Kellen Clemens did just enough as the Jets’ starting quarterback yesterday to confirm that benching Chad Pennington was both the right move and not nearly sufficient to solve all the Jets’ problems.

A 23–20 overtime loss to the Washington Redskins showed that Clemens has a better arm and quicker feet than Pennington, but also that he needs to work on timing with his receivers and that he’s often too cautious. More important, the game showed that until the Jets’ defense improves, quarterback is far from their biggest concern.

Against the run, the Jets’ defense was terrible. Running back Clinton Portis had 36 carries for 196 yards, and his backup, Ladell Betts, had nine for 64. The Redskins’ offensive line dominated the Jets’ front seven, and it’s particularly galling to the Jets that guard Pete Kendall, whom they traded to the Redskins before the season, had an especially good game.

The Jets’ pass defense, for the most part, held Redskins quarterback Jason Campbell in check. Inside linebacker Eric Barton had his best game of the season, with a sack and an interception, the latter coming when defensive back Abram Elam blitzed Campbell, hitting him just as he released his pass and causing it to come up short. When the Jets showed that type of aggressiveness — attacking rather than sitting back and waiting for the Redskins to come to them — the defense showed signs of life. That didn’t happen often enough, though.

If there’s one bright spot for the Jets’ defense, it’s rookie inside linebacker David Harris. With an incredible 20 tackles yesterday, Harris had his second huge game in two career starts. Harris is looking like one of the very few good things to come out of this season for the Jets.

Whether or not Clemens will be one of the good things to come out of this season is unclear. For much of the game, Clemens relied on the same short passing style that was so often derided as the product of Pennington’s weak passing arm. Clemens at times looked too wary, like he’d rather get a safe five yards than take a shot at a big gain. Only seven of Clemens’s 42 passes were thrown more than 15 yards downfield, and he averaged just 5.4 yards a pass and 9.8 yards a completion. Clemens appeared to have no trouble reading the Redskins’ defense and changing plays at the line of scrimmage, but he did seem to have trouble knowing exactly where to go with the ball. Some of his incompletions looked like the types of throws where a quarterback who had more of a feel for the tendencies of his receivers would have connected. Overall, Clemens finished 23 of 42 for 226 yards, with one touchdown and no turnovers.

Still, a lot went right for Clemens, especially early in the game. He got a break – if being drilled by a blitzing safety can be called a break – in the first quarter when Redskins safety LaRon Landry hit him after he threw an incomplete pass on third-and-9 that would have forced the Jets to punt. The subsequent 15-yard penalty gave the Jets a first down. On a third-and-7 pass during the same drive, Redskins defensive end Andre Carter tipped the ball at the line of scrimmage, but it ricocheted into the arms of tight end Chris Baker for 14 yards. Those two first downs were part of a 15-play, 69-yard drive that ended with a 29-yard field goal by Mike Nugent.

Clemens is a much better runner than Pennington. He had seven carries for 48 yards, including an 18-yard run on third-and-7, plus three other rushing first downs. Clemens’s running ability and his strong arm should give the Jets plenty of opportunities to make big plays.

But the opportunity to make big plays and actually executing them are two different things, and after the Jets got off to a 17–3 lead in the second quarter, their big plays disappeared. That lead came on the strength of Leon Washington returning the opening kickoff for a touchdown, Nugent’s 29-yard field goal, and a 1-yard touchdown pass from Clemens to tight end Joe Kowalewski, a tight end who has spent most of his brief NFL career as an undrafted practice squad player. Kowalewski celebrated with all the enthusiasm you’d expect from an undrafted practice squad player scoring his first touchdown, jumping up and down, hugging every teammate he could find, spiking the ball, and then retrieving it so he could keep it as a souvenir.

And then the run defense fell apart, and we were reminded that the 2007 Jets are not a feel-good story. After the Jets took that 17–3 lead, the Redskins had five different scoring drives of more than 45 yards, most of which were powered by Portis and Betts, the last of whom set up the game-winning field goal in overtime.

The start of overtime was the only moment when fans got a look at Pennington who, as one of the team’s captains, took the field for the coin toss. The Jets won the toss but couldn’t score on their first overtime possession, and their defense couldn’t stop the Redskins from marching into field goal range for the winning kick. That overtime period showed that the Jets with Clemens at quarterback are a lot like the Jets with Pennington at quarterback: just a team that can’t find a way to win.

Mr. Smith is a writer for FootballOutsiders.com.