By Mike Trovato

“You play to win the game. Hello?! You play to win the game.”

When Herman Edwards made this famous statement during a 2002 press conference, he may never have been more right in his coaching career. I suppose you can rarely go wrong when stating the obvious, but I digress. The point of playing football in the NFL is to win.

Winning has not exactly been the Kansas City Chief’s forte since Edwards replaced Dick Vermeil in 2006. Under Herm, Kansas City has won only 36% of its games, going 14-25 in that span. The Jets narrowly avoided being win number 15 for Edwards’ Chiefs this past Sunday, thanks to some creativity by football’s greatest improviser.

Brett Favre’s 457th career touchdown pass to Laveranues Coles was not in Eric Mangini’s playbook. Rather, with just over one minute remaining, trailing the 1-5 Chiefs, Favre and Coles reverted back to playground football to devise the game-winning strike.

The play itself wasn’t pretty. The fade pass, thrown behind the receiver, required a one-handed grab by an extremely well-covered Coles to give the Jets the victory. “I believe that’s why they brought him in here,” Coles remarked afterwards. “He always gives you a chance to win.” That is, of course, why they play the game.

Clearly, the Jets brought Brett Favre to New York to throw the ball. It’s what he does best. The NFL record book for quarterbacks is practically Brett Favre’s personal memoir. Favre’s name appears at the top of the following lists (take a deep breath): Career passing touchdowns, career passing yards, career passes attempted, career passes completed, consecutive seasons with over 3,000 yards passing, seasons leading the league in passing touchdowns, longest pass completion, career interceptions thrown.

Despite all the accolades, numerous passing records, the superstar status that New York hadn’t seen calling the shots clad in green since Broadway Joe, Brett Favre had absolutely no business throwing the ball on Sunday. None at all.

Going into Sunday, the Kansas City Chiefs had, by far, the worst rushing defense in the National Football League.

Before playing the Jets, the Chiefs were allowing 5.6 yards per carry. Giving up 5.6 yards per carry means that if teams did nothing but run the ball, they would, in theory, never have to run a third down play. Opposing teams ran the ball an average of 37 times a game. Allowing 37 rushing attempts per game put them on pace to be run on nearly 600 times this season.

Now, it’s true that statistics can be twisted and turned upside down and made to be deceiving. What I just pointed out was part in theory, part projection. But here are some numbers that are cut-and-dry, plain and simple

Through 6 games, the Kansas City defense was giving up 2 rushing touchdowns per game. Tack on the assumed converted extra point attempts; that’s 14 points on the ground alone. Through those same 6 games, the Chiefs’ offense was scoring 12.1 points per game. In each of the past 5 games, Favre had thrown at least one interception, 8 picks overall.

You do the math. All the Jets had to do was put the ball in Thomas Jones’ gut, and let him run the ball down the Chiefs’ throats, challenging them to make a stop, a stop they hadn’t made all season. The “Man-genius” move would have been to take the ball out of Favre’s hands, giving his arm a rest without actually benching him.

I take that back. That would’ve been the no-brainer move.

Instead, the Chiefs did what Eric Mangini failed to do, taking the ball out of Favre’s hands themselves. After logging only three interceptions total through their first 6 games, Kansas City doubled their season total, picking off Favre three times. The last interception came in the fourth quarter, Jets on the Kansas City 9 yard line. Rather than increasing their lead, Brandon Flowers returned a Favre pass 91 yards for a touchdown to give the Chiefs a 24-21 advantage.

Luckily, the Jets were able to come back, and with 1:00 on the clock, Coles’ contortionist act to pull in what could have been Favre’s fourth interception proved a game saver, and potentially a season saver.

That’s not to say the Jets will or won’t make the playoffs. That remains to be seen. The fact is that a loss would have dropped Gang Green into a last place tie with Miami, led by former Jet quarterback Chad Pennington. Interestingly enough, Pennington has only thrown 3 interceptions in his entire career in and-goal situations.

Granted, Pennington is no Favre. And when it comes down to it, I do think the Jets are a better team with Brett. But for a game in which the Jets should have outright crushed their opponents, they sure made it interesting. As sad as it may be, they actually made the Chiefs look, dare I say it? Good.

Without Pro Bowl workhorse running back Larry Johnson, Tyler Thigpen led the Chiefs’ offense to two scores in just his second NFL start. Thigpen did not turn the ball over, and recorded a QB rating of 110.9. On the other side of the ball, Kansas City actually improved their run defense this past weekend. Their 196.9 yards per game surrendered is 34 yards more per game than the next worst team- the 0-7 Fluffy Kittens… also known by their six reluctant fans as the Detroit Lions. But, that 196.9 average is actually 10 YPG better than it was before Sunday.

Though the Jets did pull out the win, essentially what we have is a mystery, a bevy of unanswered questions. Against the league’s worst run defense, why did the Jets only handed the ball off 23 times? Why didn’t the Jets call a single running play on 11 third down opportunities? Why did starter Thomas Jones only get 14 rushes? Why did the Jets only dial backup Leon Washington’s number 6 times on offense? Washington 20.8 yards per touch for the game, scored from 18 yards out on his first reception, then busted out a 60-yard TD run on his second carry. Was he on a 2 touchdown quota? Why did he only get one carry and two passes the rest of the game?

This was not a win that Jets fans can be comfortable with. Not against the Chiefs. Not on the heels of a loss to Oakland the week before. Not heading into a Week 9 matchup against the first place Buffalo Bills.

What is truly mind-boggling is that somehow, the New York Jets could be in a 3-way tie atop the AFC East at this time next week. A win this weekend at Buffalo, along with a Colts victory over the Patriots would make that a reality.

The bottom line is this: Whether it’s ugly or in style, a blowout or a nail-biter; a win is a win. No matter how poor your team’s game planning is, a win is a win. And you play to win the game. By that standard and that standard only, Eric Mangini succeeded.