was like 20 years ago,” Saleh said. “That’s a non-topic.”
This Sunday, Jets tight end C.J. Uzomah respectfully disagreed.
“[Peyton] made this s–t personal. Well f– him and f— them!”, the tight end cried to his teammates, before facing a 1-3 Broncos team who secured their first win in a 31-28 comeback over the Bears last week. “Let’s win this bitch for Hack!”
And win this bitch for Hack they did.
After a characteristically slow start that saw kicker Greg Zuerlein score the team’s first points in a first quarter this season, the now 2-3 Jets mounted a second half comeback—something they failed to do in last week’s 23-20 loss to the Chiefs—culminating in a 31-21 victory over Peyton’s Broncos that was plainly much more personal than Saleh initially let on.
Two days before the game, Hackett was named one of four team captains for Sunday, a role typically reserved for players; as the final seconds ticked off the game clock, Hackett was hugged, patted on the back, and then hugged again for good measure by seemingly every person on the Jets sideline; and following the win, he was awarded the game ball by Saleh who, in his post-game interview, took a subtle shot at Peyton’s coaching of Broncos quarterback Russell Wilson.
“Let me say this the right way,” Saleh began. “[I] felt like the way they were calling it wasn’t letting [Wilson] play quarterback…It was just a matter of taking out the screen game, taking out the QB scramble.”
Key to avenging the Hackett diss—aside from an abnormally serviceable performance by quarterback Zach Wilson—was a relentless Jets run game which accumulated 234 rushing yards. Even by Broncos standards, which are the worst in the NFL at 187.6 rushing yards allowed per game, that’s a lot.
Running back Breece Hall accounted for 177 of those yards, averaging 8 per carry and scoring 1 TD on a 72-yard breakaway in the third quarter which marked the third longest run of the NFL season (he’s also responsible for the longest run of the season with an 83-yard rush against the Buffalo Bills in Week 1).
“[W]e wanted to come in and get a win today for [Coach Hackett] and we did that,” said Hall. “Better coach, better team won.”
On the Jets’ defensive end, linebacker Quincy Williams finished with nine tackles for a second consecutive game, not to mention his two sacks, one of which caused a game sealing fumble. With 41 seconds remaining in a three-point game led by the Jets, Williams hounded Russell Wilson out of the pocket before launching himself on the quarterback like a lion would a gazelle, knocking the ball out of Wilson’s hands and into those of Jets cornerback Bryce Hall who waltzed into the endzone. In the words of Bill Paxton’s Private Hudson from Aliens (1986), “Game over, man. Game over.”
Alas, the Jets remain the Jets, so even a victory begets a loss.
In their second win in a row in which a key offensive player tore an Achilles—I needn’t remind you of the first—offensive lineman Alija Vera-Tucker suffered an Achilles tear late in the first half of Sunday’s game. Named to the PFWA All-Rookie Team in his only full season, the loss of Vera-Tucker represents another attenuation to an already unstable offensive line.
Eerily, this is the second consecutive year in which Vera-Tucker sustained a season ending injury in Denver; last year it was a torn triceps in a Week 7 win at Denver during the same game in which Hall tore his ACL.
And so, beset by torn Achilles and decades of failure, the Jets and their fans endure, ever in pursuit of that intoxicating green light, that elusive future forever retreating before them: a future where they run faster, stretch further, and, somehow, yes, somehow, win 10 or 11 games to claim a Wild Card spot. Or perhaps the consoling familiarity of severe disappointment invading an otherwise joyous victory is enough for now.
Either way, the Denver trip delivered another win, another Achilles tear, and another end to a week on the Jets rollercoaster. Back to East Rutherford it rolls for the undefeated Eagles.
