JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- The Jaguars hit their bye week last week on a two-game losing streak, capped by a 28-point loss to the Los Angeles Rams in London.
Things have been ugly during the streak, too: 23 penalties, 14 sacks allowed, one sack made, 153 yards rushing, 19 points scored, and three missed kicks (two field goals and a PAT).
Yet coach Liam Coen says it's important to remember that the team is 4-3 (and would qualify for the playoffs if the season ended today) and there's no need to revamp everything they're doing. There are areas of major concern, especially the pass rush and penalties, but this is the same team that started the season 4-1, and an overhaul would be irresponsible.
"What we just talked about as a staff was, we cannot, absolutely not, go back and try to reinvent the wheel here," Coen said. "We're sitting at 4-3 [and] everything's ahead of us. We've got to play cleaner football. That's the reality and until you play cleaner in between the whistles, in between the white lines of playing more fundamentally sound, having better situational awareness, executing and handling the controllables [things won't improve].
"...We have not played our best the last two weeks going into the bye, which does kind of suck. It does. It's not a great feeling, but everything's ahead of us and my thing to this team is going to be, 'Man guys, we have done so many good things. We are a really good football team, but not when we hurt ourselves.'"
Getting Travis Hunter more involved on offense, cutting down on penalties, and finding a way to generate more pass rush top the list of things the Jaguars must do over their final 10 games if they're going to be in the playoff hunt in December.
More Hunter on offense
Coen hinted at some lineup shifting after the bye week, saying: "We are going to play the best 11 [on each side of the ball] as much as humanly possible." He said that during an answer about assessing Hunter's play and if they would be updating the plan for Hunter's usage after the bye.
Reading between the lines, it looks like Hunter is going to be a significant player in the offense going forward. That's what Coen said heading into last Sunday's game against the Rams and then Hunter led the Jaguars in targets (14), catches (eight) and receiving yards (101) while playing a season-high 64 snaps. He now leads the team in receptions (28) and is second in receiving yards (298).
So don't be surprised if Hunter starts getting the WR1 treatment from the Jaguars in the season's second half, and that's partly due to his playmaking and run-after-the-catch ability, but also because Brian Thomas Jr. hasn't played at that level all season.
Thomas tied for the NFL lead with five drops with three other players through Week 7, per ESPN Research, and there have been multiple instances where he has appeared to alligator arm a pass or shy away from contact. He had third-down drops against Seattle Seahawks and the Rams and a fourth-down drop against the Cincinnati Bengals that would have given the Jaguars a first-and-goal late in the fourth quarter.
How that impacts Hunter's role on defense isn't yet clear, but it's notable Hunter played only 12 defensive snaps against the Rams (he had a pass breakup against Davante Adams) after playing 25 and 22 snaps on defense the previous two games.
"[The updated plan for Hunter] is absolutely going to be a part of the conversation [during the bye] with both sides of the football," Coen said. "... We've kind of gotten a sample size of everything, the totality of the first seven weeks of every position, but specifically with him. There was definitely some really good things [on Sunday], specifically on the offensive side of the ball. There's still a lot of things that need to be cleaned up and corrected."
Fix self-inflicted wounds
That's what Coen told the players in the locker room following the Week 6 loss to Seattle, and he was referring to issues such as penalties, drops, missed throws, missed kicks, missed tackles, blown coverages ... meaning they must stop beating themselves.
But it's the penalties that are the biggest problem. Heading into their bye week, the Jaguars led the league in total penalties (83), accepted penalties (65), and accepted offensive penalties (37 -- six more than the next closest team). They were second with 528 penalty yards (the Denver Broncos has 575). But the issue is more than the number and yards.
The Jaguars have had two touchdowns taken away by penalties in the past two games. Thomas' 54-yard touchdown catch was wiped out because Hunter lined up offside against Seattle and Parker Washington's 62-yard punt return for a touchdown was wiped out by an illegal block in the back by Jarrian Jones.
"Operation, penalties, missed assignments, those are all things that are super controllable as a group and as individuals," center Robert Hainsey said. "Penalties, mental errors, they're going to show up. It's just the nature of the game. ... That's just how this game works. Everyone's good and you're competing and you're battling, but when you add all those up it becomes way too many and the negatives just decrease your chances of continuing drives and scoring on drives by astronomical numbers every time you get one."
Find some pass rush
The Jaguars are one of the league's worst teams when it comes to pressuring the quarterback. Though their 84 pressures ranked 16th through seven weeks, their QB pressure percentage (30%) ranked 27th and they had a league-low eight sacks.
Defensive end Josh Hines-Allen, who set the franchise's single-season sack record (17.5) in 2023, has just a half sack to go along with 27 pressures, which ranked 14th in the NFL through seven weeks. Out of the 42 players with 21 or more pressures in that time frame, Hines-Allen had more sacks than only three: defensive tackle Christian Barmore, defensive end Boye Mafe, and linebacker Jalyx Hunt.
Defensive tackle Arik Armstead has 3.5 sacks and defensive end Travon Walker, who missed one game with a left wrist injury and has played the past two with a club, has two. They're the only players with multiple sacks.
"We haven't been doing up to our standard and that's something that we want to continuously improve on," Walker said. "As long as we execute the playcalls, know what we're doing, be in the right spots at the right time, then I feel like on the back half of the regular season that [getting more pressure and sacks] will take care of itself."
Blitzing more might not necessarily be the answer, either. The Jaguars haven't been able to generate much pressure despite being one of the NFL's top blitzing teams (30.4%, which ranked 11th). They've managed four sacks when rushing five or more, and Coen said they've missed chances to get more sacks when blitzing.
"When we've been able to send some pressure and get some blitzes and get these guys moving, we've had some more opportunities," he said. "So, it's a fine line. It's a balance of being able to send five, send four, send pressure whether it's zone or man behind. It also impacts sometimes the front and their ability to get home when the ball has to get held onto it for another click.
"...If we're able to do it on third downs and get after the quarterback and impact the receivers and the coverage, we've got to find ways to do it as well a little bit better on first and second down. But yeah, it [the pass rush] has to improve just like the rest of it."
Silver lining? The schedule gets easier
Despite the back-to-back losses, the Jaguars sitting better than .500 after seven weeks makes them one of the NFL's surprise teams, especially since they entered the season losers of 18 of their last 23 games.
There is one thing working for them if they are going to be one of the handful of teams to make the playoffs after not making it the previous season: Their schedule gets easier.
The final 10 games come against teams with a combined 27-33 (.450) record (they play Indianapolis Colts and Tennessee Titans twice). The Jaguars' first seven opponents have a combined record of 29-23 (.557).
The Jaguars face only three teams with winning records in their final 10 games: Indianapolis, Denver and the Los Angeles Chargers. Five of the first seven teams they played currently have a record of .500 or above: Carolina Panthers, San Francisco 49ers, Kansas City Chiefs, Seahawks and the Rams. The Jaguars are 3-2 against those teams.
The Jaguars haven't lost at home to Indianapolis since 2013, have won five of their past six against Tennessee (including season sweeps in 2022 and 2024), and the New York Jets are 1-7.