Antonio Cromartie on Dee Milliner: “…We Expect More from Him…”

Aug 17, 2013; East Rutherford, NJ, USA; New York Jets corner back Dee Milliner (27) during warmups before a preseason game against the Jacksonville Jaguars at MetLife Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Brad Penner-USA TODAY Sports

One thing we are learning, as this preseason progresses, is that Dee Milliner is not ready to start on the outside, opposite Antonio Cromartie. He is getting beaten, not getting his head around at the correct time, and generally just looking like a young player, adjusting to the NFL. He will be good, it’s just going to take some time.

This is not lost on the leader of the backfield, Antonio Cromartie:

For him it’s a learning experience. For this game, it’s the second preseason game for him and we expect more from him than we saw tonight. That’s something that he needs to learn from and he has to come out with a great attitude and get ready for the next week when we get ready to play guys like Hakeem Nicks and Victor Cruz. When we come to week one, we have to play two of the best receivers in the NFL with Vincent Jackson and also Mike Williams.

It’s not that we need to panic, Dee Milliner is entitled to look like a new player. Why? He is one. He is not going to just jump into the league and play like an All-Pro right from the jump. Milliner is entitled to a learning curve. I am just hoping they don’t force Dee out there too quickly. Work him into the game slowly. Kyle Wilson has looked better, he can hold down the job for a while.

Just FYI, here is what Cro had to say about the difficulties with the hurry-up from Saturday night:

You know honestly, we come into a preseason game not expecting a lot of hurry up but for us we were kind of glad we got a look at it. (It) had us on our toes a little bit you know its preparing us for when we play New England you know with the hurry up offense. For us it’s another key to the game that we got to look forward to knowing that teams want to get us into our sub positions. Also we can’t run our defense how we want to so we got to make sure we keep guys on their toes and go out and go play.

We’ve talked about this…they need to improve against the hurry-up…and hurry-up!