Jets. Giants. Rutgers. Yes, we are in football hell, New Jersey | Politi

As I sat in my seat in the MetLife Stadium press box on Monday night, watching the New England Patriots roll over the Jets as if they were playing Rutherford High’s JV team, I found myself muttering this question: What did I do to get here?

To be clear, I’m am not talking about “here” in the literal sense. I know the answer to that question -- I sat in traffic with 70,000 other angry people on Route 3 for a half hour. I’m asking this in an existential sense. What did I do to get here, in this dreary football hell of ours, where I torture myself every weekend watching the home team lose again and again and ...

Haaaang on. The Patriots just scored another touchdown. It is 24-0 already, and the few thousand Jets fans who didn’t sell their tickets to Patriots fans are no doubt regretting that decision on multiple levels. Hey, at least it isn’t pouring here like it was Sunday afternoon, which is what Giants fans had to endure as they watched their team slapstick their way to another mind-numbing defeat.

Our local NFL fans could learn something from their college counterparts in Piscataway: Just stop coming. The attendance for Rutgers’ 42-7 loss to Minnesota was the program’s lowest announced crowd in 14 years. I would joke that they have thrown in the towel, but if the Scarlet Knights tried to do that, the towel would be intercepted and returned for a touchdown.

Jets. Giants. Rutgers. Again: What did we do to anger the football gods to deserve this? Did we defrost some frozen tundra in another life? Did we use a Terrible Towel to wash the dishes? “I’m seeing ghosts,” Jets quarterback Sam Darnold said on sidelines on Monday night, an unfortunate confession caught on a hot mic. Don’t worry, big guy. You’re not alone.

I see dead teams!

I did the math, and no, it isn’t your imagination. It is really that bad. The combined record of these three teams this season is 4-16 and since the start of the 2017 season is 26-82. The amazing part? I can’t remember any of those 26. I know I must have seen a couple of them, but the sheer volume and degree of misery has wiped away the good times.

Introducing Rutgers Sports Insider: Sign up for exclusive news, behind-the-scenes observations and the ability to text message directly with beat writers

It isn’t just the .240 combined winning percentage. It is the unprecedented level of across-the-board ineptitude. If the three teams could just suck normally, and not in a dumpster-fire-on-the-surface-of-the-sun level, maybe we would all be able to stomach it. Instead, I can’t figure out which of the three teams is truly the most pathetic.

Hell, you decide:

The Giants drafted their quarterback of the future and are in the process of ruining him with clueless play calling and a typically inept offensive line. This, of course, is after they traded away their most electrifying offensive player in the winter, tied up $39 million in salary-cap space on two players who are never on the field and strung together a series of seasons that made the grim 1970s feel like the good old days.

The Jets already had their franchise quarterback, but then he missed three games with mono and -- based on the number of passes he threw to the Patriots on Monday night -- looks like he also came down with colorblindness. They did what they always do, tease fans with a promising win over the Cowboys only to get pantsed in front of the entire country as they plummet to the AFC basement.

As for Rutgers, well, where do you even begin? The Scarlet Knights have lost 17 straight Big Ten games, been outscored 207-14 against conference opponents this year, had one passing yard on five completions in a recent loss -- or an average of about seven inches -- and will be a home underdog against a team they are paying $1 million to play this weekend.

That is a lot of bad football for one state.

“For Giants fans to spend their hard-earned money to sit in the rain and watch us do that? It’s unacceptable,” Giants receiver Golden Tate said after his team lost to Arizona. Jets coach Adam Gase was more succinct one day later in the same stadium: “That was brutal.”

Finally, when the 33-0 Jets loss ended with Patriots coach Bill Belichick smirking on the sideline, Darnold looked like ghosts had followed him from the field to the parking lot.


Buy Rutgers-Liberty tickets: StubHub, SeatGeek


At one point, the Jets quarterback was 8-of-25 passing for 50 yards with four interceptions. That was good for a 1.67 quarterback rating, which means a state trooper might have found somebody with a higher BAC leaving the Meadowlands parking lot.

“I still have to watch the tape to see exactly what was happening,” Darnold said, but please, pal, take it from all of us. Burn that tape. Watching it once was bad enough. The problem is, we might see something just like it next weekend, and the weekend after that, and straight on through to the holidays.

We are in a special kind of football hell here in New Jersey right now. What we did to get here? That is anyone’s guess, but it must have been really, really awful.

Get Rutgers Sports Insider text messages from reporters: Cut through the clutter of social media and communicate directly with the Rutgers beat writers. Plus, exclusive news and analysis every day. Sign up now.

Steve Politi may be reached at spoliti@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @StevePoliti. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.