Our man Dan Breen is back again, to regale us with the best and worst opening days for the Jets.

One man’s opinion about the best and worst opening days in Jets history:

The Best:

5 (Tie).  1964 and 1978: After four years in the dismal, crumbling Polo Grounds, the Jets moved to Shea Stadium in 1964 and christened their new digs with a runaway 30-6 win over the Broncos on Saturday night, September 12, 1964, before a then-record crowd of 45,000.  Thanks to the Mets, Gang Green would not open at home again until 1978.  As Gerald Eskenazi describes in his excellent 1998 history of the Jets, “Gang Green,”  the Mets used their generous lease to prevent the Jets from playing at Shea for as long as possible each season (in 1973, the Jets played their first six games on the road when the Mets went to the World Series), a ridiculous state of affairs that resulted in the Jets having to open on the road for 13 consecutive years.  WIth the help of a court order, the Jets were finally able to open at home in 1978, and began the second year of the Walt Michaels era with a 33-20 win over the hated Dolphins that indicated that the team was finally on the right track after three consecutive 3-11 seasons.

4.  2000: Al Groh, who turned out to be a “one-and-out” coach, started his only year in charge with a very difficult challenge – a game at Lambeau Field against the vaunted Green Bay Packers, and their star QB, one Brett Favre.  Curtis Martin rushed 30 times for 110 yards and a touchdown and caught a two-yard scoring pass from Vinny Testaverde with 3 minutes 30 seconds left as the Jets beat the Pack, 20-16.  Victor Green made an acrobatic interception at the Jets 9 with 1:08 to play to seal the important win.  Though the Jets ran out of gas at the end of the 2000 season, this was the first of several games that year – the Monday Night comeback against the Patriots, the Keyshawn game in Tampa, and, most famously, the “Monday Night Miracle” against the Dolphins – in which Groh’s team won tight games in dramatic circumstances.

3.  1968: The Super Bowl season began with a tough road win over the Chiefs, who were generally regarded as the Raiders’ prime competitor for the AFL title and started the game as 6.5 point favorites.  Joe Namath threw TD passes of 57 and 30 yards to Don Maynard (the first of which you’ve seen a million times on NFL Films), and the once-pass-happy Jets’ offense ended the game by grinding out a six-minute, 14 play drive, as the Jets beat Kansas City, 20-19.

2.  1994: The short-lived Pete Carroll era began with a shocking 23-3 over the four-time defending AFC champion Bills in Buffalo.  As it turned out, the Bills would have a down year, but nobody knew that at the time and the Jets’ rout shocked the NFL and silenced over 80,000 fans in Buffalo.  The Jets contended for the AFC East lead into late November, but the “Spike Game” blew up the season and, after a five-game losing streak to end the year, Carroll was fired because Leon Hess, who wanted to “win now,” brought in…. arrrrggggh… Richie Kotite.

1.  1997: After the awful carnage of the Kotite era, the Jets, winners of 4 of their last 37 games, brought in the grownups.  Bill Parcells – along with his coaching staff that included Bill Belicheck, Charlie Weis, Romeo Crennel, Al Groh and a young defensive assistant named Eric Mangini – took over Kotite’s 1-15 team, immediately reworked the roster, and drove the team to the verge of collapse in training camp.  Most obervers thought they’d be lucky to win more than four games, and Opening Day presented a difficult test with a cross-country trip to face the Seattle Seahawks.  Stunningly, the Jets led 27-3 at halftime, on their way to a dominant 41-3 win.  The Jet Dark Ages had finally ended.

The Worst:

5.  2007: Yeah, last year was pretty bad.  After a relatively close first half, the hated Patriots blew the Jets’ doors off in the second half, as Tom Brady completed nine passes to Randy Moss for 183 yards and a 51-yard TD, Ellis Hobbs set an NFL record by returning the second-half kickoff 108 yards for a score, and Chad Pennington suffered an ankle injury that would hamper him for the entire season.  The good news; Steve Yarnell caught the Patriots making illegal videotapes, and the term “Spygate” entered the lexicon.

4.  2005: Opening Day, 2005 dawned with high hopes for Gang Green.  The team had come two missed Doug Brien FGs away from the AFC Championship game the year before, and was viewed as a legitimate contender going into the new season.  Pennington proclaimed that his surgically repaired shoulder was healed, and expected to carve up a Chiefs defense that had finished 31st in the league the year before.  Then the game started.  The Chiefs started with a three play, 75-yard TD drive, including 35-yard runs by both Priest Holmes and Larry Johnson;  Trent Green then took the Chiefs on a 12- play, 95 yard drive for a second score;  and the Jets offense simply imploded, surrendering seven fumbles (three lost), three sacks, and an interception.  Even rookie kicker Mike Nugent got into the act, with his slip causing a blocked 38-yard FG.  Nobody had high hopes when the game ended, and the Jets were on the way to a 4-12 season and the end of the Herm Edwards era.

3.  1985: Eskenazi recalls that “the Jets were forced to play their opening game without their offensive tackles (Marvin Powell and Reggie McElroy) against the sack-happy Raiders,” as well as their first-round draft pick, Al Toon, due to holdouts.  ”The result was a 31-0 defeat,” a fiasco so complete that Freeman McNeil “even believed the Raiders had somehow stolen the signals.  They jumped on every play with anticipation, as if knowing where it was heading.”  O’Brien was sacked 10 times, still a team record.  Amazingly, the Jets recovered from this disaster to finish 11-5 and make the playoffs.

2.  1996: Another opener with absent tackles, but there would be no recovery for the Jets this season.  Rich Kotite, heading into his second season, had rebuilt the offense after a 3-13 horror show in 1995 (that year’s 52-14 opening day rout in Miami was among the finalists for this list).  Among his high-priced offseason signings were tackles Jumbo Elliott and David Williams, brought in to protect new QB Neil O’Donnell.  Unfortunately, both would miss the opener with injuries, and Kotite, displaying the bizarre decision-making that characterized his tenure, moved guard Roger Duffy outside, thereby weakening a third position.  The game was an ugly mess for the Jets.  They were outgained by an amazing 244-33 yards in the first half, and ended the game, having given up nine sacks, on the short end of a 31-6 loss.  Things wouldn’t get much better for the remainder of the 1-15 season, after which Kotite was mercifully ousted.

1.  1999: The worst of ‘em all.  The result, a heartbreaking 30-28 loss to the Patriots, was bad enough, as a series of bad breaks and misplays led to a last-second loss that eventually cost the Jets a playoff berth.  All that was overshadowed, however, by Vinny Testaverde’s ruptured Achilles Tendon.  The 1999 Jets were supposed to be dominant;  they had been unlucky to lose the AFC title game in Denver the year before, had loaded up with key free agents (Atwater, Green, Phifer) in the off season, and were ready to roll through the league.  Yeah, they weren’t exactly set at backup QB, with the erratic Rick Mirer as #2, but Testaverde had never had a serious injury before, and all systems were go for a great season.  Then, early in the game, a fumbled exchange, an awkward step, and it was all gone.  A gorgeous day that began with the brightest hopes that I’ve ever had for my team ended in abject misery.  Mirer then “led” the team to a 1-6 start before Ray Lucas stepped in an brought the Jets to the verge of the playoffs, ending the season one tantalizing victory short of a spot.

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