Three on D: Moore, Smith, Briggs

After each game, we typically highlight three defensive and three offensive players and look in detail at their performance. We'll start today with the defense:

She cried "Moore, Moore, Moore"

Malachi Moore was starting for the sixth time in his rookie season and this may have been his best game so far.

Having set a career-high with eight tackles in the win over the Bengals, Moore matched that on Sunday.

While only two of these were within six yards of the line of scrimmage (and one of those was on a play that still went for a first down), he was still contributing well in terms of limiting potential big plays from going further and didn't miss a tackle all day.

This was probably his best play, though.

One interesting thing about Moore's role on Sunday was how the Jets used him. When Jarvis Brownlee had to move outside due to the Azareye'h Thomas concussion, the obvious thing to do would be to put Isaiah Oliver in the slot for nickel packages. However, the Jets instead moved Moore into the slot and put Oliver deep in those situations. That speaks to their confidence in him to make plays closer to the line of scrimmage.

The Browns were completely unable to exploit Moore in coverage with the only catch he gave up being a 12-yard dump off on 3rd-and-22. He was unsuccessfully targeted three other times.

With Andre Cisco out for the season, Moore's starting role feels pretty secure, whether he is paired with Oliver or Tony Adams the rest of the way. If his consistency and impact continue to improve as they have been, he's going to develop into a very solid piece.

Now, if he could just start coming up with some turnovers...

The Mazi Regime

It would be a nice bonus if the Jets can turn Mazi Smith into something. The former first round pick had struggled to crack the rotation in Dallas this year after starting every game in 2024 so he was arguably little more than a throw-in from the Quinnen Williams trade.

There should be a spot for him in the Jets' rotation, though, and he already got on the field for 20 defensive snaps against the Browns in his Jets debut.

On those plays, Smith had a minimal impact. He didn't get close to registering a pressure on 11 pass rush attempts and he wasn't credited with a tackle (although he missed one) as he was mostly controlled pretty easily at the point of attack against the run.

Unfortunately, all our first look at Smith provided was an insight into why he wasn't getting any reps in Dallas. However, this is a guy with a lot of untapped potential so the Jets will see what they can get out of him. That process might take a while though. Hopefully he's a late-developer.

Brigging the Game

Also affected by the Williams trade was Jowon Briggs, who moves up a spot in the rotation, although the Jets opted to have Jay Tufele starting. Briggs made a big impact, though, as he had six pressures on just 16 pass rush attempts.

He was very close to rounding off his performance with what would have been his third sack of the year, but just couldn't quite drag Dillon Gabriel down or get him wrapped up on this play, where he actually lined up outside.

While those contributions are impressive, his most exciting play was arguably this one. Going up against seven-time pro bowler Joel Bitonio, Briggs kept his pad level low, extended his arms and drove Bitonio laterally to bottle up a run for no gain. Excellent stuff.

In addition to this play, Briggs was also in on two other tackles near the line. One saw him initially stand up his man in the trenches before giving a little ground so he could get off the block and plug the hole to block the runner's path. The other saw him hustle to bring down Gabriel on a scramble as he looked to avoid pressure, although there was an offensive penalty on the play anyway.

Briggs wasn't perfect against the run as he was sealed off or driven back a few times, but his disruptiveness was apparent there too.

This continues to have been one of the finds of the season as Briggs appears on course to play a significant role in the wake of Williams' departure. So far, so good.

Three-on-O will follow tomorrow.