Rex Ryan, humbled? Say it ain't so!
With Ryan's Bills 7-8 and out of the playoff race, and with the team he had coached for the previous six seasons—Your New York Jets—rolling into Ralph Wilson Stadium on Sunday with a chance to clinch a postseason berth, Ryan is eating crow.
Somebody get the guy a bib. This is remarkable stuff.
"I think we got a great thing going here," Ryan told WGR radio in Buffalo on Monday, via ESPN.com's Mike Rodak. "We just didn't produce the wins I thought we would.
"The thing that kind of gives this team a black eye when we're looking at it is that I let my mouth get ahead of everything. And I think if I would have come in there and just said, 'Hey, we're gonna compete,' and do all that stuff, maybe we wouldn't have such a bad feeling about this team.
"This team doesn't deserve that. This team has fought, and they've played extremely hard. We've had a lot of things happen this year where we've felt, where we've came up short. There's no question about it. But I think I could have handled it differently."
ALSO: Bowles says there's 'no pressure' on Jets
Ryan had missed the playoffs in his last four seasons with the Jets, but he came sweeping into Buffalo this year much the way he did with the Jets in 2009: By making bold promises. At his introductory press conference back in January, Ryan declared, in no uncertain terms, that the Bills would go back to the playoffs this year for the first time since 1999.
In a scene had to look familiar to Jets fans, Ryan's bluster had the entire Western New York region eating out of the palm of his hand this offseason. But where Ryan once had the credibility of two AFC Championship Game runs in his first two seasons with the Jets, he had no such track record in his second act with the Bills. And after Ryan failed to deliver this year—with a team that went 9-7 and had a terrific defense last season—the fans and the media there began to turn on him.
And now Ryan might have to stand there and watch the franchise that
fired him one year ago this week wrap up its first playoff spot in five
seasons—in his own house, no less. Has to hurt. You better believe it.
And things.
With Ryan's Bills 7-8 and out of the playoff race, and with the team he had coached for the previous six seasons—Your New York Jets—rolling into Ralph Wilson Stadium on Sunday with a chance to clinch a postseason berth, Ryan is eating crow.
Somebody get the guy a bib. This is remarkable stuff.
"I think we got a great thing going here," Ryan told WGR radio in Buffalo on Monday, via ESPN.com's Mike Rodak. "We just didn't produce the wins I thought we would.
"The thing that kind of gives this team a black eye when we're looking at it is that I let my mouth get ahead of everything. And I think if I would have come in there and just said, 'Hey, we're gonna compete,' and do all that stuff, maybe we wouldn't have such a bad feeling about this team.
"This team doesn't deserve that. This team has fought, and they've played extremely hard. We've had a lot of things happen this year where we've felt, where we've came up short. There's no question about it. But I think I could have handled it differently."
ALSO: Bowles says there's 'no pressure' on Jets
Ryan had missed the playoffs in his last four seasons with the Jets, but he came sweeping into Buffalo this year much the way he did with the Jets in 2009: By making bold promises. At his introductory press conference back in January, Ryan declared, in no uncertain terms, that the Bills would go back to the playoffs this year for the first time since 1999.
In a scene had to look familiar to Jets fans, Ryan's bluster had the entire Western New York region eating out of the palm of his hand this offseason. But where Ryan once had the credibility of two AFC Championship Game runs in his first two seasons with the Jets, he had no such track record in his second act with the Bills. And after Ryan failed to deliver this year—with a team that went 9-7 and had a terrific defense last season—the fans and the media there began to turn on him.
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