Suck it up

Jets must breathe deep and play

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Posted: Friday January 15, 1999 05:45 PM

Hall: "It's light air and it helps your ball move further. There's more implications, but you have to look at it that it's just a game." Brian Bahr/Allsport

DENVER (AP) -- The Jets say they won't be caught breathless in Denver. The Broncos say that's a lot of hot air.

When the Jets visit Mile High Stadium for Sunday's AFC championship game, they will be riding high, with a seven-game winning streak. Their attitude, however, could fall victim to the altitude, as the thin air thins their chances of advancing to the Super Bowl for the first time in 30 years.

"You can tell the altitude takes its effect on people," Broncos defensive tackle Mike Lodish said. "I don't care who you are. Late in the fourth quarter, you have some guys who are just dying out there. Even early in the game at the end of a 12- or 14-play drive, you have some tongues hanging down."

Lodish saw that at the outset of last weekend's playoff victory over Miami. The Broncos marched 92 yards in 14 plays, a drive of nearly eight minutes.

He hopes to see it again from the Jets. But New York isn't buying it.

"Mile High is not unlike talking about several other places we went," coach Bill Parcells said. "Go to Buffalo, Kansas City, Miami, don't think the place can be unlike that, and at least we been through it.

"I don't think [the altitude] has anything to do with it."

Asked if teams must acclimate themselves to being in the Rockies, Parcells shook his head. He coached at Air Force in Colorado Springs, which gives him something to base that opinion on.

"I don't think they are moving the game to sea level, so I think we just have to go play," said Parcells, who added he wouldn't even mention it to the players.

"Why bring that up and create another distraction?" linebacker Bryan Cox said. "The only ones thinking about those things are the media, not the players.

"Our job is to get ready and play the Denver Broncos for the AFC championship in Mile High Stadium. Nothing else will matter to us."

Perhaps. The Jets certainly have done well in what they term "hostile environments," winning at Kansas City, New England, Buffalo, Miami and Tennessee this season. They've displayed poise and gumption.

One Jets player thinks the altitude will help. Placekicker John Hall, who has converted 27 of 37 field goals, including 52- and 30-yarders in last Sunday's 34-24 playoff win against Jacksonville, has no problem with playing in Denver.

"It's light air and it helps your ball move further," Hall said. "There's more implications, but you have to look at it that it's just a game."

And not look at it as a head game, where the Broncos are breathing easily because they are used to the atmosphere, and the Jets are not.

"They might have a team where it affects nobody," Broncos fullback Howard Griffith said. "It's a mental aspect. Even if it doesn't affect you, you've heard all week that you're going to Mile High and the altitude is going to affect you. Even if it doesn't really affect your game, it's already been embedded in your mind. If you allow it mentally to be a block, it's an advantage for us."

 

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