He Wouldn't Do This To Us, Would He?

Woody Johnson took over ownership of the Jets in 2000. Since that time, on paper, the Jets haven't been too bad with 6 playoff appearances in 13 seasons.

But it's the way that he's done business that has perplexed and disenfranchised the most loyal and hard-suffering fan base. Now there's talk floating about a possible trade of Darrelle Revis, perhaps the best player ever to put on a Jets uniform.

You know Robert "Woody" Johnson IV, a real American success story. He is of course an heir to the Johnson & Johnson fortune, and has been a major bundler for Mitt Romney and the GOP.

As CEO of a private investment firm, he like Romney hovered above the clouds in the business world, unable to relate to the human element of either those whom he employs or those who have been consuming the product he now owns. He is a multi-billionaire who sees only a bottom line: how to maximize value while slashing costs.

If that means bringing in a relatively inexpensive player like Tim Tebow for a temporary spike in merchandising, bring it on. Nothing against Tebow - I don't love him or hate him. But it didn't matter that the coach didn't want him or his presence wrecked team chemistry.

Then Johnson blamed the Tebow acquisition on recently-fired GM Mike Tannenbaum, who said that Tannenbaum "forced" Tebow on him.

Now Johnson has "no comment" on the Revis trade rumors. The plans to jettison the team's best player (ever) have almost everything to do with his pricetag, and maybe just a little bit to do with his 2010 contract holdout.

The new GM, John Idzik, just came on board so what is he supposed to say? Rex Ryan could stand up for Revis, but he's living on borrowed time with one year to save his job. Rex seems like a principled guy who would go down with the ship, so how could he leave Revis twisting in the wind?

My theory is that it's not just Ryan's job that's on the line here. Woody Johnson has the means and the political playbook to ruin Rex Ryan if he doesn't play ball. What if the info unearthed on Rex and his wife a couple of years back was just a sample? Do you still think Rex would go down with the ship at the cost of his family?

Woody Johnson is going to get his way, and nobody is going to get in the way. Certainly not Revis, Ryan, or those pesky unimportant Jet fans. Bill Parcells read the writing on the wall once Leon Hess put the Jets up for sale in 1999. He resigned. The heir apparent, Bill Belichick, also resigned. He found an owner that was on the same page, and the rest is history.

We see how successful a football team can be when everyone's on the same page. The Jets are all over the map. And it all starts at the top.

Same Old Jets

This has been the mantra of the Jet fan for the last 40 years. A stretch in which they’ve had fewer playoff wins (6) than head coaches (12).

You can change the coach, the culture, the QB, the uniform, the attitude. But the Jets still find unbelievably inventive ways to lose. This week, it was Maurice Jones-Drew sliding down just short of the goal line so the Jaguars could drain the remaining seconds and kick the game-winning FG, which was really essentially an extra point.

You could make the argument during the Jets' 40 years wandering in the desert, that for Bill Parcells’ 3 years in charge the Jets had turned the corner for the turn of the century and were headed in a more positive direction.

Year 1, 1997 – Parcells took Rich Kotite’s sorry 1-15 bunch and made them a 9-7 contender for the playoffs overnight.

Year 2, 1998 – Took the Jets to the AFC Championship game. Had a 10-point lead before succumbing to eventual Super Bowl champion Denver. Enough said.

Year 3, 1999 – After Vinnie Testaverde tears his Achilles tendon in the opener, the Jets start 1-6. But behind 3rd string QB Ray Lucas, the Jets (who had nothing to play for) won 7 of their last 9, beating 5 playoff teams down the stretch to finish 8-8. It was as inspired as I had ever been as a Jet fan.

If Bill Parcells walked up to my front door and told me to “run up that hill!” I would have said “Yes sir!” But Parcells didn’t come to my front door, he walked out the Jets back door in the face of an ownership change.

Parcells installed Bill Belichick as Head Coach, and that lasted 1 day. Belichick took Charlie Weis up to New England and won 3 Super Bowls. But the Jets reverted to that same old script.

Jets fans are generally a pessimistic lot, but my outlook is tempered because I’m still basking in some New York Yankees afterglow, so I gave the Jets and Rex Ryan and Mark Sanchez plenty of slack early.

But halfway through the season, the Jets were 4-4. They were coming off a bye week, and had finally put away those dumb throwback jerseys. I had been tough on their wins, thinking about what they needed to shore up. And I had seen hope in their losses, knowing the razor-thin margin between their .500 start and being 7-1. And star players like Kris Jenkins and Leon Washington were gone for the year.

But now it’s mid-November and as long as you’re still competitive (unlike Eric Mangini’s pitiful Browns), it only matters if you win or lose.

And Jets fans had their hearts broken again. Next stop for the 4-5 Jets...Foxboro. Maybe the Jets can summon a late-game stop, a mistake-free QB performance, or a big play on special teams (god forbid). They'll sweep the Patriots and climb right back into the playoff picture when they return to Jersey. But they probably won't.

"Is a dream a lie if it don't come true, or is there something worse?" Bruce Springsteen, The River