The New York Jets wasted all the goodwill they received after their Week 10 win over the Houston Texans, including their standing in the Week 11 On SI NFL power rankings, released earlier this week.
Each writer for the 32 NFL sites voted on team rankings after the conclusion of action on Monday. Based on those votes, this week's power rankings were updated and the Jets ended up dropping due to their 31-6 loss to the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday.
The Jets dropped two spots to No. 25 based on the loss. For perspective, their victory over the Texans nudged them up three spots to No. 23 from Week 9.
New York has been at the bottom half of the power rankings most of the season, even though the Jets started the campaign 2-1. Since that intriguing start, New York has lost five of their last six games.
New York had a golden opportunity to improve its standing in the AFC playoff race going into Sunday's game. At the beginning of the week, the Jets (3-7) were 10th in the AFC, three spots out of the final playoff berth. But, New York received three gifts going into that game with the Cardinals.
Cincinnati, Indianapolis and Denver all lost before New York took the field, which meant the Jets could move up to eighth in the conference with a win.
That victory did not materialize. In fact, New York played perhaps its worst game of the year at the worst possible time.
The Jets defense gave up four touchdowns and a field goal on Arizona's first five drives of the game. The defense was also credited with 20 missed tackles, matching a season high that it set against San Francisco in the season opener.
Meanwhile, the New York offense failed to score a touchdown and quarterback Aaron Rodgers threw for fewer than 200 yards.
Now, the Jets enter Sunday’s game with Indianapolis at MetLife Stadium in the same place they were going into the Arizona game.
The only difference is that, with seven games remaining, New York basically needs to win out in order to have any reasonable shot at making the playoffs. It would be a near-miracle for that to happen to an organization that hasn't been to the playoffs since 2010.
For that reason, changes seem likely at Florham Park this offseason. Jets owner Woody Johnson fired head coach Robert Saleh, and his replacement, interim coach Jeff Ulbrich hasn't done much better.
In addition to a potential coaching search, general manager Joe Douglas is in the final year of his contract and seems unlikely to be brought back.
