JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The Jaguars aren’t playing good football right now. Sunday was basically the nightmare before Christmas. Here are my Four Cents takeaways from a 30-12 blowout loss.
A 180 from last December
Recommended Videos
This season has been the exact opposite of the Jaguars from a year ago. Last season, the team started slow and then figured it out late in the season on their way to the playoffs. This year, the Jaguars got a fast start to the season and it all fell apart in December. No wins so far this month. And the way this team is playing, it is tough to pencil in any wins the rest of the way.
Jaguars have lost all momentum
In sports we like to talk about momentum when it is positive but there is also negative momentum. And right now the Jaguars’ season is rolling out of control in the wrong direction. Can they fix it in the last two weeks of the year. Probably not. There are fundamental problems with this team.
Weak in the trenches
Games are won and lost in the trenches. Every old football coach will tell you that and it is still true today. If I could see Trevor Lawrence’s Christmas letter to Santa, I bet right at the top it would be asking him to bring him an offensive line. The problem is that there isn’t a new O line that is going to be under the tree for the Jaguars on Christmas morning. This season, Lawrence has been sacked more than any other year of his career. Let that sink in because his rookie season, they won three games. The O line this year has given him less time to work with than that.
Is Trevor good enough?
I know there are a lot of takes flying around about Lawrence’s play and if he has been good enough. I think he will tell you that he hasn’t been good enough this year. But this shouldn’t be some referendum on Lawrence not being the guy in the future. You don’t have to look much farther than the team that beat the Jaguars on Sunday. Buccaneers quarterback Baker Mayfield was the No. 1 pick back in 2018. It didn’t work out for him in Cleveland.
Now, he is in Tampa playing good football and probably going to get a pretty big contract. It’s not that Mayfield didn’t have talent, he just needed the right situation. That is the same thing Lawrence needs. And while a late season collapse may not be fun, it is the best shock to the system to the people in charge. This swoon will make sure they don’t just try and run it back next year with the same players. They need to improve the team and the situation in Jacksonville.