The Jacksonville Jaguars are on a precipice. Or maybe some sort of bluff or enlarged dune. Definitely not a cliff of any kind. The Greatest Show in Teal continued in London on Sunday and the Jaguars were decimated by the Bears to the tune of 35-16. Afterwards head coach Doug Pederson said his 1-5 team was on the verge of something. Greatness? Doom?
“We’re on a slippery slope, or right on the cusp of that slope,” Pederson said. “At some point we’ve got to [say] enough is enough, and you’ve got to have enough pride and figure out a way.”
I’m not entirely sure what kind of rock formation Pederson is talking about, but it does not seem promising. But there is a cusp! Perhaps there is relief in that, like some kind of foot hold that keeps you climbing, or plummeting to certain doom.
On Sunday dumb penalties and dropped passes told part of the story, including two targets to receiver Gabe Davis in scoring position. On the Jaguars first play of the second half, tight end Evan Engram caught a 24-yard pass from quarterback Trevor Lawrence only to fumble the ball at Chicago’s 42-yard line; Bears defensive end Elijah Hicks returned it for 19 years. On the ensuing drive Bears rookie Caleb Williams threw for his third score of the day, he would finish with four touchdowns in the air. Lawrence would eventually connect with Davis for two touchdowns, going 23 of 25 with one interception on the day.
Thanks to the Jaguars Williams is now only three games away from breaking the Bears record for passing touchdowns from a rookie and there are 11 games left on the schedule. Jacksonville started this season on a string of four straight losses, the lone win coming last week in a game they allowed a Joe Flacco-led Colts team to score 24 points in the fourth quarter. It took a field goal in the final minute for the Jaguars to come out on top.
All of this may be why ahead of the London game Jaguars owner and mustache wax enthusiast Shad Khan was answering a local reporter’s question about whether he still supports Pederson, especially after saying in the offseason that “winning now” was his expectation for his team:
“I still believe in them. I believe in the players, I believe in the coaching staff. I believe in Trent [Baalke]. Obviously, the results are disappointing for all of them, just as well as me or any other Jaguar fan, but, the key thing one has to understand [is] we have evolved and really got to a level.
One man’s level is another man’s cusp, I assume. Still, there is a reason the Jaguars have taken on the mantle of “cardiac cats” over the years. The team started the 2022 season 2-6 and went on to win the AFC South at 9-8. They went 6-2 in the first half of the 2023 season only to stall out at 9-8 and miss the playoffs. We can at least say with some confidence that the AFC South is a garbage fire that allows for any number of imagined scenarios. It’s certainly possible Jacksonville could get its act together starting with next week’s game against the Patriots in London. Pederson’s team may be on some sort of difficult and craggy surface, but he said Sunday he believes they’ve got plenty of fight left for the rest of the season. “I feel like the guys are…they don’t quit,” Pederson said. “They keep fighting. We’ve got to figure out how to just get out of our way and just play football.”
In a separate post game interview with a local Jacksonville TV station, faced with the question “was it as bad as it looked out there,” safety Andre Cisco had this to say: “It was really bad,” he started. “I just … I feel like it was…how should I say this…a lot of quit. Last line of defense in a situation like that you could feel when we’re playing as one and when we’re not.
There might be more slip on that slope.
