1 hour ago 1

The Jets need to be smarter about avoiding bad Brandon Stephens matchups in key situations

I know I risk entering Captain Obvious territory when I say the Jets covering Mike Evans with Brandon Stephens on the goal line of the team’s Week 3 loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers was a bad idea. The play resulted in am easy Tampa Bay touchdown.

There is something I would like to point out about the play that shows just how bad of a matchup it was for the Jets. The Bucs were in a run play.

You can see a pair of double teams up the middle. This is a run blocking scheme called Duo.

Running back Bucky Irving is also driving forward at the snap as though he is going to receive a handoff. There is no fake from Mayfield so this isn’t play action.

As you are likely aware, there is nothing unusual about a play like this in a modern NFL offense. Quarterbacks, particularly veteran signal callers frequently have the freedom to throw the ball if they see a matchup they like presnap, even if the call is for a run play. Aaron Rodgers did this a lot last year.

I just think it speaks volumes that Mayfield identified this as a mismatch like the rest of us watching at home did.

The Jets really need to be smarter about how they match up with opponents at the goal line because putting Stephens on a receiver of this caliber this close to the end zone is close to an automatic touchdown. In fact I would imagine the Bucs sent Evans isolated to the outside to see whether Stephens would follow him and Mayfield could get an easy touchdown.