–Injuries can be a great equalizer in the NFL. Lose a couple key players and a team goes from a contender to trying to reach .500. A year ago, the Jaguars were relatively injury-free the entire season. They lost only one player of significance for the entire year — wide receiver Allen Robinson went out with a torn ACL in the team’s first series in their first regular season game. Otherwise, they just had a couple of linemen miss a game or two. But already, 2018 is shaping up as a different story. Starting wide receiver Marqise Lee was lost for the year with a knee injury in the preseason. And last Sunday, starting left tackle Cam Robinson went down with a torn ACL and is also out for the year. Robinson’s loss puts the starting job in Josh Wells’ hands. He’s been a swing-tackle, back-up lineman for the team for five seasons now. His only starting experience came a year ago when he filled in for injured right tackle Jermey Parnell for three games. But Wells says he’s ready for the starting spot on a full-time basis.
“I have a lot of confidence in taking over for Cam,” Wells said. “They always tell us to prepare as if you’re going to play and that’s what I’ve done each week, prepare like I’m going to play. It’s a shame what happened to Cam and I’m praying for him, I really am. But it’s an opportunity now and it’s an expectation that you need to be ready to step in and help out. There’s an expectation level here between the coaches and everyone, just to be ready to play if called upon. That comes from everybody, all the way from the starters to the swing guys to the backup guys.”
Fortunately, there’s experience surrounding Wells. Left guard Andrew Norwell has 54 starts in 55 games during the past four seasons with Carolina. Center Brandon Linder has 45 starts in four years with the Jaguars while on the right side, guard A.J. Cann and tackle Parnell have 44 starts each.
“The cohesion and the depth of our group, it’s all good stuff, it’s exciting,” Linder said. “I know Josh will come in and dominate. The standard doesn’t drop at all. I’ve seen Josh improve a lot over the years. I mean, he was a quarterback in high school to where he is now. He comes to work every day, he puts his head down and takes it one day at a time. That’s the position where he’s at right now, stepping in and now he’s going to play for the rest of the season.”
–Jaguars wide receiver Keelan Cole has received added attention this week following an impressive showing in last Sunday’s game against New England. Cole led all Jaguars receivers with 7 catches for 116 yards (16.6 avg.) and one touchdown. Included in his seven catches was a one-handed grab along the sideline where Cole reached high with his right hand for a Blake Bortles pass and brought it into his body, all with just the one hand, beating Patriots cornerback Eric Rowe on the play. Cole never did get a second hand onto the ball until he was rolling on the ground.
The play was so good it was rated the No. 1 Play of the Day on ESPN’s SportsCenter. Cole confirmed that it was the best catch he had ever made.
“(Yes), so far,” he said. “That’s all I have to say about that. I have to watch it too.”
The catch and national recognition that Cole received helped bring a positive light on the Jaguars receiving corps that had taken its fair share of criticism in the past for not making more plays. Cole said he doesn’t let such talk affect him or his teammates.
“We do a good job of not bringing the outside into the locker room,” he said. “Honestly, I don’t watch TV personally, so I wouldn’t know either way.”
Cole also threw the final key block that enabled Dede Westbrook to make it to the end zone and complete a 61-yard scoring play in the fourth quarter of Sunday’s game.
–You never know when and where a team will hear or see a message that inspires them to play a little bit harder. For Jaguars cornerback A.J. Bouye, it came Sunday morning when he was still at home, spending time with his daughter who was in town to visit. That’s when Bouye decided to watch the NFL Network and its pregame show.
“The funny thing is I don’t like to watch the NFL Network especially before a game,” Bouye said. “I was spending time with my daughter and my dad decides to put the TV on. Steve Mariucci said something like Tom Brady had the highest completion percentage and then he said he’s going to break it today. So I took a picture and sent it to the DBs so we took (that challenge) personally.”
Brady finished with 24-of-35 (68.6 percent) for 234 yards, two touchdowns and a rating of 106.1, five points less than what Jaguars quarterback Blake Bortles finished with.
BY THE NUMBERS: 1,280 — Represents the total number of yards that Jaguars quarterback Blake Bortles has thrown for in his last four regular-season games at TIAA Bank Field (all wins). That’s 320.0 yards per game and includes 11 touchdowns and one interception for a passer rating of 122.8. The four wins (by a combined 75-point differential) were over Indianapolis, Seattle, Houston (all last year) and New England (last week).
