Gang Green Nation
The Jets secondary had a rough day at the office in their Week 1 loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers. The sole exception was Sauce Gardner, who did a good job neutralizing DK Metcalf. Gardner drew Metcalf almost exclusively.
This is an interesting development. Under Robert Saleh and Jeff Ulbrich, Gardner rarely traveled. Gardner lined up almost exclusively on the left side of the defense and took whichever receiver came in his direction. Of course, this arrangement was easy to understand. The Jets had a high end number two corner in DJ Reed who could be trusted with most assignments.
With Reed gone and the Jets playing a higher proportion of man coverage, it makes sense for Gardner to start lining up more frequently against the other team’s top wide receiver. The Jets are paying Gardner $30.1 million per year on his new contract. The way they can extract the most value from that deal is having him take on the other team’s top target.
Interesting, Aaron Glenn in Detroit was not known for having his top corner follow the opponent’s top wide receiver on most weeks. Having a talent like Gardner tends to make you reconsider things, though.
