Next Tuesday’s press conference featuring Jets owner Woody Johnson and Jets coach Rex Ryan will be the franchise’s most anticipated non-football event since officially introducing the quarterback they never used.
This time, the anticipation comes from the fact that the Jets intentionally delayed the media availability in defiance of league rules. And while the actual press conference is coming only a few days after the mandatory one-week window for a postseason postmortem from the head coach, the Professional Football Writers of America have filed a formal complaint with the NFL.
“We have been assured the league is looking into it,” PFWA President Mark Gaughan, who covers the Bills for the Buffalo News, told the Associated Press. “We’ll await word from the NFL.”
The Jet deferred any comment to the NFL. The NFL has declined to speculate on what the penalty for delayed access will be.
The Jets welcome attention when they want it, which is pretty much always (except this week). If the league won’t force them to comply with the rule (and the league should), the NFL should impose a penalty so significant that no franchise will in the future choose silence and the relative parking ticket that goes along with it.