Geno Smith has been one of the biggest reasons why the New York Jets have been watchable this season, unlike a year ago.

By no means has he been perfect, but at the very least, the veteran has brought stability and strong accuracy, which the Jets didn’t have in 2025 by any stretch of the imagination.

Looking at his numbers so far, though, an interesting contradiction stands out. He’s arguably been the best QB in the league at completing passes under pressure, but he’s also been highly vulnerable to sacks.

Why is that?

Smith’s under-pressure numbers are intriguing

Let’s start with the good.

This season, Smith has completed 64.5% of his passes this season when pressured, which leads the league. No other qualified QB has completed more than 57% of their passes under pressure, so Smith is not only No. 1 in that metric; he is pretty much isolated at the top.

Also, his pressured reps are a pretty large sample size; it’s not just like he is a merchant of being in a small amount of pressured situations and excelling in those select moments. He has been under pressure on 42.7% of his dropbacks this season, the third-highest mark in the league.

When he was first brought in this offseason, one of the biggest questions regarded how he would fare under pressure, especially given his struggles in that regard with the Las Vegas Raiders last season.

This year, when he has gotten a throw off, the QB has looked solid. That’s key, because 25.7% of Smith’s pressures have turned into sacks this season, which is the third-highest among starting QBs.

It’s just such an interesting contradiction. Smith is an experienced quarterback who has historically thrived from the pocket, but it’s still impressive to see him remain composed under pressure and stay accurate.

Still, he’s also taken a lot of sacks, which lead to negative plays and push the offense back. Sure, the offensive line deserves some criticism for that, but the QB is certainly not absolved of blame.

Implications vs. Miami

This creates such an interesting matchup for Sunday’s game against the Miami Dolphins.

While Smith has struggled to avoid sacks when pressure collapses this year, the Dolphins have had the complete opposite problem on defense. They haven’t been able to finish sacks.

Miami has converted just four of their 59 pressures into sacks this season (6.8%), the lowest rate in the NFL. That is also one of the lowest pressure-to-sack conversion rates by any defense in the past decade. The Dolphins’ four sacks this season are dead last in the league.

If Miami does generate pressure, it will be interesting to see which trend prevails. While the Dolphins remain winless, New York, at 2-4, needs every advantage they can get in what’s a must-win game for them.

The pressure is on the Jets’ offensive line to hold up for Smith, but it’s also on the QB to get the ball out in a timely manner.

At the end of the day, he hasn’t particularly gotten the ball out quickly. In three of the Jets’ six games this season, his average time to throw has exceeded 3.00 seconds, while in the other three, it hasn’t fallen below 2.85 seconds. For context, the league average is right around 2.86 seconds.

Against a Miami defense, though, that has had this much trouble getting quarterbacks to the ground, the Jets really shouldn’t be putting themselves in too many third-and-long situations because of avoidable sacks. That, frankly, is the blueprint for how to hand a 0-5 team, like the Dolphins, their first win of the season.

If the Jets capitalize on the simple things and limit their penalty yardage, they should take care of business against the Dolphins. But against a defense that has struggled this much to generate pressure, there’s really no excuse to let sacks limit the offense.