Jets' defensive linemen had an impressive game against Panthers

Just about everyone on the football team gets to do what it is they actually do during training camp practices. That’s the point of all those reps, to refine moves and techniques that will be employed once the regular season rolls around. So the quarterbacks throw, the receivers catch, the cornerbacks cover, the running backs run, the offensive linemen block, and the defensive line . . .

Not so fast, defensive line.

“We’re like the only position that can’t go full speed in practice, especially now with No. 8 out there,” Jermaine Johnson grumbled about the rules that prevent him and his fellow pass-rushers from going anywhere near those precious little men  in the red jerseys, particularly Aaron Rodgers, upon whom the hopes of the franchise rest.

Even when the Jets had a joint practice with the Panthers last week, contact with the passers was verboten. The Jets would have had plenty of opportunities to deliver hits on the Carolina crew, but they instead did the civilized and sporting thing by running around or past their intended targets.

But for about three hours once every week or so in the summer, all of that changes. Football becomes like the autobahn: no speed limits. All protections are lifted. Everyone is fair game. There are no red jerseys or red lights in the preseason games.

“To be out there and be able to hit a real live quarterback and finish,” Johnson said, “it feels pretty good.”

The Jets took advantage of their allotted time on Saturday night when they made five sacks and eight quarterback hits on the Panthers’ Bryce Young and Matt Corral in a 27-0 win in Charlotte.

They did so while playing, at least in the beginning, against the Carolina starting offensive line

. They did it without five of their top defensive players up front, which was absurd.

The Jets knew they were coming into this season with tremendous depth on their defensive line, perhaps with more total talent there than any other team in the NFL. They have shown that through two preseason games.

“Those guys love the game of football,” Robert Saleh said. "They play their absolute tails off and they feed off one another, they cheer for one another and they take pride. We talk about it on defense all the time: We go as they go. The group is awesome. Whatever people see, they see, but we have a lot of faith in all the guys who are on our roster.”

That little motto — “We go as they go” — isn’t just a catchphrase. And on a team that has acquired Rodgers to lead them back to prominence, it sounds hyperbolic or even a little pandering, but the Jets believe it to be true. Rodgers and the receivers may create all the highlights, Sauce Gardner and the secondary may make all the takeaways, but the defensive line has been designed to be the overarching identity of the entire team.

Everyone knows it. Everyone appreciates it.

“Those guys are psychos, man,” quarterback Zach Wilson said of the D-line he has to face in practices. “The way they train them and teach them . . . That’s a position where they are training to be violent, and you can definitely see it on the field.”

Johnson certainly didn’t take being called a “psycho” as an insult.

“We like to play like that,” he said.

We haven’t even seen the best of them yet, either. Quinnen Williams has yet to dress for either of the first two preseason games. On Saturday, Carl Lawson, John Franklin-Myers, Al Woods and Micheal Clemons also were bystanders.

It was the second and third wave that put the hurt on the Panthers, players such as Johnson, first-round rookie Will McDonald (who recorded his first pro sack), returning veteran Bryce Huff, newly acquired vets Quinton Jefferson and Bruce Hector, and undrafted rookie Deslin Alexandre. Those six recorded all five of the sacks and all eight of the QB hits.

The Jets hardly blitzed at all. They didn’t have to.

“It’s very healthy competition in that room,” Johnson said. “You want to get every sack in the game. I see Q. Jeff get a sack, I see Will get a sack, I’m like, ‘I’m not coming out of the game until I get a sack!’ ”

He didn’t have to wait long.

“There are high expectations, high standards, but everyone in that room is willing to live up to it,” Johnson said. “We take that as an honor. We look forward to doing that every day, setting the tone. We can do that. We had some guys sitting out [on Saturday], and to see what you saw . . . ”

He paused and shook his head, almost in disbelief himself.

“Get ready,” he concluded.

Don’t say you weren’t warned, quarterbacks.

By Tom Rock

tom.rock@newsday.com@TomRock_Newsday

Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.