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David Garrard: Jets QB Geno Smith too worried about outside noise

New York Jets quarterback Geno Smith has had a tumultuous start to his career, to say the least. In his first two years in the league, Smith has underperformed while consistently turning the ball over.

And former Jets quarterback and backup to Smith, David Garrard says he knows why Smith has struggled to live up to the hype he had coming out of West Virginia, according to ESPN.com.

“I definitely think Geno has the ability to be a pretty good quarterback. I just think sometimes he’s worried about the outside noise,” Garrard said while appearing on NFL Network’s ‘NFL Total Access.’ “He’s worried about what his teammates think, what his coaches think, what the media thinks, what the fans think and he’s not just concentrating on his game and just making the plays that he should be making. You can see a lot of times in practice and in the meeting room, he’s spot on; he knows exactly what to do. But he has moments where he’s not doing that.”

Garrard went on to say he didn’t see Smith making a lot of the mistakes he’s made in games during practice.

“No because you don’t have the stress of everybody looking at you and seeing exactly what you’re doing,” Garrard said. “But when he gets out there on game day, he has great plays but then he just has too many bonehead mistakes where we didn’t see those things at practice. Why are we seeing them now in game time? He has to fix those before he can be a great quarterback.”

Smith threw for 2,525 yards with 13 touchdowns and 13 interceptions in 14 games last season.

(via kickoffcoverage)