How About Them Jaguars?

There are certain things that every guy hates- ballet, diets, in-laws. As an athlete, there is one thing in particular that you want desperately never to happen to you, so much that you almost hate playing in games where this situation arise for fear that the moment karma chooses to get even for some unrelated wrong will be that moment.

That thing? - playing the winless team and losing to them.

It happens every year and this year that dishonor has fallen to the Jaguars as they faced the holder of the best record in football last year and one of the worst teams in football this year, the Tennessee Titans.

I am sure most of the players were really looking forward to the game. You always enjoy playing divisional opponents; the established relationships often come with a heightened degree of animosity. You don't just want to beat your divisional foes; you want to destroy them. When they are playing as bad as the Titans have been this season the likelihood of the Jaguars unleashing some destruction seemed pretty high.

And then there came Sunday.

Something unusual happened. The Titans finally came to play. They hated the shellacking that Garrard unleashed on them a few weeks earlier when he threw for nearly 400 yards against the once proud secondary. Vince Young looked poised and ready to play. Chris Johnson was ready to let the afterburners loose (and did).

No matter, right? Oh so wrong. While it appeared as if the Jaguars were ready to go tit for tat as Maurice Jones-Drew blasted the Titans with touchdown runs of 79 and 80 yards that was the last thing they ended up doing. Those runs ended up being most of MJD's work for the night as he only amassed another 18 yards on 6 carries.

Garrard could not seem to get it going either. His day looked nothing like the last matchup between the two teams as he only completed 14 of 27 for 139 yards; he did complete two more passes, just to the wrong team.

Maybe if the Jaguars had the ball a little more they would have been able to do something. Instead there defense did a lot of bending as they allowing Johnson to gallop into the end zone twice, Young threw one, and Bironas nailed three balls through the uprights. The Titans ate up nearly 40 minutes of the game clock in the process not leaving the Jaguars much room for error.

No problem boys. It happens sometimes; we know it, we hate it, and wish it never happens to us. Time to shake off the bad juju and move onto the Chiefs.