09/17 — Over the past several years there probably have been four NFL defenses known for their relentless pressure — Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, New England and Baltimore.

Feel free to throw in your favorites as well. We'll leave aside the Pennsy teams and your picks for another day. On Sunday it's Bill Belichick's Patriots vs. Rex Ryan, the guy who choreographed the Ravens "D" and now calls the plays for the Jets.

Ryan was asked at today's news conference how he'd describe his scheme's style of blitzing. Not surprising, he wasn't at a loss for words.

"Just multiple, I guess," he said. "It's fun. Everybody has an opportunity to make plays. It's not set up for just one guy to make plays. You set your defense up so everybody gets a shot. That's basically how we try to approach it every week. You try to put pressure on the entire offense, not just the quarterback but on the offensive line, the backs — that's what we try to do.

"Mentally, if you can get just one guy to be hesitant, then that's an advantage to the defense. So we always want to be in that attack mode, whether it's a three-man rush of an all-out blitz. We're always looking to be playing off the balls of our feet and not our heels. Sometimes if you can make your opponent think they're getting something and you give them something else, you can catch them. Hopefully they're catching more than attacking."

But Rex also knows the Patriots scheme (which he admits borrowing a few ideas from over the years) can be tough on a rookie quarterback such as Mark Sanchez. That's because he knows his "D" would be tough if it was going up against a rookie as opposed to Tom Brady.

"I would feel confident against any rookie quarterback," Ryan said. "I'm sure it really depends on who it is, but I always felt you had an advantage going against a rookie. They haven't seen you, you think you can rattle them, confuse them, run traps against them. I'm sure Belichick is going to try to do that.

"Eli Manning's a great quarterback and he had that zero-point-zero QB rating against the Ravens [in 2004] — that was probably a long day for him. ... I think our system, just like Belichick's, it's probably easier to face another system than it is that."

All that being said, Dan Dierdorf, who will be calling the Jets-Patriots game with Greg Gumbel for CBS, said that the only problem he sees with Mark Sanchez is that he's "really raised the bar" on himself.

"People are going to have to remember that he is a rookie and has played one game in the National Football League," said Dierdorf. "Now the one game that he has played was flat-out outstanding. Certainly the reasons for optimism in New York are limitless based on how good he looked. But he’s got big shoes to fill and they are the shoes that Mark Sanchez left after Week 1. There’s a lot to like about this kid.  If I was a Jets season ticket holder, I’d have a major reason to be fired up."

It'll be interesting to see how Dierdorf feels about Sanchez after Week 4. He and Gumbel will also work the Jets' Game 3 vs. Tennessee and Game 4 at New Orleans. This will be the first time that the same network announcing tandem will do three consecutive Jets games since the NBC team of Charlie Jones and Randy Cross called three in a row in 1996.

Third-and-Long ... On the Mark

Sanchez already spoke about the challenges of the New England scheme he'll be trying to solve Sunday. But if his Houston showing is any indication, whatever happens on the first two downs, he's a pretty cool customer on third downs.

Sanchez and his receivers combined to convert seven third-down situations of 6 yards or longer in the opening-day win over the Texans. The seven such conversions is something that happens about once a decade for the Jets. In the previous 20 seasons, only two other QBs came up with that many third-and-6-or-longer conversions in a game — Ken O'Brien in a loss to the L.A. Raiders in 1989 and Vinny Testaverde in the successful 2000 season opener at Green Bay.

Such third-and-long success doesn't guarantee victory — the Jets are 5-4 in games in which they converted at least six chances at third-and-6 or longer. But in all nine games, the Jets either won or else lost by seven or fewer points. Here's the list since 1989 (home teams in CAPs):

Rex's Rankings

Ryan and the Ravens continued their streaks that began after the fourth week of the 2005 season, Ryan's first as Baltimore's defensive coordinator. Both ended last season with 64 consecutive weeks with a defense that ranked in the top 10 in the NFL in total yards allowed per game. With the Jets' "D" ranked second overall and the Ravens' third after opening week, that's 65 weeks and counting both for the architect and for one of the defenses he helped build.

Here's another rankings wrinkle that means little but still is neat. The Jets after Week 1 are in the top 10 in all six of the league's main yardage categories plus the two point ranking categories. When was the last time the Green & White could claim top-10 status in all eight categories in one week?

The answer is 12 years ago, after the awesome opening-day 41-3 road rout at Seattle that began Bill Parcells' Jets head-coaching tenure in 1997. Here are the league rankings for those two weeks, for old times' sake:

Hitman with Silencer

Ryan was asked today about David Harris, who a day earlier was named the AFC's Defensive Player of the Week.

"It's hard to have a conversation with him ... nah!" the coach said. "He's really not that quiet. But I guess compared to Bart [Scott], anybody seems quiet. But I think it's great. I know all the guys in the locker room respect David Harris. He's a good guy, he has a lot of fun out there, he always has a smile on his face. Players enjoy his personality. It's a little different than the other guys, but he's true to himself, every day he's the same, he loves playing this game, he's passionate about it, and he's a great football player, too."