BY NICK ST. DENIS
Josh McDaniels has seen enough Rex Ryan's defenses to know that he hasn't seen it all.
The New England Patriots offensive coordinator will get his next look at Ryan's squad when the New York Jets travel to Foxborough Thursday night for an AFC East showdown.
"I always think that a preparation for Rex's defense is unique and different basically from everybody you play," McDaniels told reporters Monday. "He's very willing to change and make adjustments and give you things and looks that you haven't seen before. This year will be no different.
". . . I'm sure there's going to be some things that happen on Thursday night that we didn't prepare for."
Ryan, the Jets' head coach, has re-taken the reigns of Gang Green's defense with the departure of former coordinator Mike Pettine, who jettisoned to the Buffalo Bills. McDaniels faced Pettine's defense last week but expects a different look in Week 2.
McDaniels was up against Ryan's squad twice last year in his current position, in 2010 as head coach of the Denver Broncos and a handful of times before that as a Patriots assistant when Ryan led the Baltimore Ravens defense.
"He's always presented a great challenge offensively to us, and I'm expecting no different this week," McDaniels said. "They're well-coached, they have good players and a good scheme, and he certainly knows exactly what he's doing, and we have a lot of familiarity with each other -- our offense, their defense -- but each game certainly has a flavor of its own and playing on the short week certainly adds a different element to that as well."
In the Jets' season-opening win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Ryan's defense held tailback Doug Martin to 2.7 yards a carry and kept quarterback Josh Freeman under a 50 percent completion rate. Thursday, Ryan will be in attack mode against Tom Brady's injury-depleted offense.
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