Now that much of the noise from the Baryon Edwards arrest has subsided, the drama-queen Jets can turn their attention away from off-the-field calamity and toward their pivotal showdown for first place in the AFC East against the Dolphins on Sunday night at Sun Life Stadium.
This is, after all, what we're all here for, isn't it?
One day after Rex Ryan spent nearly his entire 20-minutes press conference answering questions about Edwards with not a single question asked about Sunday's game - other than injuries - some semblance of normalcy returned to the building yesterday: Football was the topic of football jersey
most conversations.
The focus for the 1-1 Jets is beating the 2-0 Dolphins, not reacting to the mess Edwards got himself into.
Right guard Brandon Moore was relieved that, "for the first time in like two weeks nothing was brought up," yesterday by Ryan or the team's media-relations department, "that could be some sort of distraction.
"Guys in the locker room have the ability to block that stuff out," Moore said. "When Sunday comes there are no excuses. That's not even a concern of mine. The concern I have is that guys have learned lessons and none of this will happen again."
What the Jets are hoping will not happen again is another loss to Miami. They have lost three straight to the Dolphins.
"It's personal," Jets injured linebacker Calvin Pace said of the Miami sweep in 2009.
"There's still a wound there," Jets tackle Wayne Hunter said. "We made it all the way to the AFC Championship game and we still had a feeling of being unsatisfied because we didn't beat Miami even once. Even if we had gotten to the Super Bowl it still would have bothered me that we didn't beat Bills jersey
Miami."
The first three games on the Jets' schedule have been staring them in the face for months. Baltimore is a legitimate Super Bowl contender. New England has owned the AFC East seemingly since the Nixon administration.
And the Dolphins have owed the Jets in the last three meetings.
A lot of players believe how the team handles these first three games will go a long way toward determining where they go the rest of the season.
"Guys understand this is a tough stretch and that we've got to perform well," Moore said. "As much as we've been saying we're a great team, we have to perform well against these teams."
The Jets, playing at home in their first two games, lost by a point to Baltimore and dusted New England in the second half.
Now comes Miami. A win gives them a 2-1 record and a 2-0 mark in the division.
If the Jets are going to win, they're going to have to do it without Darrell Revise, their best defensive player, who's out with a hamstring injury. They, too, go into the game with the playing time of Edwards up in the air.
The Jets, who have had a tumultuous week already with the distraction of the Edwards arrest dominating Tuesday and Wednesday, believe they can overcome these issues.
Ryan can't seem to overstate the importance of 49ers jersey
division games, viewing them as a game-and-a-half in the standings.
"It's a huge, huge game for us," Ryan said. "If we win, we're half a game in front and if we lose it we're 2 1/2 games behind [the Dolphins].
"Obviously the fact that we were 0-2 against them last year is a burr in my saddle," Ryan went on. "It's a new year and it better have new results."
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