Does Geno Smith deserve blame for NY Jets’ Week 2 collapse?

After soaking in a Week 1 victory last week, New York Jets fans woke up with a much different feeling this time around, one that is all too familiar: disappointment.

Going from a double-digit fourth-quarter lead to losing in overtime to the Green Bay Packers was frustrating for the team’s fanbase, especially given how winnable the game was.

The Jets had an opportunity to steal a victory from a sputtering, banged-up team to start 2-0 for the first time in over a decade, and they squandered it.

How much blame does their starting quarterback deserve?

While he wasn’t as effective as in Week 1, quarterback Geno Smith certainly played well enough for the Jets to win against Green Bay.

Smith wasn’t great, but he was good enough

Smith completed 27 of his 41 passing attempts (65.9%) for 247 yards (6.0 yards per attempt), one touchdown, and zero interceptions. His adjusted completion rate was 82.4%, and he posted a 90.2 passer rating.

Among quarterbacks who have played before Monday Night Football this week, he ranks eighth in adjusted completion percentage (82.4%) and 18th in EPA (Expected Points Added) per dropback (+0.02).

He wasn’t as dominant as he was a week ago, but Smith’s outing was still good enough for the Jets to come away with a win. He didn’t have any turnovers and threw the ball accurately on a rainy afternoon, despite being asked to make up for a non-existent run game.

The Jets’ running backs combined for just 36 yards on 21 carries (1.7 yards per carry). That left Smith facing longer third downs, and it was much harder to keep the offense multi-dimensional. Still, on third downs, the Jets were much better than last week, going 8 of 19 on Sunday (42.1%) after finishing 2 of 12 (16.7%) in the opener.

In the third quarter, Smith led a 10-play, 70-yard touchdown drive to give his team a 14-7 lead. Late in the fourth, he got the offense to midfield with a chance to win it in regulation, but the run game blew it with back-to-back run stuffs, leading to the turnover on downs. What more could you ask from Smith?

As the game continued to go on, it became more and more obvious that Smith wasn’t to blame. The team’s offensive sequence at the end of regulation sums it up.

After two completions to Garrett Wilson, the Jets were up to their own 49-yard line, and they needed two yards for a first down. Despite the passing attack working and the run game struggling mightily (especially inside), Frank Reich dialed up two consecutive inside runs, which failed to generate a new set of downs.

Sure, there were some plays earlier in the game that Smith could have made, but all in all, he did his job. Once the passing game finally hit its stride in the fourth quarter and the Jets had a chance to secure the win, the ball was taken out of his hands. There’s nothing he can do about that.

Aaron Glenn had another chance to give Smith a possession before overtime, too, but he elected to let the regulation clock run out with the ball in Green Bay’s hands, despite having two timeouts. The Packers let the clock drain, took a delay-of-game penalty, and attempted a Hail Mary with two seconds left after running the clock off for a minute or so.

The Jets had just moved the ball to midfield on their previous possession, and Glenn still didn’t want to give the unit an extra chance.

Then came overtime. The Jets won the ball and elected to receive, only for Smith to be sacked on back-to-back plays, with a false start penalty setting up third-and-30. New York was forced to punt on the next play, and Green Bay hit a game-winning field goal on the ensuing possession.

Smith is the type of quarterback who has cost his team games because of his aggressive approach, but Sunday certainly wasn’t one of them.

Can he play better? Absolutely, but he was far from a key culprit behind Sunday’s loss.