Jets Vs Jaguars TNF Special Preview

 As the Jets come off of one of the most difficult losses of the year and their worst stretch throughout the 2022 season, they remain at home with their playoff hopes on the line in primetime against a surging team in the Jacksonville Jaguars. To make it that much better, it'll be nationally televised as it is this week's Amazon Prime Thursday Night Football matchup. For both of these teams, their playoff lives are within the balance and consider tonight's game as a must win in order to keep their 2022 playoff hopes alive. 

With the playoffs being a bigger topic now towards this point in the year, let's review where the Jets stand now and what results would wager big this week. Currently, as it stands, the Jets are two spots out of a wild card, only trailing the Patriots in the hunt based on losing to them twice this year. The last two wild card spots are currently owned by the Miami Dolphins and Los Angeles Chargers, so their matchups will weigh heavy on the Jets this week assuming the Jets can find a way to win. The most ideal scenario that could see the Jets back in the playoff picture would be a Jets win tonight mixed with A Patriots loss (they play the Bengals at home), and either a loss by the Dolphins (Green Bay at home on Christmas day) or the Chargers (Monday Night Football in Indy against the Colts) or losses by both of them. If this happens, the Jets would be back in a wild card spot by the end of week 16, and in a good position going forward. 

The Jets would be smart to play run heavy with
both RBs Michael Carter (Left)
and Zonovan "Bam" Knight (Middle)
and to feature more of TE CJ Uzomah (Right)
in the red zone after his big performance last week

For tonight's injury report, starting with the Jaguars, they will be missing a few key defensive pieces along with some hiccups offensively as well. Jags Rookie and first overall pick of the 2022 draft LB Trayvon Walker is out tonight with an ankle injury, along with former Jets DE Foley Fatukasi, who also has an ankle injury. OT Cam Robinson is also out for the Jaguars tonight with a knee injury as well. Five players are listed as questionable, one of them being star QB Trevor Lawrence, but they more than likely will all play with the importance of tonight's game. 

For the Jets injury report, it is worth noting that QB Mike White has yet to be cleared from doctors to play as he has a broken rib, so he will be out tonight leaving QB Zach Wilson to pick up another start. Along with White being out, WRs Denzel Mims and Jeff Smith are both out with a concussion and knee injury respectively. Along with them, CB Brandin Echols is also out tonight with a quadriceps injury as well. Three Jets are listed as questionable, and that includes Safety Lamarcus Joyner (Hip), DT Quinnen Williams (calf) and RB Zonovan "Bam" Knight (ankle), but it would be safe to assume that all three of these guys end up playing and that Joyner and Williams return this week. Along with them, WR Corey Davis returns tonight after missing last week's game with a concussion that he suffered early in the game in Buffalo two weekends ago. Ultimately, injuries are starting to pile up in this later half of the season. 

For a team preview today, the Jaguars come into this game being winners in three of their last four matchups and have continued to excel on the offensive end. They are led by second year QB and former Clemson QB Trevor Lawrence. He has had nothing short of an outstanding year, and is starting to excel in his second year in the NFL. He already has 24 TD's thrown to just 7 INTs, and is starting to learn from lots of the mistakes he made during his rookie season. With better coaching and better players around him, it all adds up. In the backfield, The Jags will feature a combo between RBs Travis Etienne Jr. and former 49ers RB JaMycal Hasty. Etienne has continued to grow this year after spending all of the 2021 season on the sidelines with injuries. Etienne is a hard aggressive runner who has gelled into this offense very well, and will without a doubt be the feature RB tonight for Jacksonville. In the passing game, Lawrence has two solid options at WR in Christian Kirk and Zay Jones, who have continued to improve as this season has progressed, along with TE Evan Engram, who has been a security blanket target for Lawrence over the past few weeks especially. 

Jets WR Corey Davis will return tonight
from concussion protocol

Defensively is where the Jags have struggled, and they are vulnerable to giving up a lot of points, especially in the secondary. Up front, they'll have Adam Gotsis and Roy Robertson-Harris at DEs with DaVon Hamilton at DT, none of which are particularly big pass rushers. The LB position is one of the stronger parts of this defense, where LB Josh Allen is a leader and rounds out this defense, and usually LB Trayvon Walker too, although he won't be playing tonight. In the secondary, they are young and inexperienced but are slowly improving with time. Their main corner is CB Tyson Campbell, who is young, but has shown signs of improvement early in his career. On the other side, they'll have Montaric Brown. Their main safety is Rayshawn Jenkins, who is coming off having the game-winning pick-six against the Cowboys in their win last week. Ultimately, this defense has a lot of holes and the Jets will have a great opportunity to expose their defense, regardless of who's playing and not playing. 

For the Jets to come out and win tonight, if the defense can continue to play as they've played most of this season, I can't see any reason why this Jaguars offense will expose them. The defense broke down badly once in last week's game which proved costly in the loss to the Lions. If the defense can eliminate any big plays like that broken coverage TD pass to Brock Wright, they should be in good shape for this game. The main concern for the Jets will come at the QB position, as fans aren't sure what they will get out of second year QB Zach Wilson. Tonight will be a good opportunity for Wilson to flourish against a weaker defensive team and If they are able to get a decent amount of points on the board, it should do enough for the Jets to get the win. With the rainy conditions set in store for tonight, it might not be a bad idea to play a run heavy offense and feature more of RBs Zonovan "Bam" Knight and Michael Carter, as last week, the run was almost forgotten about. Knight led all Jets rushers with only 23 yards rushing, which will need to improve this week in order to find success for a rainy Thursday Night game. I'm not saying to not pass the ball, but playing conservative football with an exposable defense could do the Jets a solid and find themselves posting points on the board. 

For this week's prediction, the weather will definitely make an impact to both teams offensively, and because of that, I do see this as a low scoring game. However, with the Jets season on the line, I do have confidence that the Jets will find a way to pull out this win tonight, even without a ton of points being scored. Jack and I will be in attendance with one of our friends who is also an avid Jets fan as well. With that said, I say the luck is on our side and home field advantage will prove to be big in this game. I'll take the Jets to win by a score of 17-14. 

-Miles Chamberlain  

Tonight's Thursday Night Football matchup will
feature the top two picks from the 2021 NFL Draft Class
(Wilson at number 2 and Lawrence at number 1)