On this same weekend one year ago, it was the responsibility of the Pittsburgh Steelers to orchestrate the annual ejection of the San Diego Chargers from the AFC playoffs, which, perhaps you'll remember, went off with little pomp and even less circumstance. Willie Parker carried the football 27 times for 146 yards (yes only one year ago, not 1959), and Mike Tomlin's momentum-gathering world champions built a 28-10 lead at the start of the fourth quarter and short-circuited the Bolts, 35-24.

Around here, the good old days are practically new.

The same cannot be said, I'm afraid, of the New York Football Jets, whose charge it becomes late this afternoon to force San Diego onto its familiar January exit ramp.

The J-E-T-S Jets, Jets, Jets?

You J-E-S-T Jest, Jest, Jest.

Although they outplayed the Cincinnati Bengals last week on mild card weekend, the Jets haven't won consecutive playoff games since Casey Hampton could hide in a clothes hamper without breaking it. A decent-sized hamper to be sure, but still.

That was the winter of 1983.

"M• A• S• H" was still on network television.

So pardon me if I'm not buying the Jets just now, impressed though I am with D'Brickashaw Ferguson. There's never been a better name for an offensive tackle than D'Brickashaw Ferguson, and there are few better tackles of any name currently. D'Brickashaw is headed for the Pro Bowl, partly because in his fourth year he turned into a dominant force up front for New York, and partly because the Jets aren't going to be playing after today, which frees him up to participate in the Pro Bowl Jan. 31.

When you put Alan Faneca next to Ferguson, put Nick Mangold next to Faneca, and trot out thoroughbred running backs such as Thomas Jones and Shonn Green, the Jets certainly do take on an aura of accomplishment, and as Chargers quarterback Philip Rivers observed just the other day:

"That's a really good football team that's played really good football in the past few weeks."

Uh-huh.

Probably have really good football players on both sides of the football, but I wouldn't put words in his mouth.

These Jets, actually, are the first team to lead the league in defense and rushing since your 2001 Pittsburgh Steelers.

At the same time, however, these Jets lost at home to Buffalo, lost at home to Atlanta, lost twice to the Dolphins, finished 2-4 in their division, and probably would have lost as many games as they won in the regular season were it not for the skittish thinking of the Indianapolis Colts, who re-leashed the hounds in the middle of the Dec. 27 game the Jets went on to win.

The Jets were so bad at one point that head coach Rex Ryan mistakenly pronounced them eliminated from the postseason, the worst semantic mistake he made until he subsequently read them an itinerary extensive enough to include a championship parade. If you didn't know Rex Ryan was the son of Buddy Ryan, who made a heckuva career out of inspired defensive schematics and blabbermouth intemperance, you knew it then.

The infusion of erstwhile Baltimore Ravens attitude into Ryan's defense courtesy of Bart Scott and Jim Leonhard combined with the immense skills of former Pitt corner Darrelle Revis have turned the Jets into something pretty competent, but the bandwagon is way too big and loud for this 9-7 team with no pedigree.

There might have been a team in this playoff round the Jets could beat (like the Ravens), but it isn't the Chargers.

It's not so much that the Chargers have won four consecutive AFC West titles and 11 games in a row, it's more that San Diego presents too many matchup problems for the Jets to overcome. New York has no middle-of-the-field answer for either tight end Antonio Gates or all-purpose water bug Darren Sproles. Sproles, last seen on postseason TV taking a short Rivers toss 62 yards for a touchdown against the Steelers, needs just 51 all-purpose yards today for 1,000 in his career, a plateau he'll have scaled faster than anyone in playoff history.

On top of that, for all his athleticism and football intelligence, Revis is not going to smother the 6-foot-5 Vincent Jackson the way he asphyxiated Cincinnati's Chad Ochocinco. Jackson is 4 inches taller and five years younger than Senor 8-5. Senor Ochotress will have his way at some point.

Without trying to over simplify (though yes, I'm a former Over-simplifier of the Year in the Knee Jerk Reaction division), San Diego has an overwhelming advantage in something so rudimentary as quarterback comparison. New York's Mark Sanchez had a fine playoff baptism, but he's still the guy who threw 20 picks this year against 12 touchdowns, while Rivers led the pass offense that scored more points than any team in the conference including Peyton Manning's.

Ryan's defense will pose some problems, but Rivers won't be looking at Troy Polamalu today, or Aaron Smith, or James Farrior, Larry Foote, James Harrison, and LaMarr Woodley, much less at the big kid in the middle who's clearly been out of the hamper a long time.

Ed Bouchette's blog on the Steelers and Gerry Dulac's Steelers chats are featured exclusively on PG+, a members-only web site from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Our introduction to PG+ gives you all the details.