On January 12, 2003, in the 14th start of his NFL life (but only his second truly important one), Chad Pennington threw two interceptions and the Jets lost,30-10,in an AFC wild card playoff game. His quarterback rating for the game, that esoteric numerical value the NFL assigns to assess a quarterback’s performance, was a woeful 44.9.

On October 24,2004,in the 30th start of his NFL life (but, arguably, only his third important one), Pennington had the football in his hands with eight minutes left on the clock, 86 yards of real estate in front of him, and a six-point deficit on the scoreboard to the unbeaten New England Patriots.A tough task, no doubt, but surely not beyond the capabilities of an elite NFL quarterback, and certainly not too much to ask of a player touted by many as the superior of Joe Namath.

Five minutes and 56 yards later, the Jets final drive stalled when Pennington misfired for a triple-covered Wayne Chrebet. Pennington’s rating for the day was a mediocre 77.4, and the Jets went on to lose, 13-7.

Two Sundays ago, in the next biggest game of Chad Pennington’s professional life, the Jets managed just two field goals against the Pittsburgh Steelers in a 17-6 defeat. Pennington threw three interceptions and his QB rating for the day was 33.6, a number that would make Eli Manning blush with embarrassment.

This is not my opinion. These are cold, hard facts, not open to interpretation, or for that matter, misinterpretation.

Clearly, as Pennington goes, so go the Jets. Just as clearly – and some might call this misinterpretation – in three of the four biggest football games of his life, Chad Pennington has not played very well at all.

It is a privilege for me to have been able to write this, just as it is a privilege for Pennington, former journalism major at Marshall and, as we have been reminded ad nauseum, a Rhodes Scholarship finalist, to be able to earn millions of dollars to play a game 16 weeks out of the year.

Pennington plays it very well. Then again, he has yet to show that he plays it well enough. If that is to be construed by Pennington or the Jets as unfair criticism or an abuse of my privilege as a columnist to interpret that facts as I see fit, that is their right.

They might also take issue with the view that despite their 10-4 record, the Jets have yet to beat a really good NFL team, defined herein as one with a legitimate shot to win the AFC.(Yes, they did beat the San Diego Chargers on the road in Week 2, but that was a far different Chargers team than the one that now sits atop the AFC West.)

But there is one fact that should not be disputed by anyone on either side of the ball this week. Instead of concerning themselves with media criticism of the fair-haired quarterback or a perceived lack of respect for their capabilities, the only thing Pennington and the Jets should worry about right now is winning their rematch with the Patriots Sunday at Giants Stadium.

The way things stand right now, the Jets are likely to qualify as the fifth seed in the AFC playoffs, provided they can win one of their remaining two games. (They finish up in St. Louis on January 3.)

But they are just as likely to bow out after a single playoff appearance, considering the fact that their first-round opponent, be it San Diego, Indianapolis, New England or Pittsburgh, will have home-field advantage, a more significant edge in the NFL than in any other professional sport. And, of course, they have yet to prove they can beat any team outside of the NFL’s vast collection of parity-induced second-raters.

In that case, for all the hype about having finally enjoyed the luxury of having Pennington at quarterback for the entire season, for all the excitement of their 5-0 start, for all the satisfaction of Curtis Martin’s phenomenal season, the emergence of Justin McCareins as a true possession receiver, and the vast improvement of the defense, the 2004 Jets will have played precisely one more game than the 2003 Jets.

What will Pennington and head coach Herm Edwards have to say then? More to the point, what will they have to say about what is being said and written about them? In reality, squabbles between the media and players/coaches are boringly commonplace and of about as much significance to the outcome of a game as the amount of tape used to spat down a wide receiver’s spikes.

The flap over what is fair criticism of Pennington and what was appropriate retaliation was kid stuff, as was Edwards’s week-long hissy-fit in October over whether the six-point loss to New England constituted some kind of moral victory.

But when a team appears to be more concerned about the critiques of its performance than the performances themselves – now, that’s a problem.

Herm Edwards and Chad Pennington have enjoyed two of the longest honeymoon periods a coach and player have ever received in this voracious, insatiable town. It is not surprising that it has finally ended, because eventually, they all do.

What is surprising is the manner in which it ended.

The facts, once again, are as follows: In three of the four most important games he has ever played in – Pennington did play superbly in the Jets 41-0 victory over Indianapolis in the 2003 playoffs – the quarterback played poorly and the team lost. That is cause-and-effect, action-and-reaction.

Chad and the Jets may not like to hear about it or read about it. They may not like the perception that it gives life to; that he, and they, cannot win the big ones, only the medium ones.

There is a way to change all that, and it isn’t in the newspapers or at the podium. It is on the field, against the Patriots, at Giants Stadium on Sunday.

You don’t have to be a Rhodes Scholar or a journalism major to figure that much out.

Mr. Matthews is the host of the “Wally and the Keeg” sports talk show heard Monday-Friday from 4-7 p.m. on 1050 ESPN radio.