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It’s getting a little ridiculous. Once you retire from a team, and move into the media, your emotions need to be put in neutral.
Whether it’s Tedy Bruschi, Willie McGinest or Rodney Harrison, they seem to have a hard time leaving their New England pom-poms in the closet.
They wear their bias on their sleeves.
Harrison made news over the weekend for a remark he made about the Jets on NBC Sports Radio.
“The Jets are, all of a sudden, on a high thinking they’re going to win a championship,” Harrison said. “You’re not going to win a championship, you’re not even going to make the playoffs, because you don’t have a quarterback. If you go into the season and you’re expecting Geno Smith to improve, it’s not going to happen. He might get a little better, but when times get tough, when adversity hits, guess what he’s going to do? He’s going to fold just like the last couple years.”
Aside from his Patriots bias coming through here via his venom towards the Jets, a lot of what he said doesn’t make a lot of sense.
First of all, I talk to people around the Jets all the time. At no point, over the last month, since some of these new players were added, like Darrelle Revis and Brandon Marshall, have the Jets said anything about winning a championship. And there has been zero cockiness from their brass. I interviewed Woody in Phoenix. He talked about how much work they still have to do. That was the narrative he was pushing.
Harrison is imagining this through his Patriots-colored glasses.
Perhaps he’s mad a Revis for bolting Foxboro after one year.
So you can throw his premise that the Jets think they are going to win a championship based on their work in free agency by the curb. That air isn’t emanating from Florham Park at all.
This is a bogus angle.
Don’t get me wrong, they do feel they have improved, but their aren’t getting their fingers fit for Super Bowl rings just yet. They know they have a lot of work to do.
To me, Harrison didn’t distinguish himself with this comment that wasn’t based on anything tangible.
And for him to say Geno Smith isn’t going to improve. Does he have a crystal ball?
Perhaps he won’t, but Smith was thrown to the fire in his first two seasons. Forced to start before he was ready. Perhaps this trial-by-fire, and on-the-job training, will help him in Year Three. We shall see.
Harrison went on to say the Jets’ only salvation would be to pick a quarterback in the draft. If not, Harrison surmised, they are going to win 5 or 6 games.
“I don’t believe in Geno Smith. Hopefully in this draft, they try to address this quarterback situation, because if they go into the season with Geno Smith they might win five or six games.”
That is a foolish theory.
Should they pick a quarterback in the draft? Probably. But to expect that player to be their best chance in 2015, to win more games than Smith or Ryan Fitzpatrick is foolish. The kid most likely will be lost this year.
Harrison seemed to be angry in his commentary. Like he hates the Jets.
He needs to forget his playing days in New England when he puts on his commentator hat.
March 30, 2015
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