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Sauce Gardner called the Jets secondary’s performance “unacceptable.”
He described giving up 34 points as “depressing.”
It was one of few negatives in the season-opening loss to the Steelers, along with Xavier Gipson’s fumble and a few costly penalties, but it ruined a strong day from the offense and an encouraging performance by quarterback Justin Fields.
The group has to recover quickly.
Josh Allen and the high-powered Bills visit MetLife Stadium on Sunday.
In Week 1, Buffalo put up 41 points and 389 yards through the air against the Ravens in a dramatic come-from-behind victory.
The Jets couldn’t stop Aaron Rodgers, despite the Steelers managing just 53 rushing yards.
Rodgers, 41, threw four touchdown passes, looking better than he ever did as a Jet.
One of the main culprits was newcomer Brandon Stephens, a former Raven the Jets signed to a three-year, $36 million deal in the offseason.
Rodgers went after him.
According to Pro Football Focus, Stephens was targeted seven times and allowed five receptions for 60 and two touchdowns.
The replacement for D.J. Reed was also called for a critical defensive pass interference penalty on the Steelers’ game-winning field goal drive.
“Brandon has been doing a really good job in coverage, all through training camp,” coach Aaron Glenn said. “The thing we have to continue working on with him is being able to locate and finish on the ball. I am encouraged and I do think as the season progresses he’ll be able to make those plays because he’s a really good cover guy and that showed [Sunday] on tape.”
The concern with Stephens is he is coming off a shaky year.
PFF rated him the 100th cornerback out of 116 graded.
He allowed 72 receptions for 926 yards and five touchdowns.
That trend continued on Sunday.
Stephens wasn’t alone in his struggles.
Tony Adams and Michael Carter II had rough days as well, not only in coverage, but with some killer missed tackles.
Glenn felt the Jets secondary was solid in man-to-man coverage, but was picked apart in zone coverage.
Inside linebacker Jamien Sherwood faulted the defense’s lack of communication in coverage, not giving credit to something the Steelers did well.
“Secondary-wise, there are some things that we have to clean up,” Glenn said.
Gardner was the lone defensive back to excel.
He shadowed star wideout DK Metcalf, which he has rarely done in his career.
Metcalf only caught one pass with Gardner defending him, according to PFF, and that was an 11-yard grab in which Metcalf caught the ball after it was deflected multiple times.
Gardner also had two pass breakups.
“In my career, I was able to do that on a number of occasions, and man, to me, it makes it really easy for the defender because you can really study and hone in on that guy that you’re going against,” Glenn said. “I know that’s exactly what Sauce did, and there are going to be some games where we want him to be able to do that and there are going to be some games where we’re going to say, ‘play right and left.’ But it depends on the matchup, it depends on what we want to do on defense.”
However the Jets deploy Gardner, they are going to need their other defensive backs to play better.
Otherwise, opposing teams will simply stay away from Gardner.
It worked out pretty well for the Steelers, and now here come the Bills and Allen, who completed at least four passes to five different receivers.
The Jets secondary is going to get tested frequently by the reigning MVP.
