The Jets suffered one of their most gut-wrenching losses in franchise history on Sunday, and one of their best offensive players was inexplicably riding the bench for much of the game.
Chris Ivory, who battled a knee injury in practice all week, rushed just six times for 81 yards against the Bills. Stevan Ridley, who had 36 carries this season after making his debut on Nov. 11, carried the ball nine times for 29 yards. It was Ridley’s biggest workload of the season.
After the game, Ivory admitted he is banged up but did not defend the coaching staff’s decision to give Ridley more touches than him.
“I was still a little shaky, but I’m a strong man,” he told Bart Hubbuch of the New York Post. “I know how to play with pain. I was in a little pain, but I could have played more.”
Perhaps Ivory should have played more — a lot more — after he broke a 58-yard run on his first carry of the game in the second quarter. The Jets ended that drive by missing a 40-yard field goal.
Making things worse for himself, Jets coach Todd Bowles said Ivory’s lack of playing time was due in part to his health but also “game-plan related.”
“It was game-plan related,” he explained. “We tried to give him a break a little bit, too. He wasn’t 100 percent, but he was good enough to play. We could have got him more plays in there, but the game didn’t dictate that way.”
The Jets rushed just 17 times and Ryan Fitzpatrick attempted 37 passes. They clearly came into the game wanting to throw against Buffalo’s secondary, but they also may have abandoned the run way too early in a game that was relatively close.
Ivory’s 81 yards on the ground put him over the 1,000-yard rushing mark for the first time in his career, but that is a lousy consolation prize for missing the playoffs. If you read what Ivory said about himself a couple weeks ago, you know he wanted to have a bigger role on Sunday.
