Following in the footsteps of one of his linebacking mentors, C.J. Mosley, Jamien Sherwood paced the Jets with 13 tackles (6) solo in Sunday's game against Buffalo. In the opener against Pittsburgh, the fifth-year player out of Auburn (where he played safety) shared the team lead with Quincy Williams, each with 6 takedowns.

Sherwood, one of the team's captains who is coming off a strong 2024 season, has emerged as the quarterback of the defense on the field and a thoughtful game analyst off the field ... as he was after the Bills' 30-10 victory.

"Obviously, when we go on the road, it's going to be even harder," Sherwood said, speaking about the Week 3 game at Tampa Bay after two games at MetLife Stadium to start the season. "Nobody's going to give us a chance when we go on the road. But again, like I tell them all the time, it's all about the men in this room. Nobody else matters. You got to believe the man to your left and to your right, and then you just got to fight for him."

The Jets managed only a field goal (Nick Folk's 51-yarder) and left the field after the first half trailing by 17 points. Buffalo ran 38 plays to the Jets' 23 in the first 30 minutes, converted 3 of 7 on third down and had 14 first downs to the Jets' 5.

"We had some three-and-outs at the end of the game, but we have to have that same momentum at the beginning of the game," Sherwood said. "And we got to do a better job on defense, giving our offense the ball back quicker, so they can go put up points."

QB Tyrod Taylor: 'Remain Confident'

Now in his 16th season in the NFL, QB Tyrod Taylor has pretty much seen it all. After starter Justin Fields left Sunday's game with a head injury and was placed in the concussion protocol, Taylor came on and completed 7-of-11 passes for 56 yards and a TD pass, with a 106.6 QB rating.

"Obviously, we left some plays out there on the field," he said. "There's a lot that we can clean up, but the main thing is that you remain confident. Find out what we did wrong, understand why we did it wrong, correct those mistakes and move forward and learn from these games."

With Fields in concussion protocol and his status uncertain for Sunday's game with the Buccaneers, it's possible Taylor could get his first start with the Jets Sunday in Tampa against the Buccaneers.

"We've now played two games," Taylor said. "There's some positives that we've done, and there's some, some not so things that we've done as well, too. The main thing is that you learn from both and continue to keep building your games early on in the season."

Quincy Williams on Run Defense

After limiting the Steelers to 53 yards on the ground in Week 1, the defense yielded 224 yards as the Bills held the ball for more than 38 minutes on Sunday. For LB Quincy Williams, that was a stat that spoke the truth about the result.

"Stop the run for real. For real," he said. "The Bills are one of those teams that's not going to shy away from what's working out for them. So they're going to continue to do the same thing, but we got to have more gap discipline, stopping the run, to make them one dimensional."

First TD Grab for Jeremy Ruckert

In his fourth season with the Jets, TE Jeremy Ruckert landed on the stat sheet with his first NFL career TD catch, coming from QB Tyrod Taylor late in the fourth quarter. He kept his reaction low key after the game, talking instead about the importance of the players sticking together.

"I was just trying to tell the guys that whatever the score is, every time you go on that field, they record their tape and the tape doesn't lie," the Long Island native said. "So whenever you go out there, you have an opportunity to put something on tape, and everybody's watching it. So every opportunity you get to go out there, make the most of it, stick together and play the style that you want to be.

"Just to get in there and show everybody that there's no quit and every time you get out there is a blessing."

Snap Counts

For the second straight week, the five players on the offensive line -- Olu Fashanu, John Simpson, Josh Myers, Joe Tippmann and Armand Membou -- took all 47 snaps (100%).

There were other numbers of note. Among pass catchers, WR2 Tyler Johnson took 45 snaps (95%), 2 more than WR1 Garrett Wilson; rookie TE Mason Taylor logged 34 (82%); and rookie WR Arian Smith had 22 (47%), 16 more snaps than in the season opener.

After an injury sent S Tony Adams to the sideline, rookie Malachi Moore stepped into the vacancy and took 48 (64%) snaps on defense and 23 (82%) on special teams. In addition, CB Qwan'tez Stiggers has emerged as a key player on special teams with 26 (93%) snaps to go with 25 (81%) ST snaps in the opener against Pittsburgh.