Rex Ryan treated Mark Sanchez like backup quarterback in game full of the bizarre

You don't bring a starting quarterback into a preseason game in the fourth quarter with your starting offensive line on the bench. Every beat writer and columnist in New York has now beaten that point home after Saturday night's preseason game in which Mark Sanchez suffered an injury in the final quarter.

That is very clear - well, at least it was to everyone but Rex Ryan. However, more so than just a lack of common sense, Ryan exhibited a complete lack of certainty about the Jets' quarterback mess in what was far from your typical preseason game. 

Usually a dress rehearsal for starters, the Jets were instead auditioning rookie Geno Smith for the main role.

In three quarters of play, Smith clearly demonstrated he's not ready, throwing three interceptions and then embarrassingly running out of the end zone for a safety.

Weird moves didn't just come aboard the Jets' quarterback carousel. Giants head coach Tom Coughlin sent his field goal unit on for a game-tying field goal with less than a minute left in regulation, playing for overtime - in a preseason game that doesn't count.

Once into extra time, Coughlin called a timeout to ice Jets kicker Nick Folk, who missed the first try that didn't count, then missed the second that would have won the game. Later, Billy Cundiff got a shot at a 38-yard game-winner and again Coughlin attempted to ice the kicker, as Cundiff's kick that sailed wide right was rendered null. 

At that point, Ryan countered by sending the offense back onto the field. Matt Simms and company gained six more yards, then Cundiff finally ended the bizarre night in which both coaches played the MetLife Bowl like it was the Super Bowl.

Coughlin and Ryan were full of odd and unnecessary coaching decisions in the third preseason game's fourth quarter. 

A dress rehearsal hasn't gone so awry since "Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark" attempted to hit Broadway.

Ryan earned a meaningless win in a "battle for bragging rights" but may have lost his best option at quarterback, the trust of his team and, in his animated postgame press conference, some dignity. 

Jets fans have already lost any hope for normalcy this season - and it's not even Labor Day yet.

Gold medalists kiss: Protest of Russian anti-gay propaganda law?

With the Socchi Winter Olympics less than six months away, the host country’s stance on gay rights continues to create controversy.

Two Russian sprinters’ kiss on the medal stand has left many wondering if it was a protest against their country’s anti-gay propaganda law or just a show of affection.

Kseniya Ryzhova and Tatyana Firova shared the smooch following their victory in the 4x400 meter relay at the World Athletics Championships in Moscow Sunday.

Sky News reports a source tells them the kiss was not a political statement though some have interpreted it as such.

New Russian legislation passed in June made it illegal to talk about gay issues around minors. Displaying symbols like a rainbow flag in public could lead to accusations of propagandizing.

Athletes and sporting officials continue weighing in on the issue with opposing viewpoints.

Last week, Russian pole vaulter Yelena Isinbayeva criticized athletes who painted their fingernails the colors of the rainbow in support of gays and lesbians. 

"If we allow to promote and do all this stuff on the street, we are very afraid about our nation because we consider ourselves like normal, standard people," Isinbayeva said, later backing down from those comments, claiming she may have been misunderstood.

American Nick Symmonds fired back after winning a silver medal in the 800 meters.

"I want to say to Yelena, `You understand a very large portion of your citizens here are gay and lesbian people. They are standard people, too. They were created this way. For you to tell them that they're not normal and standard, that's what we're taking an issue with.' That's why we have to continue to demonstrate and to speak out against the ignorance that she's showing," he said.

Symmonds called what he has seen in Russia “atrocities.”

The county’s sports minister, Vitaly Mutko, said Sunday that the law will not infringe on the Olympics.

Mutko alleged that the Western media has given the issue more attention and called the law “an invented problem.”

"We want to protect our children whose psyches have not formed from the propaganda of drug use, drunkenness and non-traditional sexual relations," Mutko said.

The winter games will be held in Socchi from Feb. 7-23.