Jets foster a sense of belonging in NFL playoffs

Reporting from San Diego — 

They are who we thought they were: Minnesota, New Orleans and Indianapolis are one win away from the Super Bowl.

They are who they thought they were: So are the New York Jets.

That’s right, the Jets are four quarters away from making it to Miami, and they’ve heard all the chatter outside their locker room -- that they didn’t belong in the playoffs, that the Colts handed them a victory by pulling Peyton Manning in the third quarter of a Week 16 game, that they’re merely accidental tourists playing on borrowed time.

They’ve heard. But they haven’t listened to a word.

“We’re on a steamroll train, and we’re happy that people don’t give us a chance or don’t respect us,” Jets receiver Braylon Edwards said. “They go out there and say that we don’t deserve to be in the playoffs. Each week, we’re showing them otherwise.”

That the Saints, Vikings and Colts are in this position is not particularly startling. They ran away with their respective divisions. But the wild-card Jets are a stunner.

“We know what people think about us,” Edwards said. “They don’t have to say it. We don’t have to read it. People think we’re a hoax, a fluke. We don’t care. We’re happy that people feel that way.”

And now, the Jets stand at the brink of an incredible irony. They could be the team that knocks off Indianapolis, less than a month after the then-14-0 Colts mailed it in by resting Manning. They lost, and that kept the Jets in the postseason picture.

There was precious little bravado Sunday from the Jets when discussing the Colts’ quarterback, who recently won his record fourth most-valuable-player award. They know how good Manning is.

“We know they’re extremely talented, there’s no question about it,” Jets Coach Rex Ryan said of the Colts. “It’s going to take our best effort, and we’ll see if that’s good enough.”

Ryan conceded, in fact, that he’d rather be playing Baltimore, his former team, in the championship game -- in part because that game would have been played at the Meadowlands, but also because he knows the personnel better.

Not all of his players agree.

“We wanted this challenge; we didn’t want nobody else,” defensive tackle Marques Douglas said. “We wanted to play Indy, and we wanted to show everybody that we can beat them with all their guys. When [Manning was in the game] we weren’t that bad. We weren’t chopped liver. . . . We’ve got a chance to be successful, and we know that.”

The Jets-Chargers game proved to be the only close one of the weekend, and only the second nailbiter in the postseason. The Saints and Vikings won their games by 31 points each, pounding Arizona and Dallas.

After this weekend, the NFL is assured of having a different NFC team in the Super Bowl for the ninth consecutive year. In order, those teams are St. Louis, Tampa Bay, Carolina, Philadelphia, Seattle, Chicago, the New York Giants, Arizona, and now either New Orleans or Minnesota.

Never in NFL history has a team signed a hired-gun quarterback and won a Super Bowl that season. But the Vikings have a chance to be that team.

“This is what I came back for,” said Minnesota’s Brett Favre, who threw four touchdown passes -- his career high for the playoffs -- in a 34-3 stomping of Dallas.

It was the first time Favre has beaten the Cowboys in the playoffs -- they ended his first three postseasons with Green Bay -- and he loved turning the tables on them. Maybe, he loved it too much.

After the game, Fox TV cameras showed the quarterback in the locker room leading his Vikings teammates in a rendition of “Pants on the Ground,” the country’s trendiest, goofiest song, performed in an “American Idol” audition last week by 62-year-old “General” Larry Platt.

The song mocks youngsters for “looking like fools” with their low-slung pants and hats turned sideways. Favre and his teammates chanted “Pants on the ground! Pants on the ground!” in celebration, minutes after embarrassing the Cowboys.

Already, Dallas players were steamed about a late touchdown they thought unnecessary.

“I thought it was totally classless and disrespectful,” fumed Cowboys linebacker Keith Brooking, who went looking for Vikings Coach Brad Childress after the final touchdown. “This is the NFL. That’s not what it’s all about.”

Said Childress: “That wasn’t rubbing it in. It’s just taking care of business.”

sam.farmer@latimes.com

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