JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A loss is a loss but how Sunday’s 23-20 defeat to the Texans went down is tough. Another close loss, blah, blah, blah, same old, same old. The different part is the hit. Trevor Lawrence gets hit like that and some of his guys were ready to crash out for him. But only some. That’s the line in the sand for me. You’ve got to ride for your guy.
If you ever look up and see Evan Engram — who is one of the calmest, chillest guys on the roster — crash out like he did in defense of Lawrence, you know something up and it’s time to strap up. I loved to see Engram and Brenton Strange and Jarrian Jones and the other guys stand up for their teammates.
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But the guys who should have been jumping in to start and finish the situation were the offensive linemen. Their job is literally to protect the quarterback. They call them guards. G-U-A-R-D. Their job is to guard the quarterback. It doesn’t get any simpler than that. Now, Anton Harrison, Ezra Cleveland and Brandon Scherff all did get involved at some point.
But I have never missed Cam Robinson so much as I did on Sunday. He would have lost it. Robinson would have crashed out and cleared the whole crowd out even if he was alone. Robinson would ride for his guy.
But, he’s gone and now the Jags now have Walker Little at the left tackle spot. Who just got a new contract extension this morning? Have you ever had buyer’s remorse, like instantly?
Lawrence is on the ground and Little is just standing around. And that’s they guy they paid to protect the quarterback’s blind side? He has been playing well this season and it looks like a solid deal, but after Sunday, I’d hit the undo button fast. I’m ready to sign a petition to bring Robinson back. At least he would protect the quarterback when he needed it the most.
Now, that brings me to the guy who signed Little to that contract. I didn’t forget about Trent Baalke. Who let’s a guy on the hot seat spend money for the future? Just nasty work. Baalke is known for not doing deals in the middle of the season. But somehow the fanbase is calling for his job and, poof, he pops up with a deal in the middle of the year. Seems like a power play to me, a message to folks that he is going to be hanging around for a while. Maybe he will be, but one guy who won’t be hanging around is running back coach Jerry Mack. He is the new head coach at Kennesaw State.
That was announced during the fourth quarter of the game. How did that work? Did his agent text him at halftime and Mack said ‘do the deal, I gotta get out of here!’ I don’t know if I have ever seen a coach have his new job officially announced during the game. That’s taking jumping ship to a whole new level. If that doesn’t tell you that there are problems in the building nothing will. There are issues here that have got to get solved.