KC Joyner created a list of Super Bowl dark-horses and the Jets are the first team on the list.  After talking about the Jets impressive defense, Joyner turns his attention to the offense and why he thinks they are better off this year despite all the distractions and all the noise this summer.

The Jets also could see improvements in their offense since their passing woes last year had as much to do with the poor play of Plaxico Burress than it did with any leadership deficiencies of Mark Sanchez. Of course, they aren’t showing much yet, but the additions of Chaz Schilens and Stephen Hill should eventually make this team’s vertical game much better than it was with Burress.

Add that to a strong rushing attack (New York ranked 10th in the league in good run-blocking rate), and it might be enough to vault Gang Green back into the postseason and onto the Super Bowl track Ryan has seen in this club’s future in previous seasons.

It’s really hard to overstate how little preseason performances can mean. Yes, I’m calling the Jets a dark horse, not a favorite. But it’s because they’re already extremely good in one area, and even competence in another could make them very good.

Brian Bassett, theJetsBlog.com

I’ve gotten a number questions about why the Jets haven’t tried to get Plax back on the team.  In short?  Because Plax was bad for the offense as Joyner points out.  Outside the red zone, Plax was just not a fit for the Jets and the thought of bringing him in to be a red zone specialist at this point wouldn’t make sense.  The Jets have enough other players to make up for the loss that can provide tall targets in the red zone between Hill, Schilens, Turner, Keller and Cumberland.  Assuming that the line can stay somewhat healthy then they should be able to generate enough rush to get after the quarterback.  I know that there was a lot of concern over the offense that we saw in the preseason … but I’m not ready to buy into it yet until I see it in a real game.

With that in mind, if the Jets offense can be just average with a great defense, they could go a long way this season.  I think that’s a realistic expectation, and totally get why Joyner has them in the “dark-horse” category because of it.