Do the Jets have a path forward after beating the Texans?

Heading into Thursday night’s matchup against a 6-2 team. Houston Texansquestion around New York Jets it was less, “Is this team making the playoffs?” what it was: “Is this team going to hit the sell button at the trade deadline?” Absolutely nothing was working this season, with Aaron Rodgers looking out of sorts even after the team acquired Davante Adams, a porous offensive line not helping matters, and a once-elite defense starting to leak. Defeat to Jacoby Brissett and New England Patriots Week eight seemed to be the final nail in the team’s coffin.

However, a few days later, reports of New York’s demise turned out to be greatly exaggerated. After a terrible first half at MetLife Stadium in which fans were openly chanting To get Woody Johnson to sell the team, the Jets flipped the script by going three second half touchdowns Rodgers and a powerful pass led to a 21-13 win over Houston.

To be clear, there’s still a long way to go: 3-6 is still 3-6, and New York made a lot of unfortunate mistakes in this game. But that second half was only as good as this team, and especially this offense, has looked for quite some time, and with the AFC Wild Card picture wide open, it begs the question: What is the path for this Jets team to make the playoffs? Let’s figure it out.

The bad news: The Jets are still 3-6 from the outside looking in. The good news is that no one is running away with an AFC Wild Card spot right now, which leaves the window of opportunity very open. Here’s how things stand after Thursday night.

The Jets currently have three teams between them and the seven seeds in the AFC: the Chargers, Colts and Bengals. But Cincinnati has become so frustrated that it is openly considering a trade deadline sale. The Colts just replaced their starting quarterback and the Chargers are running out of receivers. Any of these teams winning more than nine or 10 games seems far-fetched, which opens a path, albeit a narrow one, for New York.

The Jets travel to Arizona to play the Cardinals in Week 10 before facing the Colts in a game that appears to be a must-win for New York’s playoff hopes. And from here on out, the schedule really doesn’t look that bad: The Jets have one more game against the Buffalo Bills, but other than that, they have the Dolphins twice, the Seahawks and Rams at home and the Jaguars. on the road. In fact, with the exception of the Buffalo game, none of the Jets’ remaining opponents boast a winning record entering this Sunday’s game.

Of course, those other teams probably view the Jets as a winnable game themselves. But on Thursday night, we saw a glimpse of that passing attack when it clicks, and we know the talent behind the ball. If New York can just come out swinging, take over the AFC South, take care of business at home and split road trips against the Cardinals and Dolphins, it would improve their record to 9-8. Considering the state of this race, this may be enough.