Normally I'd be content enjoying the 49ers playoff berth, but there are some story lines from around the league that are pretty awesome to check out. We'll have a weekly review by urnext tomorrow, but in the meantime, two story lines emerged from the same game yesterday. The Dolphins-Jets season finale brought the awesome in both a touching and a hilarious manner.
Yesterday marked the final game of Jason Taylor's NFL career. Over the past week he announced Sunday's game would be the final game of his career. After the game, Taylor spoke to the team in the locker room and expressed his feelings in a scene that should give folks at least a modest amount of chills.
In the other locker room, well, Rex Ryan and the Jets were Rex Ryan and the Jets. For most of Rex's tenure with the Jets, we've heard how great his team is and how they are going to win Super Bowls and blah blah blah blah blah. The Ryan brothers (Rex primarily, but Rob to a lesser extent) enjoy talking a whole lot of smack.
The Jets had a wildly inconsistent season this year and now they get to watch the 49ers and eleven other teams on their TVs. The Jets opened the season 2-0, then lost three straight. They then won three straight, lost two in a row, won three straight and lost three straight. Now, the "big brother" of the New York teams is heading home after what can only be described as an incredibly disappointing season.
I don't expect Rex Ryan to be fired anytime soon, but having him swing in the wind a little bit brings a certain enjoyment factor for me. It will be interesting to see how much smack talk we hear from Rex to start next season after this failure. I generally prefer to not take pleasure in the failure of others, but given how frequently Rex Ryan runs his mouth about the greatness of the Jets, there is a certain entertainment factor by their meltdown.