Tight end Dustin Keller opted to ditch the Jets after the expiration of his rookie deal, signing a one-year contract in Miami. But he’s not ready to write off the quarterback he left behind.
Even if everyone else is.
“I think the times that Mark [Sanchez] has always been the best is when the most pressure’s on him,” Keller tells Jim Miller and Ralph Vacchiano of SiriusXM NFL Radio. “He’s the guy who got the team to the AFC Championship two years in a row. So he’s definitely capable, and I think he’ll be able to pick things up and get back on the right track this year.”
Keller also believes that the efforts to supplant Sanchez in recent years, most recently via the decision to draft Geno Smith, will help.
“I think he definitely doesn’t like the fact that those moves were made him,” Keller said. “I don’t think those are things that made him happy. . . . It definitely lit a fire underneath him, I think. I’ve talked to him a couple times this offseason, and he’s been working. So I think you can expect some good things from him.”
Not many do. The only thing on which most will agree is that, if he doesn’t get it done now, he’ll likely be out of chances to do it again, in New York or elsewhere.