JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – After an embarrassing loss to Seattle last week, the Jaguars’ schedule gets a lot more difficult this week with Buffalo coming to town.
The Bills (5-2) are one of the top teams in the AFC and have Super Bowl aspirations. The Jaguars on the other hand, have a 1-6 record. Any momentum they had after the London game is long gone. With that in mind, this week’s Four factors will be a little different. Instead of four factors to win the game, this will be four factors to at least be competitive. A win this week may be asking for a lot.
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Have the good Josh Allen
Both teams on Sunday will have a Josh Allen taking the field. During Jaguars Josh Allen’s rookie season there was a Twitter joke that the Jaguars had “The good Josh Allen.”
Well, the Bills’ Josh Allen has taken his play to a new level over the past few seasons so that joke went out the window. But the Jaguars’ Josh Allen can still be the good Josh Allen.
Last week against the Seahawks, Allen had possibly his best game of the season. The Jaguars will need him to have an even more impactful game this week. Plus, it would be nice to be able to say Josh Allen sacks Josh Allen. It’s the little things, you know?
Everyone do their job
There has been a consistent message from the Jaguars defensive coaches and veteran players that everyone needs to “Do their Job.”
Jaguars defensive coordinator Joe Cullen said, “My dad taught me, God rest his soul, if you have a job, whatever it is, you do your job, don’t worry about his job, don’t worry about the guy behind you’s job, you do your job.”
I agree with the message. Every player should do their job, but that seems to be an increasingly difficult challenge for the Jags players. Last week the defense had multiple 12 men on the field penalties and Cullen said “it starts with me. The packages? No, we have four of them. It’s not hard.”
Let me break that down the Jaguars have FOUR packages on defense and players are still struggling to know when they should be on the field. Not five or six, not 10 or 11. FOUR.
When I played football in high school and college we had more than four packages. The Jaguars coaching staff needs to make sure that every player can “do their job” on Sunday, and maybe even do it at a high level.
Someone help Trevor … anyone
No. 1 overall picks are normally thrust into situations where they have to carry a heavy load for their team, but this just seems absurd. If James Robinson can’t go on Sunday, Lawrence has no one he can trust on the offense. Dan Arnold has turned into the team’s second option in the passing game. Arnold is a solid tight end but he is not a second option on a good offense. Trevor has no help.
The wide receiver room has struggled to create consistent separation and they have had a series of dropped passes over the past few weeks. Someone has to step up. At this point, it can be anyone. Trevor needs help from someone. Maybe they can steal a page from the Atlanta Falcons and move Laviska Shenualt (6-1, 227 pounds) into a Cordarrelle Patterson (6-2, 220 pounds) running back-type role. It may not work but at this point what do they have to lose?
Get lucky
Look there is no way around it. The Bills are the better team. They have a physically more talented roster and a better coaching staff. If the Jaguars are going to have a chance at keeping Sunday’s game close, it will take luck. It took Matthew Wright kicking two career-long field goals in the final minutes against the Dolphins for a losing streak-breaking win. That sounds like luck to me. The Dolphins just lost 26-11 to the Bills. So, everyone get out those four-leaf clovers and lucky horseshoes for Sunday’s game because the Jaguars will need every bit of luck they can get.