E-Boland & Gang Green

By Tom Rock

So much to say and so little space. That’s the problem with a newspaper when a story like this one comes along. A blog, however, can go on and on and on. That gives me plenty of room to sprinkle some thoughts and observations about today’s first day of minicamp.

First, back to the Pete Kendall situation. The thing I found the most interesting is that Kendall spoke about his brief meeting with Mangini on Wednesday night and said the coach was more concerned about how things would fall out in the media than he was about having his starting left guard in minicamp. Kendall was asked if anything was accomplished in the conversation. “Absolutely nothing.” Was it amicable? “No.” How long did it last for? “Seconds.” Who initiated it? “He did.”

Kendall continued. “All I know is he wanted to know how this was going to go down today,” he said, pointing to the throng of reporters and cameras surrounding him. “I told him to do what he had to do and I was going to do what I had to do.”

Did he think the conversation was professional? “No. There’s some hard feelings.”

Kendall may not be right in this situation, but he certainly presented a more quotable account of the conflict so you’ll probably hear a lot more of what he said and not so much what Mangini and Tannenbaum said. Essentially their stance is that he is under a contract that he signed last year. While Kendall was turning phrases such as hoping to make this “a good divorce” and issuing statements such as “I tried to keep things under wraps and handle things professionally and I don’t think that’s been reciprocated,” the Jets maintained that all conversations and contract negotiations are internal and steadfastly refused to engage Kendall in a war of words.

So, how does this resolve itself? For a team that has such a tight grip on message and communication, it must have been disturbing to hear one of its own players – a captain no less – blasting the organization while standing on the practice field and still wearing the team uniform (sans helmet decal, of course). Normally punishment would ensue, and there’s a chance the Jets could fine Kendall. That would only create more of a chasm between them. Still, Pete’s comments and his actions in practice (he was very distant and unengaged) make it clear that he wants out. The Jets will release him since he has little trade value now. But the release won’t come until a little later this summer, making it a bit more difficult for him to find work in another training camp. The bottom line is that the Jets can’t have a player rip the franchise apart and then throw him an extra million bucks to keep him, which is what Kendall wanted to begin with. And while Kendall is a very good player and had a strong influence on many younger players including Mangold and Ferguson, he’s ultimately an offensive guard and can be replaced. Hell, when he was hurt last year, Norm Katnik stepped in. Kendall may be worth the money he wanted, but now he’s made himself not worth the aggravation for the Jets.

Here’s a few other snippets from the workout, where it felt more like October than June. At one point David Bowens came off the field and shouted “Somebody turn the heat on” and “Where are the space heaters at?” He did play the last few years in Miami.

WR Brad Smith is looking very sharp and caught a TD pass from Chad Pennington to cap a two-minute drill. He also made some strong catches in traffic in the afternoon session and then stayed “after school” with the rookies and other new Jets to play quarterback

Leonard Peters was chewed out by special teams coach Mike Westhoff during a three-on-three kickoff coverage drill. “Less dramatics and more movement,” the coach shouted. “Get your (butt) to the football!” Later Peters had a moment of redemption when he made a strong play at safety, breaking up a pass over the middle from Marques Tuiasosopo during 7-on-7s.

Darian Barnes is moving very well at fullback. In open field tackling drills he’s one of the better runners and showed some impressive agility along the sideline. In the same drill, Darrelle Revis flew past rookie DB James Ihedigbo with a burst of speed.

Rookie OL Andrew Wicker may look familiar. His heavy beard and long blond hair make him a ringer for starting center Nick Mangold. They even wear similar jersey numbers, Nick having 74 and Andrew 64. It usually takes a second or third glance to tell them apart on the field. New nickname for Wicker: Fool’s (Man)gold.

Kerry Rhodes missed practice today for a family obligation. Eric Smith played with the starting unit in his place.

Mangini tripped over some words this afternoon when talking about Vilma’s dog fighting comments (which were pretty tame but raised a bit of a storm because of the hot-button nature of the topic). Mangini said that both he and the organization “condone any cruelty to animals on any level.” Of course he used the wrong word and probably meant to either say “condemn” instead of condone or forgot the do not as in “do not condone.” Either way, it was a rare slip of the tongue for Mangini.

And Katie Strang, Newsday’s summer intern, was at minicamp today. She wrote a few blogs, as you can see below, and contributed to a notebook that will appear in the paper on Friday. I know some of you were very excited to see someone else writing on this blog. Well settle down, I’m still here! As long as Kendall is here, anyway. If he goes, I go!