Solid Week 1 from New York Jets Rookie Mekhi Becton

In his NFL debut, Mekhi Becton had a solid game and showed his potential.

Mekhi Becton lived up to the hype in Week 1, the New York Jets rookie having a strong debut.

It isn’t an overstatement to say that Becton was one of the few Jets players to have a solid performance in their season opening 27-17 loss at the Buffalo Bills this past Sunday. Becton held down the left side of the offensive line, protecting quarterback Sam Darnold relatively well.

He did concede a sack and had a holding penalty but all things considered, his first NFL game went along pretty, pretty well.

“Yeah, he looked really good. I mean there’s some things that – just like I feel like everyone had – there’s some things that we can learn from,” Darnold said. “But again, he looked really good for his first start in the NFL, and we’re just going to continue to look to build off of that.”

Analytics site Pro Football Focus gave him a relative solid grade of 77.2. Becton was taken No. 11 overall in April’s NFL Draft.

The Bills had the second-best overall defense in the NFL in 2019, providing quite the learning experience for Becton in his first NFL game. This coming Sunday won’t be an easier.

The Jets face the San Francisco 49ers, who made the Super Bowl last year behind a tremendously aggressive defense. Becton will be matched up against 49ers edge rusher Nick Bosa.

In the 49ers loss to the Arizona Cardinals this past weekend, Bosa had six tackles and a quarterback hit. He is considered one of the best emerging pass rushers in the NFL.

Last season as a rookie, he had nine sacks and 25 quarterback hits in 16 games.

Becton is the centerpiece of a line that was rebuilt this offseason. He was one of four new starters on the line who started on Sunday. The reviews were mixed on the rest of the performances from the loss in Buffalo although Jets head coach Adam Gase saw some positives emerge.

“Protection wise, I thought the line, they were doing a good job with their communication, I feel like Sam had some passes where he was able to hang in the pocket, when he got flushed, at least there was a lane created,” Gase said on Monday.

“I thought there was, considering that last year in that game it just felt like a constant avalanche, it didn’t feel that way this time around, it felt like our guys did a better job of really giving Sam some time. Early in the game, Sam was a little quick with his feet and then he settled down and started playing better as the game went on.”