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FLORHAM PARK Jordan Scarlett Jersey , N.J. (AP) — Spencer Long was frustrated, angry and thoroughly embarrassed.He had gone from being the leader of the New York Jets‘ offensive line to an unexpected punchline.Long was all over the blooper reels and social media — the center who simply couldn’t snap the football.“It was a tough, challenging time that I don’t think a lot of people knew exactly what was going on,” Long told The Associated Press on Friday. “My reputation was on the line.”Long was already dealing with a lingering injury to his right hand — his snapping hand — early in the season when he hurt a tendon in his middle finger against Jacksonville in Week 4. It made for a painful combination — “kind of just a chain reaction,” he said — that produced sometimes unpredictably ugly results.There were a few wayward shotgun snaps, and Long tried to push through his misfires before sitting out one week.Then came a disastrous game at Miami in Week 9.“Any time you put your hand on the ball and it doesn’t feel right, it creates an issue, especially for a guy that’s only been playing for so long at that position,” said the 28-year-old Long, who was a guard in his first 2½ NFL seasons in Washington. “I gave the impression that I was ready to go that week and throughout practice I was fine, all my snaps were fine. And then we go into the game and re-injury happens and then you’re in panic mode, you know? And, it was tough.“It was a pretty (awful) time.”The Jets ran an inside zone play against the Dolphins when Long was hit in the back and his right hand was engaged with another player. That’s when he felt a familiar searing pain in his finger.“There it goes again,” Long recalled, “And this is in the middle of a drive. I’m not going to pull myself out during the drive and create dysfunction in the flow.“But obviously, it was a risky decision that didn’t pay off.”Long had at least six errant shotgun snaps to rookie Sam Darnold, including one that soared over the quarterback’s head. He was replaced by Jonotthan Harrison on the next series — and hasn’t snapped in a game since.Long, who signed a four-year, $27.4 million contract last offseason Jonah Williams Jersey , became a popular target of frustrated fans, with the snaps mockingly turned into gifs and memes on social media.“I felt bad for my teammates and coaches for putting that out there,” he said of his performance. “For the fan base, too, because they deserved more than that from me. I’m a guy that’s supposed to be an addition and not a subtraction to this line.”Some blamed coach Todd Bowles for not pulling Long sooner. Others thought offensive coordinator Jeremy Bates should have called for fewer shotgun plays.“It was on me,” Long said. “It was completely on me. I made a decision that maybe wasn’t smart at the time. But I thought until it happened, I was getting through it. It was a (lousy) situation. It was really hard for a while there. I mean, I get it. I understand. I’m a pro center. I’m not supposed to have issues like that. I understand why people would be frustrated. Nobody was more frustrated than me, I can promise you that.“It was tough for me, but, you’ve just got to stick it out.”That, however, was far from easy.His hand was betraying him. And that put him in a dark spot mentally.“It was probably the most stress I’ve ever had playing football,” Long said. “It just kept getting worse because I was using it. I couldn’t protect it. It was a tough month there. It was probably four to six weeks until I was able to move on and be the person that I know I can be, and come back and contribute to this team without that worry.”Starting left guard James Carpenter went down with a season-ending knee injury in Week 10 against Buffalo, creating a void on the offensive line. The Jets shifted Long to guard — where he has started three of the last four games.“It’s crazy how things rearranged themselves via an unfortunate circumstance, but I’m just glad to be playing ball again,” Long said. “I know that I could play both positions at a high level, so whatever the team needs me for.”Bowles has seen Long grow more comfortable at left guard during the last month http://www.bengalscheapshop.com/cheap-authentic-drew-sample-jersey , and his teammates praise him for bouncing back from a situation in which some players might have withered.“He’s a fighter,” Harrison said. “The fact he was able to push through all he had going on, come back out there and keep on fighting, we’ve got all the respect for him.”Long’s future with the Jets is uncertain. He’s due to make $3 million next season with a $3.5 million roster bonus due in February. It’s unclear if he’d be move back to center after an offseason of healing and rehab or stick to left guard. There’s also the likely possibility that there will be a new coaching staff in place.He insists he isn’t thinking about any of that right now. Long is focused on ending what had been a brutal season for him on a positive note.“This was a tough time and it all really tested me,” Long said. “I feel like I’ve come out on the other side with a lot more knowledge about the game and what it takes to get through stuff because of it. It makes the game uncomfortable when you’re not playing with the swagger that you need to have.“But you know, I’m not a quitter, so I just keep going.” Frank Clark will be making big bucks next season in the NFL.Kareem Hunt gets a shot at redemption.That video of Jeffery Simmons will be forgiven.Ditto for Nick Bosa’s tweets.Chances are, someone will find a way to employ Tyreek Hill.With the NFL — and, really, everything in life — it always comes down to the bottom line. The owners are simply working the numbers, deducing that whatever baggage the aforementioned rogues bring to a franchise’s reputation are more than offset by their stellar ability on the playing field.The Venn diagram goes something like this:More wins lead to more fans.More fans mean more dollars.More dollars make owners even richer.Rest assured, nothing’s going to change until those filling the seats and bolstering the TV ratings back up whatever disgust they may be feeling by actually abandoning their support of the NFL. And if you think that’s likely to happen, we’d love to hook you up with a Nigerian prince who’s holding millions of dollars in your name.A quick recap of the league’s infamous offseason (so far):— Looking to bolster a porous defense that cost them a chance to play in the Super Bowl, the Kansas City Chiefs worked out a trade and a new $105.5 million contract for pass rusher Clark. Never mind that he was kicked off his college team at Michigan after a domestic violence arrest in 2014. Or that, while with the Seattle Seahawks, he went on Twitter to taunt a female reporter over her story about domestic violence in sports, offering her a job cleaning his fish tank after she washed out as a journalist.The Chiefs’ decision to trade for Clark drew additional scrutiny because …— Hunt, the NFL’s top rusher in 2017, was released by Kansas City late last season when a hideous video surfaced that showed him shoving a woman and then kicking her while she was defenseless on the floor of a hotel hallway. Of course Germaine Pratt Jersey , Hunt has since received a second chance from the Cleveland Browns, though he’ll be suspended for the first eight games of the 2019 season. Citing his Christian faith but no doubt eager to build on the promise of a seven-win season, general manager John Dorsey said, “I see a lot of men of character who commit egregious acts. But at the end of the day, they learn from those acts, moved forward and became better people.”Meanwhile, back in Kansas City …— A local TV station aired graphic audio this week in which Hill and his fiance, Crystal Espinal, angrily discuss how their 3-year-old son was injured. Espinal said hill was “punching” the boy in the chest and using a belt on him for discipline, while Hill issued an obscene threat against Espinal. Hill has maintained his innocence, but the Chiefs barred the speedy receiver from all team-related activities while the investigation is ongoing. It’s also worth noting that Hill was kicked off his college team at Oklahoma State for a domestic violence arrest.Moving on to the draft …— Simmons was picked 19th overall by the Tennessee Titans, who shrugged off a video from 2016 that showed him striking a woman during a brawl that also involved his sister and mother. Simmons has apologized for the incident and had no troubles during his three years at Mississippi State. “I’m not perfect,” he said. “I made the mistake. I own up to it. I wasn’t raised like that, to strike a woman.”Also on Day 1 of the draft …— Bosa went to the San Francisco 49ers with the No. 2 pick after conceding that his agents deleted tweets in support of President Trump and critical of Colin Kaepernick, Beyonce and Marvel’s “Black Panther” movie. In a prescient response to his reasons for the social media scrubbing, Bosa said, “I had to. There is a chance I might end up in San Francisco.” There were also reports of Bosa liking multiple Instagram posts that featured racial and homophobic slurs. Eager to improve an anemic pass rush, the 49ers shrugged off any concerns about Bosa’s presence in the locker room or in a left-leaning city with a large gay population. “I was a little insensitive,” Bosa said. “I’m just ready to move forward from that http://www.bengalscheapshop.com/cheap-authentic-ryan-finley-jersey , put it in the past, and bring the faithful some wins.”Ahh, wins.In the end, that generally makes everything OK.Sure, some 49ers fans were critical of Bosa’s selection, and it was impossible to ignore the significance of him joining Kaepernick’s former team. During the 2016 season, the quarterback began kneeling during the national anthem to protest racial injustice in America, a stance that effectively cost him his playing career. Doing the math, the owners decided his undeniable playing skills were outweighed by his extremely vocal critics, a group that included Bosa and stretched all the way to the White House.Let’s also remember the case of former Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice, whose career rightfully ended over a gruesome video of him knocking out his fiance in an elevator. But, let’s face it, the unwillingness of any other team to offer up a second chance probably had more to do with him coming off an injury-plagued season in which he rushed for only 660 yards than a noble stance against domestic violence. As with Kaepernick, the numbers simply didn’t work in Rice’s favor.So, here’s the challenge for anyone out there who may be stewing over the NFL’s personnel decisions.If this really bothers you, find something else to do on Sundays this fall.A picnic. A movie. A bicycle ride. There are plenty of options.If you decide to stick with the NFL, there’s no chance of anything changing.That’s the bottom line.