Jets' coach says Bruschi's off the Mark

[ret2ski]

Jets' coach says Bruschi's off the Mark

MARK HALE
September 17, 2010

Rex Ryan believes ESPN analyst, and former Patriots linebacker, Tedy Bruschi would like Mark Sanchez if he were his teammate or at least saw him in practice.

Bruschi ripped Sanchez yesterday in remarks on ESPN.com, claiming that "when Sanchez gets going and things are going well, I think he's a great quarterback. His attitude is infectious. He's a leader of that team.

"But when things go bad I think he tanks it," Bruschi said. "Right now I see Mark Sanchez as a front-runner, and that's not something that you want at that quarterback position."

Ryan disputed the front-running notion and praised Sanchez for his practice demeanor.

"I respect the heck out of Tedy Bruschi. No question. But I think he would have a different opinion if he was here every day," Ryan said. "Just because of the way [Sanchez] leads on the practice field. The personality he has. What [Bruschi] says about him when we get ahead, that's how he is every day here on the practice field.

"It never went our way on Monday night, but I would definitely not put Mark in a front-running category. He's a competitor. I think Bruschi would have loved to have played with him."

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Ryan got creative during practice yesterday with both the offense and defense. Both units struggled with particular things in Monday night's 10-9 loss to the Ravens, with the offense converting 1 of 11 third downs and the defense committing several key penalties (the Jets had 14 penalties overall).
Ryan forced the defense to do push-ups or up-downs if someone committed a penalty. The violating player had to watch as his teammates did 10 push-ups or up-downs -- a guilt trip.

"We went back to grade school," Ryan, who called it "tough love," said. "Whatever it takes to solve this, that's what we're going to do."
Also, when the offense failed in practice on a third-down play, it had to re-run the play.

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Terrell Owens also joined in the Jets criticism yesterday, on Versus' "The Daily Line."

"There was a lot of stuff coming out of Jets camp and last week [Antonio] Cromartie and [Darrelle] Revis called themselves the Jordan and Pippen of the NFL," Owens said. "I am thinking more like the New Jersey Nets. . . . From what I saw, it was more like Ren and Stimpy kind of suits them best after Monday night's performance if you ask me."