Santonio Holmes: “Two QB Systems Don’t Work…Ours Will Be Good Though”

Santonio believes in Mark Sanchez…right up until he doesn’t throw him the ball

New York Jets’ wide receiver, and noted locker room cancer, Santonio Holmes has been in the news this offseason for many of the wrong reasons. After being one of the central figures in the Jets’ late-season collapse last year, Holmes came into offseason workouts out of shape due to a commitment to the USO, and complained openly about being asked to participate in a full practice. He was also non-commital about attending Mark Sanchez’s “Jets West” private workouts for the quarterbacks (including Tim Tebow) and receivers, but eventually decided to attend. His thoughts coming out of the mini-camp? Two quarterback systems never work…but the Jets should do great with it!

From ESPN.com:

“You have to allow one quarterback to get into the rhythm of a game and it starts from the preparation in practice,” Holmes said in an interview on the NFL Network. “(It’s) knowing the first couple of plays that he’s going to take these reps, it’s getting the feel for coming onto the field with the crowd awaiting you, it’s making the mistakes early in the game to finishing the games at the end.

“You don’t just change a guy out just because he has a few mistakes early into a game. Coming into this season, we have a lot to expect from Sanchez.”

“Tebow is going to have plays where he comes in and plays,” Holmes said. “Whether he plays at quarterback, Sanchez is on the field or off the field, those are the plays that coach has designed for Tebow to be ran that week. I’m pretty sure he’s going to get them done and he’s going to do his job just as well as any other quarterback would when they get an opportunity to get on the field.”

“Yeah, you don’t just change out a guy during the flow of a game. *Checks his playbook* Uh…except when we do it…and it’s..uh…going to be awesome?”

Holmes has pretty much set his repuatation on fire over the last 12 months by openly feuding with his own teammates, most notably his quarterback Mark Sanchez, is probably getting some heavy handed encouragement from his representation to try and “play nice” this year. Which would explain why he immediately backtracked on his statement that two-quarterback systems are dumb and doomed to fail (which is true).

It could also explain his attendance at “Jets West,” as an olive branch to his teammates who will look to Holmes as the veteran leader of the passing game (yikes). He had nice things to say about Tebow, who he described as “pretty good,” and being “on target” which lets us know they spent some time throwing balls at the ocean to see if they could get them wet. He also went out of his way to gush about Sanchez, calling him “our guy” a number of times and making the patented Jets guarantee that the embattled quarterback will “get the job done this year,” as opposed to the last three years when we’ve heard pretty much the same exact thing.

However, attending a private workout in California won’t be enough to completely wipe the stink off his image after last season. He’s still got plenty of critics to answer, including former teammate LaDainian Tomlinson, who recently predicted more complaining from Holmes if he doesn’t get the ball as much as he would like in what is expected to be a run-heavy offense. Holmes responded with incredibly selective memory:

“I didn’t say antying about last season until Week 17…It hurt to play seven games and only have 20 catches. But you live and you learn.

“LT, I wouldn’t say he’s wrong [Ed note: Because he's not], but I don’t think it would be right if I had anything to say come Week 7 and I only have 20 catches again. Just play it out the way it played out last year.”

Santonio is conveniently forgetting his tirade midseason last year where he blamed the offensive line for his lack of catches. And did he just disagree with LT, only to say that LT is totally right? If things go down just as it “played out last year,” then it’s going to be a long season in Jersey for Gang Green. But at least the train wreck will be fun for the rest of us!

(pic via)