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Dr. O, Ron Erhardt, Passes Away at 81

We have sad news to report today on the death of Ron Erhardt, the Jets’ offensive coordinator in 1996 and their quarterbacks coach in Bill Parcells’ first year at the Green & White helm in 1997. Erhardt, 81, passed away this morning in Boca Raton, Fla.

His Jets stop was the final one in a strong career as an NFL assistant coach who had a knack for coaching in Super Bowls and an impressive nickname for his work with several offenses: Dr. O.

His first two championship games came as Parcells’ offensive coordinator for the Giants. Parcells, who had been Erhardt’s linebackers coach when Ron was the Patriots’ head coach for three seasons. Both Parcells and Erhardt were on Ray Perkins’ staff in ’82.

When Perkins departed for Alabama, Parcells became the Giants’ HC and Erhardt his OC. The two were on the staffs that guided the Giants to Super Bowl victories after the 1986 and ’90 seasons.

Erhardt left for Pittsburgh in ’92 and ran Bill Cowher’s offense for four seasons. The Steelers were a top-10 offense in three of those four years, led the NFL in rushing in 1994, and played in Super Bowl XXX.

In 1996 Rich Kotite brought Erhardt to the Jets and the offense was one of the few bright spots in the 1-15 season, tying for 12th in total yards and coming in 10th in passing yards despite having to transition at QB from an injured Neil O’Donnell to Frank Reich to Glenn Foley by season’s end.

Parcells returned to the metropolitan area to guide the Jets in ’97 and retained Erhardt for one more year. Then Ron left Bergen County for Florida, where he polished his golf game during the day before he and his wife, Anita, enjoyed the Boca night life and had the kids, sons Rob and Jim and daughters Jan and Jill, down as often as they could on the weekends.

In ’81, New England owner Billy Sullivan dismissed Erhardt two days after the Pats finished 2-14, reportedly saying, “Ron’s just too nice a guy.” I can attest to Ron’s niceness and decency and I also can say that he felt the Patriots gave him a short hook at the end of an injury-plagued season after his Pats went 19-13 in his first two seasons.

But Ron was a football lifer and he moved on to his next gig and the one after that. The former head coach at two North Dakota parochial high schools and North Dakota State never got another head-coaching nod, but he didn’t need one to leave a strong pro legacy.

At the risk of repeating myself from my profile on new Jets offensive line coach Dave DeGuglielmo from two weeks ago, he said he never met Erhardt but was benefitting from Dr. O’s work from many two decades before.

“People say this is Parcells’ system, but really, it’s Ron’s,” DeGuglielmo told me then. “Every offensive system has a way of calling things, identifying players and routes, things like that. This system has a very distinct way of calling plays and formations. It’s a traditional, professional, two-back, play-action type of offense, but it easily adapts to more open offenses. If you can use the term old-school, this system has old-school qualities with the flexibility to be new-school. The way we call it, you can go from traditional to spread out with ease.”

It would be a fitting tribute if the Jets of Rex Ryan, coordinator Tony Sparano and DeGuglielmo among others can take the system that Ron Erhardt helped shape and knock some aces into the cup in his honor this season.

The Jets and the Playoff Picture, Unofficially

Updated, Wednesday, 1:05 p.m. ET

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays. And the same goes for the Jets, who will need several presents from their distant relatives next weekend to feel better about the holidays and reach the playoff wonderland for the third time under head coach Rex Ryan.

Here are the different scenarios with explanations to help you get through today and head into the coming week’s preparation for the Dolphins:

First of all, the Jets have to win and the Bengals have to lose. In addition, if the 9-7 teams vying for the sixth seed are …

1. JETS and CIN only (TEN loses and either DEN or OAK loses)

The Jets are in as the AFC’s sixth seed.

The Jets’ conference record would improve to 7-5 with a win at MIA, while the Bengals’ conference record would fall to 6-6 with a home loss to BAL.

Will the Ravens have something to play for? You betcha. A BAL loss and a PIT win at CLE gives the AFC North title to the Steelers at 12-4 and the Ravens would go in as the fifth seed, on the road for Wild Card Week. A BAL win OR a PIT loss gives the Ravens the 2-seed, a bye week and a home game at M&T Bank Stadium, where they just finished their 8-0 regular season.

2. JETS, CIN and TEN (either DEN or OAK loses)

Jets are out.

CIN beat TEN in Week 9 but that washes out because the Jets didn’t play either team. In Scenario 1 above, CIN falls away due to conference record, but Jets and TEN, with a win at HOU, would both be at 7-5. Next tiebreaker is common opponents. Titans win, 4-1 to 3-2.

Does Houston have something to play for? No. Their AFC South title and first-ever playoff appearance is locked up. But even with a win to go to 11-5 and BAL and PIT losses to drop both to 11-5, the Texans cannot get the 2-seed because BAL would win the AFC North and the Texans lost to the Ravens in Week 6. This is not a good scenario for the Jets.

3. JETS, CIN and OAK (TEN loses, DEN wins)

Jets are out

The only way OAK gets into a wild-card tiebreaker scenario is if the Raiders, vs. SD, and the Broncos, vs. KC, both win. DEN wins the AFC West based on a better common-opponents mark than OAK, 8-6 to 7-7. The Broncos can’t be in a tiebreaker scenario with the Jets. Either they win the West at 9-7 or they finish second at 8-8.

CIN didn’t play OAK so the Raiders’ Week 3 win over the Jets doesn’t matter … yet. Next tiebreaker is conference record, with CIN again falling out at 6-6 to the Jets’ and Raiders’ 7-5. Then the Jets and OAK revert to the first tiebreaker, head-to-head. This is where the Raiders’ 34-24 win over the Green & White comes in and why the Jets go bye-bye.

4. JETS, CIN, TEN and OAK

Jets are out.

Originally (and as we mentioned, unofficially) we saw a possibility of the Jets being able to make up a strength of victory deficit to OAK and TEN, but upon further review, that can’t happen.

CIN again is a quick elimination based on conference record. Then it’s the Jets, Titans and Raiders in a tiebreaker steel-cage match. TEN and OAK didn’t play so head-to-head-to-head is out. Conference records would be identical 7-5′s. Common opponents requires a minimum of four games and these three combined only have three games each against common foes, so that’s out. On to strength of victory.

Based on current records plus the assumed wins or losses by teams to force this four-way tie, the Raiders’ strength of victory is now 62-78, the Titans’ 57-81 and the Jets’ 52-87. The Jets can make up only five wins (if DAL, JAX, WAS and BUF also win, with the Bills counting twice because the Jets beat them twice), not enough to catch the Raiders.

One final note: If the Jets do get in as the sixth seed, their first game would be at Houston vs. the third-seeded Texans.

These scenarios are not official, so if you see or hear something amiss above or just want to make a comment, come on down. We’ll be open (an hour here, an hour there) for Christmas.

Plays and Drives at Jets-Giants

The Jets’ 89 offensive plays Saturday was the sixth-most in a game in franchise history, the second-most in a non-overtime game, and the most in a home non-OT game. The only regulation match with more Jets plays were their 91 snaps, coincidentally on Christmas Eve, in the 34-20 loss to the Ravens (with Rex Ryan as their DL coach) to end the 2000 season.

The 64 dropbacks by Sanchez (59 passes, five sacks) was tied for third-most in a game in Green & White annals. The only games with more dropbacks were that ’00 Ravens game (70) and vs. the Baltimore Colts at home in 1970 (65).

Victor Cruz’s 99-yard catch-and-run from Eli Manning was not only the longest play from scrimmage by an opponent in Jets franchise history but also equaled the longest opponent drive by yards in Jets history. In the last quarter century there have been only three other 99-yard drives — at Buffalo in ’99, vs. the Ravens at home in ’98 and at Miami in ’89.

Cowher Comes Calling on Plaxico, Santonio

CBS analyst Bill Cowher visited a pair of his former receivers this week here at the Atlantic Health Jets Training Center. Cowher, who was the head coach of the Pittsburgh Steelers from 1992-2006, sat down with both Plaxico Burress and Santonio Holmes for a feature that will run Sunday on The NFL Today.

The Steelers selected Burress with the No. 8 overall choice in the 2000 draft. He played five years under Cowher, hauling in 261 receptions for 4,164 yards and 22 touchdowns. And now after two years out of football, Burress is writing quite a comeback story with the Jets.

“I think it’s remarkable. It speaks volumes about him and his determination,” Cowher told newyorkjets.com. “I think it’s great when people have a second chance to have an opportunity to do something with it. Plaxico has done that. It’s kind of neat to see him reunited with Santonio. With Dustin [Keller], they have three really quality people at the skill positions. It’s just a good story. I’d like to see him finish the season and finish it strong.”

Burress is averaging a healthy 14.1 yards a reception and his seven TDs pace the Jets. Many people had thought the 34-year-old pro would never be the same on the field after serving 20 months in prison on a weapons charge.

“I’m proud of him and happy for him. I’m happy that he had a chance to redeem himself and get a second chance,” Cowher said. “And he looks good — he looks like the guy, when you throw the ball that you think it’s going out of bounds on third-and-11, he looks like the guy that puts his big old arm span up and catches it. He’s a great target for a quarterback — trust me. He’s a quarterback’s best friend when you look at a target like that.”

Last Sunday, Bills WR Stevie Johnson attempted to poke fun at Burress with his touchdown dance. The latter provided answers on the field with a TD catch of his own and a critical third-down pickup on the winning drive, then acted like a true professional with his postgame comments.

“Nothing was more indicative than last week,” said Cowher. “You get the guy mocking him and the guy in the past may have had more of a redemption-type response, but his was genuine and sincere. It’s just about winning games. I think he’s become not just a better player and teammate but I think he’s become a better person, and that’s also been evident. It’s unfortunate what he went through but sometimes these things in life happen and they happen for the good.“

Holmes, who became the first Steelers receiver selected in the first round since Burress, was the 25th pick of the ’06 draft. Now known for his game-changing plays in Tone Time, it was Holmes who actually capped off his rookie year with a 67-yard OT winner against the Bengals in Cowher’s final game as coach.

“He’s very deceptive, a great route runner and he can run after the catch,” Cowher said. “You saw that at Ohio State and you saw a little bit of that in his first year. Right now he’s developed into a guy who can play big in big games. These two receivers you have have made Super Bowl game-winning catches, so they know what the pressure is like. Pressure is nothing new for these guys.”

Watch Bill Cowher 1-on-1.

Jets, Plaxico Burress Reach Agreement

Update, 5:30 p.m. ET

The New York Jets  have announced this morning that they have reached an agreement in principle with wide receiver Plaxico Burress.

Burress, of course, is the 10th-year wideout who starred for five seasons with the Steelers and four with the Giants, including Super Bowl XLII before missing the last two seasons due to a firearms conviction.

Burress, who has 505 career regular-season receptions for 7,845 yards and 55 touchdowns, was reported to have visited with his first two teams, the Giants and Steelers, before traveling to San Francisco to meet with the 49ers and then back east to talk with the Jets.

The audio of Burress’ conference call with reporters will be streamed on newyorkjets.com beginning at 5:45 p.m. ET and will be archived after that.

John Dockery: ‘I’m a Jet at Heart’

John Dockery might have suited up for both the Jets and the Steelers during his playing days, but he was pulling for only one team in the AFC Championship Game last January.

“I’m a Jet at heart.  I have the Super Bowl ring here,” he told me this week at the 40th annual Namath/Dockery Football Camp.  “The Steelers have enough of them.  We want another one for the Jets.”

Dockery, a cornerback who started his career with the Jets from 1968-71 and then played two seasons with the Steelers, made an interesting comparison between a current Green & White cornerback and one of his former Steeler teammates.

“I played with a cornerback who is as good as Darrelle Revis — Mel Blount.  Spectacular.  Big guy, long arms and tough,” Dock said.  “Darrelle Revis is a little different, but he’s so quick and he allows Rex to come with the blitz and put pressure.”

The 6’3”, 205-pound Blount, a third-round pick of the Steelers in 1970, was a four-time All-Pro who played in five Pro Bowls and four Super Bowls.  He amassed 57 interceptions and picked off a pass in each of his first 14 seasons before retiring in 1983. 

The 5’11”, 198-pound Revis, selected No. 14 overall by the Jets in 2007, already is a three-time Pro Bowl selection and two-time All-Pro.  But Revis’ interception total stayed at zero in 2010 because opposition quarterbacks rarely threw in his direction.

The Jets collected 12 interceptions last season, a number that tied them for 25th in football.  But Dockery would like to see more of a consistent push up front from a Green & White defensive outfit that amassed 40 sacks in regular-season action.

“I’d like to see more pass rush,” said the Brooklyn, N.Y., native.  “The corners are spectacular, a little help at safety wouldn’t hurt and for Rex Ryan to keep coming the way he’s been coming.”

Count Dockery as another in a long list of folks who have bought into Ryan’s refreshing approach.

“People say, ‘Oh, he talks too much.’  Hey, he’s taken pressure off the team and he believes,” he said.  “Why shouldn’t he talk?  And you know what?  He gets the best out of his players.

“If you’re running an organization like he’s running an organization, with high-octane athletes with egos as big as New York City, you better be able to manage them.  He’s been able to manage different kinds of people and get the most out of them.  I admire him.  He’s a great CEO of a corporation.”

After the Jets’ consecutive appearances in the conference championship game, Dockery believes they’re ready to be super.  Homefield advantage would be a plus next winter and there is no replacement for the experience the Jets have already gained.

“Having the home fans’ support can take you that one extra step, so I think it would be huge for them.  Also having been there twice now, these guys understand it a little bit no matter what they say,” Dock said.  “As you go along and you go to the next level in the playoffs, there’s lots of stuff going on all over the place.  But they’ve been there now and they’re ready for the next step into the Super Bowl.”

Conference Power Meter Pointing at A or N?

Which conference in the National Football League can claim superiority?

The Packers’ 31-25 triumph over the Steelers in Super Bowl XLV means the NFC has now won three of the past four championships after a 6-1 AFC run. It makes you wonder if we are in the midst of a power shift.

But during the regular season, the NFC’s six playoff teams went a combined 14-10 in out-of-conference play while the AFC’s playoff participants went 18-6 against NFC clubs.

The Jets sported a 9-3 in-conference record but owned a .500 record against the NFC North in 2010. They beat the Vikings (29-20, Week 5) and Lions (23-20, OT, Week 9) and lost to the Packers (9-0, Week 8 ) and Bears (38-34, Week 16). If you add up the points in that quartet of close contests, the Jets had a minus-1 scoring margin (86 PF, 87 PA).

Both conferences’ No. 6 seeds — the Jets (2-1) and Packers (4-0) — tasted playoff success without ever playing a single home game as they combined to go 6-1 on the road. And while the Packers were a deserving champion and the Jets finished short of their ultimate goal, it could be argued that Green Bay’s path to Dallas — Philadelphia, Atlanta and Chicago — wasn’t quite as tough as the Jets’ three hurdles — Indianapolis, New England and Pittsburgh.

After all, the Colts (2006, ’09), Pats (’03, ’04 and ’07) and Steelers (’05, ’08, ’10) have won the past seven AFC crowns and their respective quarterbacks — Peyton Manning, Tom Brady and Ben Roethlisberger — haven’t changed and all are headed to have their busts shining in Canton, Ohio. Meanwhile, the Eagles (’04) and Bears (’06) each claimed one conference championship over that same timeframe and each has at QB from Donovan McNabb to Michael Vick and Rex Grossman to Jay Cutler respectively.

If you trace back two seasons, the NFC playoff teams went a combined 15-9 against the AFC during regular-season play. Those teams representing the AFC in the playoffs finished 18-6 in interconference action and both Super Bowl participants (the winning Saints and the AFC-champ Colts) held perfect 4-0 marks out of conference.

In a quarterback-driven league, the AFC still has Brady and Manning, but the former will turn 34 in August and the latter will celebrate his 35th birthday next month. Roethlisberger is set to join Chargers passer Philip Rivers at 29 this March while the Jets figure to be a contender for a long time if 24-year-old Mark Sanchez continues to improve.

There are a pair of really good young signalcallers in the NFC as well. Aaron Rodgers, coming off an MVP performance in the Super Bowl, is 27 and the Falcons’ Matt Ryan is 25. Drew Brees (32), Michael Vick (31 in June) and Eli Manning (30) all still figure to have some good football left ahead and it will be interesting to watch Tampa’s Josh Freeman (23) and St. Louis’ Sam Bradford (23) develop.

In two regular seasons under Rex Ryan, the Jets were 16-8 in AFC play and 4-4 in non-conference affairs. While the Green & White flipped their division record from 2-4 in 2009 to 4-2 in ’10, their NFC mark remained .500. And to play in the ultimate interconference game, the Jets have to win a lot of games in 2011 considering their arch nemeses, the Pats, just captured 14 Ws and were an unblemished 4-0 against the NFC.

If you score by titles alone, the NFC looks like it has caught up with the AFC. Maybe this is just my background talking, but the AFC remains the tougher conference to get through come January. And that’s why the next pivotal step for these Jets is to win their first division title since 2002, guaranteeing themselves at least one home playoff game and possibly a bye as well.

The Jets will lock horns with the NFC East in 2011, hosting both the Cowboys and the G-Men in highly anticipated matchups. Then they’ll also pay visits to the Eagles in Philly and the Redskins in Washington. The Eagles finished 3-1 against AFC teams in 2010 while the other three NFCE teams were .500 (2-2) outside the NFC.

A year after ending one hex in Pittsburgh, the Jets will attempt to get their first-ever regular-season win in Philadelphia. In fact, the NFC East has been painful to New York’s AFC representative over the years. Here are the Jets’ all-time records against their four 2011 NFC East opponents:

Howard Green’s Contribution to Super Win

Howard Green was gracious in victory.

“For the most part, I don’t have anything bad to say about New York,” said the big Green Bay DT that Rex Ryan always calls “Big How’rd.” “I appreciate everything they did for me. This here right now takes care of all that. It’s awesome. This is the biggest stage in the world. I’m just enjoying it and letting it all soak in.”

“This here” was the Packers’ Super Bowl-winning locker room, which as the minutes passed following their 31-25 victory over the Steelers at Cowboys Stadium on Sunday night, took on the feel of a bus terminal at rush hour filling with nitrous oxide. Packers players, coaches and personnel joked and laughed and slapped each other on the back all around the room. Even the reporters milling around wore smiles as their subjects spoke giddily about “returning Lombardi to Lambeau.”

And in the middle of it, after staying out in the stadium in uniform for the longest time to let it soak in, was Green.

Just as he was in the middle of the game’s first big takeaway exchange late in the first quarter.

“I just had to get off on the ball. I had a pass/run read on Kemo,” he said of Pittsburgh LG Chris Kemoeatu, who (perhaps appropriate of nothing) is the kid brother of Ma’ake Kemoeatu, Green’s rookie teammate on the 2002 Ravens. “I had a good bull rush on him, I had my hands in.”

Before Cheeseheads and Terrible Towels knew it, there was No. 95, Big How’rd, crashing into Ben Roethlisberger at the goal line. Big Ben got off a wobbler, intended for WR Mike Wallace but falling well short, into the hands of S Nick Collins at the Pittsburgh 37.

“I’m glad I didn’t get the sack,” Green said. “Nick was faster than I thought he was. By the time I got off the ground, he was already in the end zone. That play was big. That play there put points on the board for our team.”

Collins crashed through black-and-gold-uniformed bodies at the goal line not far from where Green had done the same seconds earlier. Suddenly it was 14-0. No team had ever climbed out of that large a hole in the Super Bowl. And while the Steelers tried their best and trimmed an eventual 18-point deficit to four points and then three, they never got the lead.

It was a twister of a ride for Green to get to Green Bay. As Jets fans remember, he was one of the members of the D-line rotation in Ryan’s first year at the helm. He left as an unrestricted free agent after the season, then returned twice to the Jets in 2010, on Sept. 15 (released Sept. 30) and again Oct. 4 (released Oct. 26).

We heard the stories, that the Jets weren’t happy with Green’s weight gain after his late-September release. Green kind of agreed and didn’t agree with that when he was asked about it during Super Bowl week. But in truth, there are many reasons why players get brought in over the side and tossed back by every team, and we’ll never hear all the reasons from both sides.

As Howard said Sunday night, “I didn’t know what would be my next move” after his final Jets release. “Green Bay gave me a call. It’s a great feeling now. I’m just enjoying it.”

Green has always had the knack for the big play. In his first action back as a Jet this year, Game 3 at Miami, he forced a Ricky Williams fumble and put a fourth-quarter third-down hit on Chad Henne that helped produce an incompletion and keep the Jets in control. In his first game as a Packer, he was in the middle of that fourth-quarter fumbled reverse exchange from LaDainian Tomlinson to Jerricho Cotchery at New Meadowlands.

Then he topped his first season on the Pack with his third straight playoff start and his only stat of the night, the key QB hit on Big Ben.

I asked him what he would tell his former Green & White teammates about the feeling he was enjoying, the one they wanted so badly for themselves and just came up two wins short of savoring as he was in front of me. Green responded with an eye toward not only the Jets but also toward his new line coach, Mike Trgovac, who was the Carolina defensive coordinator when the Panthers yielded 32 points in their Super Bowl XXXVIII loss to the Patriots in early 2004.

“This is an experience of a lifetime. You never forget either end of it, lose or win,” Green said. “Mike Trgovac would always tell us, you don’t want to be on that side of the game, on the losing side. We fixed it for him tonight.”

And shortly after a couple of us helped pull Green’s rack off his body in front of his Cowboys Stadium locker, he got his finger sized for a ring.

More Super Nuggets

As announced Sunday night, when teams have three or more takeaways in a Super Bowl, they are 31-4. Not sure if it was also announced that when teams have a plus-3 or larger takeaway margin in the title game, they are 22-0. … At this morning’s final SB news conferences with Packers coach Mike McCarthy and MVP Aaron Rodgers, commissioner Roger Goodell said that “We have preliminary readings that have come in already that indicate the game will be the most-watched show in the history of television.”

Random Thoughts While Waiting for SBXLV

Sunday has been a very good day for Super Bowl XLV. The sun has come out, the slush on top and the ice underneath has melted in many areas of Dallas, and the fans are already making Cowboys Stadium, that helmet-y, silver construction in Arlington, halfway between Big D and Forth Worth, loud with the noise of a big game ahead.

After some travel issues of my own the previous three days, today went fairly well. The DART light rail train took me to the Sheraton media center, and from there one of the first media buses took me and 40 new friends on Route 30 West to Arlington. The 15-mile trip took about 35 minutes to get onto the roadway around the stadium, then another 15 minutes before we crawled through crowds of Terrible Towels and Cheeseheads before we de-bus and head through the extensive security web to get into the stadium.

Jerry Jones’ palace is impressive. I bring that up because obviously Cowboys Stadium opened up a year earlier than New Meadowlands Stadium. This place is larger, more seats, larger footprint, has taken a different architectural approach than the Jets and Giants did at NMS. That doesn’t make CS better, but it is an impressive piece of work.

I’m in the back row of the “auxiliary press tables” section of the stadium, not a bad seat, all things considered, kind of a midlevel corner end zone seat. The seating is cramped for working media, but I promise not to mention that again.

I’m sitting next to Mike Eisen, my counterpart from the Giants and giants.com whose team has already played in this pigskin palace twice. He just pointed to the famous monster videoboard that hovers over the middle of the field. “The board is so mesmerizing,” Eisen said, “that you find yourself watching that instead of watching the field.”

Different strokes, of course, but so far that is the one thing I prefer at NMS over here. The four boards in the Jets’ new stadium are impressive as well, and none of them is in danger of being hit by a punt. (And Steelers punter Jeremy Kapinos, who we’ll recall as being a Jet for a brief while, just kissed a punt off of the bottom of that videoboard structure while warming up just now.)

The tough part of being a Jets representative in Super Bowl land is that for the past two years, and this year more than last, the Jets were so close to being the team playing in this game. I’ve been getting all the quote sheets all week from the Steelers and Packers to my Jets address. Those Steelers quotes could’ve been the Jets. Half the folks wandering around my Hyatt lobby could’ve been dressed in green and white instead of black and gold.

Nothing new with that observation, but one thing I would like to add to the observation that many Jets and many NFL players always make at this time of year is, “All the hard work we put in and it ended two weeks too soon. And there’s no guarantee we’ll ever get this far again.”

Very true that there’s no guarantee. But two teams every year make it this far, and as for the interminable hard work to get this far, 31 teams have to go through that hard work every year beginning now. In fact, that’s what all NFL teams do at this time of year — work harder than ever to get to the Big Dance. There may or may not be a labor stoppage soon, but regardless, all teams will be on equal footing when the 2011 games resume.

So by no means are the Jets a lock to make it another AFC Championship Game and then to Lucas Oil Stadium and Super Bowl XLVI a year from now. But as Mark Sanchez said Friday, “Third times the charm.”

I’ll be doing some modified tweeting from today’s game, which will begin in less than 90 minutes.

Revis Drops In on Super Bowl, Makes His Pick

Today at Radio Row at the Super Bowl media center in Dallas, Jets cornerback Darrelle Revis stopped by and chatted with various news outlets about the big game on Sunday and this upcoming offseason. With labor talks the hot topic of conversation, Revis told media members about his plan over the next few weeks as the NFL and NFLPA attempt to come to an accord on a new Collective Bargaining Agreement.

“I’m just going to sit back and wait,” Revis said. “I just think that’s the only thing you can do, get information from the agents and the team and just go from there.”

While the three-time Pro Bowler signed his latest contract last summer, many of his teammates can become free agents. Wide receivers Braylon Edwards and Santonio Holmes come to mind, but in Revis’ eyes it’s his partner on the other side of the defense who is also an important piece of the puzzle. Cornerback Antonio Cromartie had three interceptions and led the Green & White in passes defensed this season.

“It would be very important,” Revis said of having “Cro” back. “We need him. He’s made a lot of plays for us. But we’ll see. I don’t know the situation. I know he’s free but I hope we re-sign him because he’s a great corner.”

Cromartie and Revis helped contain both the Packers and Steelers’ potent offenses this season, but Revis knows just how dangerous both Super Bowl teams’ quarterbacks, Aaron Rodgers and Ben Roethlisberger, can be, both in the pocket and when they scramble and make plays with their feet.

“Aaron can scramble as well,” Revis said, “but he’s a very smart quarterback and he picks and chooses to throw it deep or throw it short. I just think to defend Rodgers you have to put pressure on him. But Ben Roethlisberger and their offense, I think they have the edge because they extend plays and they have routes off of their regular routes when he scrambles and that can mess a secondary up if you don’t latch onto the guy for the whole down.”

With the fast track at Cowboys Stadium, Super Bowl viewers may be in for a game that sees a lot of deep passes and Houdini-like escapes by both Rodgers and Roethlisberger. The Green & White have a quarterback of their own in Mark Sanchez who is adept at moving his feet in order to make a big play, and Revis noted that any quarterback that can escape pressure can be effective.

“I think if any quarterback scrambles it’s rough on the secondary,” Revis said. “If there’s really no pressure on him and he looks downfield, he can hurt you. I mean, guys break their routes off, especially the Steelers, they break their routes off. Some guys might be doing an out route and do an out-and-up when they see him scrambling. So they have rules in their offense. I think any quarterback is dangerous when they scramble.”

During the regular season, the Jets and Revis lost at home to Green Bay but beat Pittsburgh on the road, then fell to the Steelers in the AFC Championship Game. That last game clearly impacted No. 24′s pick to win Super Bowl XLV.

“I think I’m going with the Steelers just because they have the experience,” Revis said. “They’ve been there, done that. They’ve won two and the whole team has experience in being in the Super Bowl. I just think overall the experience of their team, you can see it. They go to the playoffs every year, they’re always close to the AFC Championship Game or going to the Super Bowl.”

Sanchez Says No Shoulder Surgery

QB Mark Sanchez is also at the Super Bowl venue now and he told some Jets beat writers this evening that he won’t require surgery on his right shoulder. Sanchez is expected to have a busy Friday on Radio Row and we’ll report on what he tells the nation’s sports talkers, starting with ESPN’s Mike & Mike in the Morning.

Martin Threw 2 Passes, Both on the Money

Another career snapshot of Curtis Martin, who is in the running to be a first-year inductee into the Pro Football Hall of Fame on Feb. 5 in Dallas:

Here’s a list of the starting quarterbacks that Curtis Martin played alongside during his Jets and Patriots careers: Vinny Testaverde, Glenn Foley, Ray Lucas, Rick Mirer, Chad Pennington, Quincy Carter, Brooks Bollinger, Scott Zolak and Drew Bledsoe. During that stretch from 1995-2005 when Martin was active, none of these quarterbacks could say what he could — that they had a perfect passer rating of 158.3.

In the 2000 season and again in 2001, the Jets’ No. 28 threw the ball once for an 18-yard touchdown pass to WR Wayne Chrebet. For his career that makes Martin 2-for-2 for 36 yards and two TDs. Not a bad statistic to go along with the fourth-most rushing yards in NFL history.

The two games in which he threw those passes couldn’t have been any different. The first touchdown pass was the game-winning score in the fourth quarter of the “Flashlight Game” when the 3-0 Jets visited the 3-0 Buccaneers. In the week before that game, Buccaneer wideout and former Jet Keyshawn Johnson referred to himself as a “star” and Chrebet as a “flashlight”.

Martin, who had 120 yards rushing and receiving, had already caught a touchdown pass from Testaverde to bring the Jets within three points with 1:54 to play. Martin then put the Jets ahead for good, 21-17, with his strike in the back of the end zone to Chrebet with 52 seconds left. Afterwards, Key and Curt gave a hug at midfield, as the photo in our centerpiece captures.

A little more than a year later, back in Martin’s hometown of Pittsburgh, the 7-4 Jets faced the 9-2 Steelers in a game that could have drastically improved the Green & White’s playoff status with a victory. Unfortunately, the home team dominated the day, but the highlight for the Jets was Martin’s touchdown pass to Chrebet, which resulted in their only points of the night as they fell 18-7.

Regardless of the outcome, Martin, who had 87 yards rushing and receiving, proved in two important contests that he could be relied on to be a weapon not only on the ground, but also through the air.

Visit the Curtis Martin for Hall of Fame page