PITTSBURGH – The biggest impact Davante Adams made during his first game in a New York Jets jersey Sunday wasn’t a catch or a run or even a block. It was a tackle.
Adams caught three passes for 30 yards – none in the second half – on nine targets. His most impressive play came on Beanie Bishop Jr.’s second interception of Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers to officially put New York (2-5) in the danger zone during the Jets’ 37-15 loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers (5-2) on “Sunday Night Football.”
The newest Jet is learning quickly that the Gang Green lifestyle rarely mirrors expectations.
“We just got to nut up and figure it out,” Adams said. “That’s what football is about. You don’t get 20 opportunities.”
At least Adams’ night went better than his fellow Jets wideout Garrett Wilson, who let the ball bounce off his chest and into the arms of Bishop Jr., who ran the ball all the way back to the Jets’ 1-yard line. Had Adams not made a dash the other way and leapt onto Bishop Jr.’s back, the play could have been returned for a touchdown. Wilson had another drop in the red zone and placed the blame for the Jets’ fourth consecutive defeat on himself.
All things Jets: Latest New York Jets news, schedule, roster, stats, injury updates and more.
“I got to catch the damn ball. I’m playing like (expletive) right now. I got to fix it. I don’t take it light (sic). I felt like it was the reason we lost the game. (Expletive) can’t happen. Can’t happen.
“I let the guys down today. I let the team down. It’s that simple.”
Wilson said the mistakes are a culmination of bad habits and not attacking the football in the air during games.
“I got good hands. I got to use my hands to catch the damn – to catch the ball,” he said.
The first play from scrimmage for the Jets offense was an almost too-predictable five-step drop from Rodgers to Adams – the former Green Bay Packers teammates reunited this past week – on a comeback route. Rodgers misplaced the ball a step too far to the sideline and it hit off Adams’ hands for an incompletion.
“I wouldn’t say rust,” Adams said when asked what his connection with Rodgers was like after the pair spent more than two seasons apart. “Obviously we can continue to get on a better page.
“It’s football. It doesn’t always work perfectly.”
The duo’s first connection as Jets came with seven minutes left in the first quarter for a pickup of 9 yards. Later in the quarter, Adams stumbled while breaking out of his route over the middle with the Jets behind the sticks on a second down. The ball sailed over his head and Rodgers looked perplexed – and for a flag.
“We just shot ourselves in the foot a couple times,” Adams said.
Practice during the week went well, Adams said, following the transaction Tuesday that sent a conditional third-round pick (that could turn into a second rounder) to the Las Vegas Raiders in exchange for his All-Pro services. The deal went down exactly one week after owner Woody Johnson fired Robert Saleh. The former coach’s ouster came following the team’s loss to the Minnesota Vikings in London.
“You could see the great synergy, the relationship that they had and the same page they’re on,” interim head coach Jeff Ulbrich said. “At the same time, it’s been a second since they played together. As we go forward, that relationship and the production between those two will go up.”
The arrival of Adams ostensibly will lead to a decrease in targets for Wilson, previously Rodgers’ primary option. Wilson (five catches, 61 yards) caught a two-point conversion from Rodgers with 5:29 to go in the first half to make it 15-6. The Steelers scored 31 unanswered points over the remainder of the game.
Near the showers in the visitor’s locker room at Acrisure Stadium, Rodgers and Wilson crossed paths. The 40-year-old signal-caller brought the third-year receiver in for an embrace. Rodgers said he told Wilson, who had nine targets to tie with running back Breece Hall for the team lead, that he would keep coming back to him.
“He’s a dynamic player,” Rodgers said. “We need to target him. Obviously nobody feels sicker than him about that play.”
Even as the game slipped away from the Jets, Adams found himself looking around the offensive huddle with promise.
“That’s almost what pisses you off even more,” Adams said, “knowing that you got these types of weapons and to come up short and put up 15 points against a team – I don’t want to take anything away from (the Steelers) – but I feel like a lot of it had a lot to do with what we did to ourselves.”
With two star wideouts and plenty of veteran help at the position in Mike Williams and Allen Lazard, Jets offensive play caller Todd Downing and Rodgers have options galore. Everybody is well aware not every play can go to the new No. 17.
“Today could have been my day. I’m ready to rock now,” Adams said. “Part of it is we got a lot of playmakers.”
For Wilson, the Jets’ issues don’t have to do with personnel, which makes the situation less frustrating, he said.
“I think it makes it like, ‘We can go fix this,’” Wilson said. “We got to go about stuff the right way. … It’s still all in front of us, and at some point, if we want to get to where we want to go, we got to go on a run. And we got to do it now.”
Ulbrich offered the refrain “we’ll take a hard look at it” when asked if he should have eased Adams into the game plan more instead of playing him nearly the entire game. It was also how he answered a question about Wilson’s performance.
That’s not a bad idea for anyone associated with the Jets.