On the one hand, the practices now are OTAs. Older offensive players are getting acquainted with new, all are learning Marty Mornhinweg’s West Coast scheme. This is the time of year to make mistakes.

On the other hand …

“I’d rather not have him turn the ball over once,” Ryan said of QB Mark Sanchez, who turned the ball over three times in today’s practice session open to the media at the Atlantic Health Jets Training Center. “These are the OTAs, but that’s the pressure we’re putting on him. You flat tell him we can’t have these and all that stuff, and he knows.”

No. 6 sure does know. He threw a pass down the middle that was snagged on the slide by No. 37 — no, not Yeremiah Bell but rather Jaiquawn Jarrett, the former second-round pick of the Eagles fighting for the safety job that Bell left open when he departed for Arizona — and slapped his side with a hint of frustration.

Another pick went to Damon “Snacks” Harrison, yes, the 350-pound second-year DT who was sent into space by Ryan and coordinator Dennis Thurman in a particular look that worked well for the defense but gave Sanchez a Randy Starks flashback.

There were two other offensive giveaways this day, and so Ryan was spreading his pointed talk and tough love around to the entire ball-security operation.

“I think it’s a huge issue for our football team,” he said. “Obviously in that position [QB] you have to protect the ball. You’re going to have the ball in your hand every snap. But it’s more than that. We evaluate the punt returners the same way, the kick returners the same way. Those are areas we know we have to improve in. Joe McKnight led this league in kick returns but Joe’s probably the first one to tell you, ‘I’ve got to protect it to help this team.’

“So,” the head coach said in bringing the subject back to the position at hand, “that’s going to weigh into the decision of who’s going to play quarterback.”

Rex and Jets fans don’t need any anecdotal or statistical evidence to back up the importance of ball security, but for those who do, here is one factoid:

Five NFL teams have averaged 2.0-plus giveaways per regular-season game for the past two seasons: the Eagles (75 GAs), Jets (71), Cardinals (66), Chiefs (65) and Bills (64). Their combined record: 60-100, a .375 winning percentage, with no playoff appearances.

Then there’s this, which hints of the Green & White problem and its cure:

The 2011-12 Jets and ’11-12 Cards are the only two teams since 2009 to have averaged two-plus giveaways one year and not improved on their turnover total the following year. So on the one hand (Billy the Kid one more time) the Jets have been a hard case in improving their turnover tendencies. But on the other, with a sense of urgency and focus, 16 other 2.0-turnover teams since ’09 have improved their showing the following year, by an average of 10 fewer turnovers.

There’s no time like the present to stress ball security. Even if the time is at an OTA in the middle of May.

Rex Cetera

“The defense is much further ahead than the offense,” Ryan said of the units getting back into the swing at this week’s OTA start. “We’re kind of throwing the kitchen sink at the offense. You don’t put up one coverage or one front [on defense] — that’s not realistic in the National Football League. We’re going to throw a lot at them, and hopefully when we get to the real games it’s all going to look easy to them.”

Another mitigating circumstance for Sanchez and Geno Smith in the offensive showing was a group of missing WRs. Ryan thinks Santonio Holmes’ return to full practicing “will probably be more training camp than minicamp.” Stephen Hill was sidelined with some knee swelling, although it’s not considered serious. Clyde Gates and Jordan White also sat out. … On the possibility of adding another QB to the Sanchez-Smith-Greg McElroy-Matt Simms competition, Ryan answered generally: “Any player we think can help this team, we would be open to.”

Ryan, speaking for the first time on QB David Garrard’s retirement and RB Mike Goodson’s legal issues, didn’t go into detail. On Garrard: “There’s still some paperwork that needs to be done. We understand he’s put in for retirement and all that. I would like to comment on him at the appropriate time.” On Goodson: “The organization’s already issued a statement on Mike so I will just leave it at that.”

Any Volunteers? Why, yes we do. Two, in fact.

“It’s a small football world,” said Matt Simms.

Simms is the first-year QB with North Jersey roots who spent his last two college seasons with the University of Tennessee, then worked his way onto the Jets roster last offseason. Now he’s back for a second go-round in green and, like all the QBs on this roster, learning a new offense in coordinator Marty Mornhinweg’s West Coast scheme.

And one of the wideouts he’s playing pitch and catch with these days is Zach Rogers, the 6’0″, 177-pounder out of Nashville who was viewed by more than a few draftniks as one of the top undrafted wideouts available following the end of Round 7 last month.

“Coach Ryan and Mr. Idzik were very passionate about me coming here,” Rogers told me in the Atlantic Health Jets Training Center locker room recently. “They preached open competition and that’s really all I want. I wanted a shot to make a name for myself and try to make an impact on this team.”

And where did Rogers play his college ball? Tennessee, of course. In fact, he and Simms teamed up on several occasions in the 2010 and ’11 seasons, most notably on a 72-yard touchdown catch-and-run early in the Vols’ 32-29 OT win over Alabama-Birmingham in 2010.

“It’s good to be back teammates with Matt again. He’s a good guy,” Rogers said. “He’s very intelligent. I learned a lot from him. And he’s still got a cannon.”

Simms returns the compliments.

“Zach’s definitely a fast guy, he plays fast, and he’s a really smart guy,” he said. “There’s not too much on the field that he’s not aware of.”

The two didn’t have a lot of connections on the field, only 13 catches in those two seasons (but for 212 yards, a 16.3 average per catch). That’s because Rogers didn’t play a lot in ’10, both were limited in ’11, and last year Simms was gone. Before he departed for the pros, he recalled a business course the two had together. After one class, the two got to talking and Rogers said he was taking his education very seriously because he didn’t think the NFL would be in his future.

“You have the talent,” Simms told him then. “You never know what’s going to happen. It’s a long season.”

Last season at Tennessee, Rogers, despite divvying up passes from Tyler Bray with a pair of top draft picks-to-be — Cordarrelle Patterson went 29th to the Vikings, Justin Hunter 34th to the Titans — Rogers finished with 32 catches for 491 yards (15.3 avg.) and seven TDs, which attracted the attention of the aforementioned Rex Ryan and John Idzik.

“The Rogers kid, we expected him to look good, and he was a tremendous player at Tennessee, albeit he never started because of the other two guys,” Ryan said. “But he was very productive there and he really did a nice job of running routes and catching the football.”

“I was always hoping to get drafted,” Rogers said, “but at the same time this was the hand I was dealt so I’m trying to make the most of it. I was blessed to play with those big-time receivers, though. I learned a lot from them.”

“Remember that story you were trying to tell me?” Simms told Rogers when they were reunited in North Jersey. “It proved to be wrong. It just goes to show that a year or two can really make the difference.”

Now for the disclaimer. Rogers has a long road ahead to get onto the Jets’ regular-season roster, being that he’s one of 13 wideouts, with five of them veterans. And Simms, even though he’s now in a four-man QB competition after David Garrard apparently withdrew due to his ongoing knee issues, knows the field is still crowded.

“But right now I’m just going to take it day by day, improve on one thing at a time, and just go from there, really,” he said. “I’m going to keep my head in the playbook and just keep working.”

Same thing for Rogers, a volunteer no more, who worked a lot out of the slot during the rookie minicamp.

“I’m trying to learn as much as I can. Coach [Sanjay] Lal is teaching me little technique things that maybe I didn’t think about in college,” he said. “I think it’s going pretty well. I’m just trying to learn the offense the best I can and work with my new teammates. It’s a great opportunity for me and really I’m just trying to make the most of it.”

Whodat? Coleman is someone most fans have never heard of before, the 6’4″, 322-pound defensive tackle from New Orleans and Louisiana-Lafayette. Less than a week ago he went from longshot tryout at the Jets’ rookie minicamp to newly signed undrafted free agent.

But that only begins to scratch this story’s surface. Coleman was a longer shot than most tryouts in part because he’d been out of the game for three years. Well, out of the game but not far from it. As the friendly, intense big guy told me as we walked down the Atlantic Health Jets Training Center first-floor hallway last Saturday, when he was still an unsigned tryout, he’d spent those three years well in investing for his future by moving into the ranks of college strength and conditioning coaches. This past season he was one of the nation’s youngest strength coaches at the University of California.

“In my job, a lot of guys I work with and a lot of the mentors I have, they say to the guys they work with, ‘What do you desire? What do you want most in life?” he told me this week from his new spot in the Jets’ locker room. “When I look back on everything, in my youth, as a strength coach, my desire, my passion obviously is to help motivate and mold guys. But also, it was to still play football.

“So coming back into it was a huge thing on my part. I told some of my athletes I’d be a hypocrite if I didn’t get back and give it a shot.”

Coleman was “in it” in the first place for his decent career for the UL Ragin’ Cajuns in 2007-08, which got him on NFL draft radars only to the extent that he received a tryout with Minnesota in ’09. And that may have come about due to the scouting of another product of Bayou country, then-Vikings D-line coach Karl Dunbar.

“Coach Dunbar is legendary in my part of the country in South Louisiana, for not only the type of coach he is but the type of man he is,” Coleman said. “When it comes to anything in sports, before we walk through those doors, we’re men first, in the community and as leaders. He’s one of those to me, somebody I’ve always looked up to and a lot of the coaches I’ve worked for and worked with have felt the same, that he’s a great man.

“The story goes that Coach Dunbar was at LSU’s pro day, his alma mater, and he just came down I-10. When he saw me at my pro day, he was pretty impressed and told my position coaches he was pretty interested in me,” Coleman said, adding of the trip north, “It didn’t work out. I felt like I had done a lot, I had done everything I could, and when they told me they weren’t going to give me another opportunity, that was pretty tough to deal with.

“Not that I used the three years to recover from it, but it really took me a while to refocus my emotions back from football. It was a very difficult thing to deal with at the time. But I came out of it OK, I guess,” he said with a chuckle.

Coleman began his post-football career path, first with UL, then Rice for a year and a half, then Cal. But he kept in touch with Coach Dunbar, who texted him to “Keep on fighting for it, find a way in.

“It was not a big speech, nothing overly motivational,” Coleman said, “but it was just something that was enough for me to keep on fighting for this goal I had for this coming season.”

Dunbar, of course, moved on in his career path, from the Vikes to the Jets before last season. Fast-forward to this offseason. The Jets brought 61 players to their rookie minicamp: their seven draft picks, 29 undrafted free agents, 25 first-year players. The odds are prohibitively against any tryout player making any NFL roster.

But Coleman showed head coach Rex Ryan, coordinator Dennis Thurman and Dunbar that he could stay play the game. And after the release of signed undrafted FA Roosevelt Holliday, Coleman found his way in.

“It was such a huge victory, so to speak, for me, my family, my loved ones, my support system,” he said. That support system is large and includes his mom and dad, Ané and Larry, his girlfriend Alyssa, and strength coaches Rob Phillips (Tulane), Rusty Whitt (Louisiana), Jared Kaaiohelo (Rice), his coaches at Cal and coaches Chris DiSanto and Derek Keyes with the Cleveland Browns.

And he’s got a bunch of friends and well-wishers from down home and around the country who are now with him on his dream ride.

“Some of my friends are like, ‘Your goal is to go out there and be a Hall of Famer.’ Ultimately, yeah, you want to be the absolute best you can be,” he agreed. “But right now my goal is to be in the best shape I can be coming into training camp. My goal now is to go have a good lunch, go have a good meeting with Coach Dunbar, then come back and have another great day on Friday.”

Lanier Coleman may have taken some time to fight his way off that writer’s block he had, but now he’s begun writing one of those fine NFL stories, and there’s no last page in sight.

Today just happened to be a media day in the locker room at the Atlantic Health Jets Training Center. On media days, quarterbacks are front and center. One of the Jets’ veteran QBs, Mark Sanchez, was available. One of the other Jets vets, David Garrard, was not in the building.

“It was a little bit abrupt,” Sanchez said of Garrard “having to call it quits” because his knee “is not holding up,” as he said in his widely circulated text response to a question from SNY’s Adam Schein, adding that Garrard’s departure wasn’t something he saw coming. “He worked hard and he battled through some pain, it sounds like. Other than that, I don’t want to speak for David.”

But No. 6 did speak about Garrard, the nine-year QB for the Jaguars who signed with the Jets the week of the draft with the aim of providing competition at the position for the Jets heading deeper into the 2013 offseason and preseason schedule.

“David worked hard and he had a great attitude,” Sanchez said. “He was one of those guys I felt I’d be able to bounce my ideas off of, having that kind of experience. It’s tough to see a guy go like that. You just wish him the best, health-wise first. He’s played a long time in this league and did a heck of a job. So it was great to be around him the short time I had with him. I wish him nothing but the best.”

Garrard actually did speak, although not to Jets reporters in Florham Park, N.J. He talked with Bruce Murray and Rich Gannon on SiriusXM NFL Radio this afternoon and told them his knee, while it was well enough for him to run around, continued to swell on him.

“I thought, ‘I look pretty good right now. Maybe if I get on with the team, the treatment that they have there, the round-the-clock treatments you pretty much get, that should probably help me out.’ ” Garrard said. “So that’s how I was thinking. When it was healthy, when I was able to go out and participate in practice and run around. I mean, I looked great, I was excited and ready to go.

“But then I’d get four or five days of good work on it in and then the next two days it’s swollen and I have to do everything I can to get the swelling out.  Start the next week over and it would just be the same process every time. And so it was never allowing me to just go on and play without any worries. So I just kept thinking, ‘How am I going to compete for the starting job if every four days I’ve got to stop and have an ice bag on my knee while the guys are practicing?’ ”

The Jets still have not made any official comment about Garrard’s status. But if the man who wore No. 9 for less than a month isn’t returning, the QB depth chart at the moment is now at four, with Sanchez beginning his fifth year the clear veteran of the group that includes third-year man Greg McElroy, second-round draft pick Geno Smith and first-year free agent Matt Simms.

“Nothing’s changed. My mindset’s the same,” Sanchez said about his approach assuming Garrard’s taking himself out of the picture. “Stay focused, master this offense, improve on the fundamentals, be as accurate as possible, take care of the football, and lead this team.”

Garrett “Gets a Family”

Last season LB Garrett McIntyre got his first two-sack game and his first two tackles for loss of his career. Last week he celebrated another double as his wife, August, gave birth to their first two children.

“Twin daughters,” proud papa Garrett beamed at his locker. “Summer and Harper McIntyre. They were born May 7 back in Cali. A little premature, but they’re in the NICU [neonatal intensive care unit] and are doing great.”

Congratulations to the McIntyres, all four of them. And now, Garrett, back to work on orchestrating that first two-touchdown game of your career.

17 Again

WR Jordan White has returned to uniform No. 17, the number he began with last season as the Jets’ seventh-round WR out of Western Michigan. WR Marcus Davis, just acquired on waivers, is No. 89.

The anecdotes continue to collect, like three-hole-punch pages slipping onto the rings of a playbook binder.

The one impressive predraft tale was told by ESPN analyst Trent Dilfer, who runs the Elite 11 passing camp pairing up top college quarterbacks with top high school QBs. The six college signalcallers last year each got a 90-page playbook three weeks before the start of the camp.

“Geno showed up, and on day one, he could’ve taught it,” Dilfer said. “He didn’t just know it. He owned it.”

Tale No. 2 is one that I observed on Thursday. Smith was literally the first rookie to come through the football entrance after noon to check in for this Jets rookie minicamp. He had some time to kill before he headed from the hallway to the locker room, so he opened up something — his playbook. And he was studying it.

Could that have been for show? I suppose so. But there weren’t any news cameras or reporters in the hallway, just a few Jets personnel. Maybe he took a few minutes to refresh his memory about a play or two because that’s who he is.

Then came these two practices Friday and today. They’re all rookies and first-year players, so be wary of the single anecdote, but Rex Ryan remembered one particular play that impressed him as a defensive coach and head coach. It was an adjustment that wasn’t in the playbook yet but Geno made a good anyway.

“One time when Geno was back there, we had a run called,” Ryan said. “With Marty [Mornhinweg], we all know how rare that is, especially when we’re in these no-pad days. But the run was called to the tight end, and the way the formation was set up the defense gave us a crazy look. The outside linebacker was lined up two removed and there was no edge [blocker] there.

“We don’t even have a checked play in. But Geno checked out of it anyway. Obviously he’s got some awareness.”

“I try not to make mental mistakes in practice,” Geno said this afternoon in the Atlantic Health Jets Training Center locker room. “I try to be sound in the huddle, to saying the cadence, to going out there with the proper footwork, the proper depth on my drops and doing my reads. I’m trying not to make mental mistakes.”

Mornhinweg, the OC, and QBs coach David Lee, Smith said, “do a great job of allowing us to improve. I’ve got a long way to go, I know that. We all do. I think that goes for every single rookie that comes into the NFL, every single quarterback — probably the toughest position in the league. So there’s a lot on my plate. It’s just about how you handle it. I’ve been doing my best to just study my playbook, stay up late, come in here early, do all the things necessary to be a good quarterback.”

Rex Cetera

Ryan has stressed twice the better second offensive line that’s lining up now. With draft picks Brian Winters, Oday Aboushi and William Campbell and free agent All-America C Dalton Freeman, Ryan said, “It’s a good-looking group, there’s no doubt. That’s impressive to me.”

The dark-horse candidate is Will Campbell, the Michigan DT who’s lining up at guard. “He’s the kid that really intrigues me,” Rex said. “Mike Devlin’s an outstanding coach, but I’m surprised Campbell’s not making mistakes. He seems like he’s been doing it his whole life.”

Ryan gave passing praise to first-round D-lineman Sheldon Richardson again, free-agent LB Troy Davis out of Central Florida. And he did not name one defender who missed his turn on a play. “The defense was so good, they decided to line up with 10 today,” the coach said. “I can never figure that out. If I’m [on the field], I’m going to know where I am on the depth chart.”

Today’s first practice of the 2013 rookie minicamp was no different.

“I always like to challenge guys mentally when they get here,” Rex opened his news conference this afternoon, “to let them know the process speeds up quite a bit. Wow! We made a few busts today on both sides of the ball. Either way, we’ve got a long way to go.”

But as far as the talent on hand? Wow again. Ryan was first asked about second-round QB Geno Smith.

“I liked the way Geno threw the ball. He looked pretty impressive to me,” the coach said. “He can really spin it, no surprise there. … But you kind of listen to the huddle and all that kind of stuff. Some guys can’t spit it out. He certainly can. The way he conducts himself, eyes up and all that stuff. And you want to see the ball come out with some kind of rhythm.

“Obviously a lot of things have to get better, but for the most part I thought he did throw the ball on rhythm pretty well and he was fairly accurate with it, so it was good.”

Smith spoke in the locker room earlier (we’ll provide a transcript of his remarks later this afternoon) and wasn’t saying he aced his first exam.

“My first goal is to prove myself to the team here,” he said before a large group of pads and pens, microphones and cameras. “I’ll let the coaches do the grading. If I was giving myself a mark, I’m a tough grader so I’d say an F. I need to get better every day.”

The Jets’ pair of first-rounders were also around. The top pick of the draft, CB Dee Milliner, stayed on the sideline or on the stationary bike due to his shoulder.

“It’s not all the way, 100 percent, healed,” he said. “It’s a couple of months’ process before you get back to normal. I just know to listen to what the trainers tell me, go out there and do what they tell me to do. Until they clear me to get out there, I’m going to be over there doing rehab.”

But. he was adamant that he’d be on the field in full pads sooner rather than later. Will he be ready to roll by the start of training camp? “Yeah,” he said, “I’ll be ready.”

Ryan wasn’t worried that the player considered the top corner on most everyone’s draft big board might fall behind.

“Dee’s got to nail down the mental part of it because he’s not going to get out there right away physically and do it,” the coach said. “Clearly he showed in college that he’s familiar with a lot of coverages. Several of the coverages Alabama plays are our coverages, too.”

The other first-rounder is Missouri DT Sheldon Richardson, and here Ryan’s eyes lit up.

“Sheldon was good. I don’t want to put expectations to high, but he was impressive, to say the least,” Ryan said. “We move them around, we can have a guy at nose, 3-technique, 5-technique, but there’s several different things he can do. One thing we saw today was his explosiveness, another is his effort to the football. He loves to play, you can already tell that. You could’ve doubled that practice and he’d've been fine.”

Richardson explained that his 6’3″, 294-pound size helped turn him into the football personality he is today.

“I was always the chubby kid in class that everybody picked on,” he said, “and I played with a chip on my shoulder. I still feel like I’m the same kid. I like to do what skinny guys do. Dunk a basketball? I want to jump as high as him and dunk a basketball. I happen to be able to dunk a basketball because of it. I have fun.  I’m a kid out there.”

Ryan will have more comments on all his players over the coming weeks and months, but he singled out a few more players today for different reasons.

“One guy who stood out was the receiver from Tennessee, Zach Rogers,” the coach said of the undrafted FA. “He caught a lot of balls out there, he was a slot receiver, you saw him return punts. And he did a good job in the special teams drills.”

Ryan also gave some kudos to free-agent center Dalton Freeman — “That All-American from Clemson looked really impressive to me” — and even touted a tryout player, former Rutgers CB Mason Robinson — “He was playing some nickel. The coaches at Rutgers said nobody wanted to fight this guy. That’s pretty good for a little [5'10", 185] corner.”

The Jets rookies will conduct the second day of their “swimming lessons” on Saturday with a schedule very similar to today’s before conducting a closed third and final day of camp on Sunday and then heading home or to the phones to call home and wish their moms Happy Mother’s Day.

The arrivals couldn’t begin until noon Thursday, and by early evening everyone was checked in, had gone through the indoctrination process as a new Jet, and rested up in their hotel rooms for this morning’s breakfast, their first team meeting with head coach Rex Ryan and staff, and their first practice set to start around 10 a.m.

The stations each player stopped at included a visit to the doctor for a physical, equipment manager Gus Granneman’s equipment room to be fitted for a helmet and receive his initial jersey and new number, a stop with head strength and conditioning coach Justus Galac’s weightroom, a chat with director of player development Dave Szott, a stay with the media relations team, and a quick couple of headshots with the always ebullient team photographer, Al Pereira.

Among the earliest to run this pro pigskin gauntlet was second-round quarterback Geno Smith. He came through the double glass doors of the players’ entrance at 12:01 p.m. and began his check-in process. On his way to the locker room, Smith was greeted by a couple of veteran Jets WRs: Santonio Holmes, recently returned from his degree work at Ohio State, and Stephen Hill, last year’s second-rounder. Holmes, Hill and the rest of the Jets’ established pass catchers will begin to catch Geno’s passes at the June, when Smith joins the rest of the team’s quarterbacks at the full-squad minicamp.

The other five draft choices arrived in short order. In rough order of appearance they were seventh-round FB Tommy Bohanon and fifth-round OL Oday Aboushi came in the next wave, followed by first-round CB Dee Milliner, sixth-round OL Will Campbell, third-round G Brian Winters and first-round DL Sheldon Richardson.

The 15-member band of undrafted free agents, plus some minicamp invitees, were also among the new Jets on hand. Among those registering in the early afternoon were TEs Mike Shanahan of Pitt and Chris Pantale of Boston College, wideouts Zach Rogers of Tennessee and KJ Stroud from Bethune-Cookman and C Dalton Freeman from Clemson.

Shanahan, who confirms for any who doubted it that he’s not related to Washington head coach Mike Shanahan, was stopped between stations for a hallway chat with senior personnel executive Terry Bradway and pro scout Aaron Glenn.

This is not an all-inclusive list. We’ll have a report on all the rookies and first-year players who are at the camp plus new uniform numbers when everything becomes official on Friday.

Speaking of new unis, the drafted Jets are reported to have received their initial numbers. These could still change but at the moment Granneman and his staff have distributed the following numbers to the draftees:

27 — Dee Milliner

91 — Sheldon Richardson

7 — Geno Smith

67 — Brian Winters

75 — Oday Aboushi

65 — Will Campbell

40 — Tommy Bohanon

The minicamp is closed to the public. A more complete list of the participants in this camp, which includes all the Jets draft choices, 2013 undrafted free agents, 2012 first-year free agents signed prior to the draft, and tryout candidates, will be available later today. The minicamp will continue through Sunday, with media availability on Friday and Saturday, including open locker room and Rex Ryan news conferences both days.

“I was not looking forward to it at all,” Wooden, the Jets’ assistant director of player personnel, said of the small party thrown by the team’s football and business sides at the Atlantic Health Training Center as congratulations for JoJo moving 3,000 miles away to become the Chargers’ director of player personnel.

“Leaving is really, really hard, you know?” he said, still feeling the emotion of the moment. “It’s about the people.”

Wooden knew a lot of folks and wore lots of hats during his 16 seasons in the Jets’ front office. He began on the pro personnel side as an assistant, a pro scout, a senior pro scout for the AFC, assistant director of pro scouting and then director of pro scouting before getting his most recent title and adding college duties to his résumé in 2006.

“I’ve had the chance to be involved in both, and maybe the last three years or so it’s been a lot more college than pro, but I still had my hand in both,” he said this afternoon in his now in-transition office. “This is an opportunity to become the director of player personnel, overseeing both the college and pro departments, so that’s going to be exciting.

“It’s a great step. My ultimate goal, I want to be a general manager, and I think this was the next logical move for me.”

San Diego and new GM Tom Telesco were in need of a new director after Jimmy Raye, son of the well-traveled former Jets assistant coach, departed the job to saddle up with the Colts.

The Chargers offered Wooden a great opportunity, and it had to be great for him and his wife, Sarah, and two daughters to undo their ties with the Northeast. He was born and raised in Connecticut and was a two-year starter at OLB for Syracuse University.

“I’m excited, the family’s excited. They’re on board, which is big,” JoJo said. “It’s a new chapter in our life and we’re looking forward to it.”

But in keeping with his status as a Jets employee for one more day, he used the first person plural to talk about the state of the Green & White. Asked about his highlights during his Jets tenure, he offered a nod toward the Jets’ AFC Championship Game appearances in 2009 and ’10.

“Those are the biggest things, just the wins. Pittsburgh and Indianapolis … it’s hard just to get yourself in that position as an organization, and to be fortunate enough to do it two years in a row was good.”

And the team he’s leaving behind?

“I love the direction the team’s heading in now with John [Idzik] and Coach Ryan,” he said. “I feel very good about the draft, the guys we acquired. You like the direction this place is heading … and so now you’re sad that you’re jumping off ship.”

But there are plenty of tall ships in San Diego, plus the start of a new program under first-year head coach Mike McCoy. It’s tough to see Wooden head west, but it’s great to see this young man and great guy get to take that next career step. Here’s a proverbial NFL toast, JoJo: Best of luck in all you do against 30 of the NFL’s 31 other teams.

No. 1, Part II

We asked several questions Tuesday, after uniform No. 1 became free with the waiving of WR Thomas Mayo, about that non-crooked number in Jets uni history. Here are the answers:

■ Who was the last Jets player to wear No. 1 during training camp? Last year WR Raymond Webber was “the one.” The year before, P Chris Bryan wore it. Neither made it to the regular season wearing the number.

■ Who was the last Jet to wear No. 1 in a regular-season game? That was K Mike Nugent’s number from the time he was drafted in 2005 through his free agency departure following the ’08 season.

■ Who was the last non-kicker to wear No. 1 in a RS game? The only non-kicker to wear the Big Green One was RB Mike Adamle, who played for the Jets in 1973-74.

As for who if anyone will inherit the one this season, we don’t have any rookie uniform number information yet. But we will post the winning numbers as soon as we are cleared to do so this week.

Champagne and congratulations are on the menu for ageless No. 16 in green and white.

Before Vinny Testaverde came to the Jets in 1998, he had already made NFL stops with Tampa Bay and with the Cleveland Browns, who turned into the Baltimore Ravens. But before the Buccaneers, Testaverde was a great college quarterback for the University of Miami.

And it was that superb four-season career with the Hurricanes that led to Vinny T’s honor today of being named one of 14 members of the National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame Class of 2013.

Testaverde was selected the College Football HOF on a national ballot of 77 candidates from a pool of hundreds of eligible nominees. The announcement was made from the NASDAQ OMX MarketSite in Times Square, which has hosted the event for the past five years, and televised on ESPN3 for the third consecutive year.

The 2013 College Football Hall of Fame Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) Class will be inducted at the 56th annual NFF awards dinner on Dec. 10 at the Waldorf=Astoria in New York City. They will be honored guests at the National Hall of Fame Salute at the Allstate Sugar Bowl in New Orleans on Jan. 2, 2014, and officially enshrined in the summer of 2014.

Needless to say, Testaverde’s accomplishments as a Jet — leading them to an 11-1 record as the regular-season starter and on to the AFC Championship Game at Denver, guiding another 10-win season and playoff visit in 2001, compiling a 35-26 record as a Jets starter from ’98-03 and ’05 — had nothing to do with his achievements in South Florida in the Eighties, but Jets Nation will be among the well-wishers for Testaverde, a Long Islander and New Yorker and one great football player and human being.

Here is the profile that the NFF has provided today on Testaverde’s exploits at “the U”:

One of the most celebrated players in a Hurricane program stocked with mythical talent, Miami’s Vinny Testaverde claimed virtually every major award during his senior season in 1986. He becomes the sixth Hurricane to be inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.

As a senior, Testaverde earned unanimous First-Team All-American honors, and he won the Heisman Trophy, the Walter Camp Player of the Year, Maxwell, Davey O’Brien and UPI Player of the Year awards. He led the ‘Canes to three consecutive bowls, including the 1987 Fiesta Bowl National Championship game. He finished his collegiate career with more than 6,000 passing yards and 48 touchdown passes, and he still ranks in the top five in virtually every passing category in school history.

Testaverde, who was a redshirt on Miami’s 1983 national championship team, went 23-3 as a starter playing for legendary coaches Howard Schnellenberger and Hall of Famer Jimmy Johnson.

Tampa Bay selected Testaverde as the No. 1 overall selection in the 1987 NFL Draft, and his pro career spanned 21 seasons with seven different teams. The 1998 All-Pro and two-time Pro Bowl selection finished his NFL career seventh all-time in passing yards (46,233) and eighth in touchdowns (275).

The Elmont, N.Y., native currently resides in Florida, where he plays an active role with the Children’s Cancer Center of Tampa. Testaverde remains among only four Hurricanes to have their jerseys retired at Miami.

Who’s Number One?

Two late transactions were announced late this afternoon. The waivings of WRs Emmanuel Arceneaux and Thomas Mayo brought the Jets’ roster down to 90.

With a cut this early in the offseason, it’s not likely we’ll get to know these two in green and white. But here are a few trivia items to clutter up your mind two days before the Jets rookies report for this year’s three-day minicamp.

Arceneaux is considered a second-year NFL player. In fact, he has some NFL production to point to, but only a little. He was limited to one pro catch for the Vikings in ’11. But he had an outstanding two seasons with the CFL’s BC Lions, including 7 TD catches in ’09, 1,114 receiving yards in ’10 and 147 receptions in all north of the border.

For Mayo, one is also the loneliest number. That was his uniform number, assigned to him by equipment manager Gus Granneman and his crew shortly after Mayo was signed as a first-year man out of California (Pa.) in March.

And thus for today’s quick three-part trivia quiz: Who was the last player to wear uniform No. 1 for the Jets at any time. Who was the last to wear it in a regular-season game? And who was the last non-kicker to wear it in a game?

And one more for you Radar nightbirds: Who will be the next Jet to wear Numero Uno?

No need to worry about Demario Davis getting back into the swing of things, easing into a new leadership role, feeling his way. Double-D’s already got his focus locked onto the job ahead like a laser.

“We’ve got a lot of young guys, a lot of energy, a lot of athletic ability and speed,” Davis told me at the Atlantic Health Training Complex during a Phase 2 session of the Jets’ offseason strength and conditioning program. “The main thing is just all of us learning what to do, learning the best we can, understanding the concepts of the defense and being in harmony with a lot of communication, everybody being on the same page. We can be very effective. I’m very excited what this group of guys can potentially do.”

But surely every player and every team in the NFL has some extra energy at this time on the calendar?

“It’s not just regular energy. It’s a special energy,” Davis said, deadly serious. “There are some very big things, I think, about to take place, and I’m not just saying that because I’m a part of this unit. I’ve just got a feeling that some special things are about to occur. I’m not feeding into the negative being talked about. I view it, I see it every day. I know the pieces are aligning and the stars are aligning for a very big year of the Jets.”

Wow. An impressive take on these Jets. But with all of the comings and goings under new GM John Idzik, with all the work that must be done to come back from last year’s campaign, might that be a little on the optimistic side?

Davis doesn’t see it that way. The second-year linebacker’s laser is scanning his role for the coming season, and he sees great prospects for himself and his teammates.

“My approach is the same as always. It’s to get better every day, go out and be ready to contribute as much as possible,” he said. “I know my coaches are looking for me to step into that starting role and for me to be a leader. Coach Ryan’s personally issued the challenge, in front of the defense, so it’s all about me stepping up and taking advantage of that and making the most of that opportunity.”

Davis isn’t speaking out of school. The mantra under Idzik has been “competition, through and through,” so no one has a clear path to a starting gig and gobs of playing time yet. Leadership is a funny thing that doesn’t just happen. Yet head coach Rex Ryan was equally optimistic for Davis during the March conference call with Jets season ticket holders.

“Right now Demario’s the No. 1 Will linebacker on our depth chart,” Ryan said. “As John has talked about several times, you try to bring in as much competition as you possibly can, but clearly Demario is a guy that we feel really good about, we felt great about drafting him last year and he’s a guy that’s going to play a ton of football for us.”

Coming in as the third-round pick out of Arkansas State last season, Davis quickly racked up playing time. He was on the field for 371 special-teams plays, the most on the Jets, and 680 plays in all, 10th-most among defensive players and 18th on the team. He got his most action on defense late in the first half of the season, at New England and home for Miami, as Bart Scott worked on his injured toe, but outside of those two games averaged a little more than a dozen snaps a game.

This year it’s time to increase the reps under new coordinator Dennis Thurman, whom Davis met with at the start of the offseason program.

“I asked him when camp started what he wanted out of me. To be very specific, he said he wanted me to be able to fix my eyes, have a great understanding of eyes and concepts, to be physical and be a three-down linebacker,” Davis said. “He also issued the challenge of just understanding coverage at my position. So those are the big things I’ve been working on, focusing on, studying film, studying the game, being in the weightroom every day.

“I don’t think I can be more prepared for taking this opportunity than I am right now with the work I put in to this point, physically and mentally,” he said. “You can never have the attitude that you’re great. You always have to have the attitude that you’re just good. That keeps you working. You always have something to chase after.”

Davis is ready for the chase. And he’s planning on his laser helping to guide the Jets for the challenging season ahead.

Weeb Would’ve Been CVI Today

Happy birthday to Weeb Ewbank, the great Jets head coach who would have celebrated his 106th birthday today. Weeb, of course, died at the age of 91 in 1998, but memories of his teams linger on — the NFL championships won by his Baltimore Colts in 1958 and ’59, and that grand January day 44 years ago when his Jets beat his former Colts, 16-7, in Super Bowl III. He was the first Jet inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, in 1978, and was in the inaugural class of the New York Jets Ring of Honor in 2010.

“The plan” was hinted at by Rex Ryan a few months ago and has been referred to a few times since then.

And today, with the Jets veterans working out at the Atlantic Health Training Center during a Phase 2 practice of their offseason program and then meeting with reporters at midday, a little more of “the plan” was revealed in the locker room:

Q will be playing some OLB.

“Yeah, I definitely think it’s going to open up opportunities for me,” the always affable Quinton Coples said with a bigger smile than usual of rushing the quarterback from a standup position. “It’s going to help me get to the quarterback very efficiently.”

There are questions with “the plan,” of course. Coples thinks he’ll still play in the range of 280 to 285 pounds. While that’ll be a load for opposing tackles, tight ends and backs to handle, will it be too big a load for him to carry for 60 minutes a game? Will it take too long to get familiar with playing the run or playing in coverage from a two-point stance? Is Q permanently a ‘backer or will he be a hybrid?

All these things remain to play out and work on throughout the offseason, next month’s full-squad minicamp and Cortland training camp. But one thing Coples repeated today was that it didn’t seem to him that “the plan” was just hatched by the Jets this year.

“I think he had a plan for me, not knowing if he was going to draft me,” Coples recalled of the predraft workout that Ryan put him through at North Carolina’s pro day in 2012. “The workout he had for me at Carolina, I think he had a plan for me as far as playing outside linebacker from there. I think things worked out well. I fell down to 16, he picked me up, so it worked out perfect. Last year was a trial year to see how things went, and now we’ve got more depth on the defensive front, so it’ll be a perfect time.”

To be sure, Ryan and coordinator Dennis Thurman are not declaring a position change. Ryan has reminded that the Jets coach a multiple defense with multiple roles for many of the players in that unit, and Coples, with his versatility, flexibility and athleticism, is one of those players. Coples said today he will still be putting his hand in the dirt quite a bit, depending on the call.

But Ryan gave a greater hint of his thinking during his February remarks at this year’s combine.

“I see Quinton as a guy that can maybe be more of an edge presence than he was that first year,” Ryan said then, “but having him go through that, putting him over a guard, putting him over tackles, even over centers, I think it’s good because when you put him over tight ends, it’s a lot easier to knock those guys back and you have a lot of confidence when you face those double-teams. That was kind of what we did with him, but I’m expecting big things from him. Like I said, I think he’s just now scratching the surface.”

Coples had another way of talking about the implementation of “the plan.”

“Things,” he said, “are starting to develop.”

Hayden’s Continuing Higher Education

Hayden Smith made it through year one as a “cross-training” athlete, someone who wasn’t changing positions but whole sports. The tight end who hails from “Down Under” as well as “a Mile High” and “from Across the Pond” said he’s getting more comfy with the surroundings in this neck of the woods, even though in his second year in the NFL he’s already learning his second offense from new OC Marty Mornhinweg.

“I feel a lot more comfortable the second time around,” Smith said. “I don’t have to spend so much time on the details of the game itself, so at least all that’s kind of taken care of this time so I can just focus on the offense itself. There’s new things to learn there, but there’s a lot of common threads, and that’s just knowing football. So there’s a lot less on my plate from that standpoint.”

That was apparent to at least one interested observer this afternoon.

“Hayden looks sharp for a second-year football player,” QB Mark Sanchez said. “He looks awesome.”

Helping Smith with the transition is coach Steve Hagen, who comes to the Jets this year off of his four-year stint as Cleveland’s TEs coach. He’s in his ninth NFL campaign (the first eight came in two four-year hitches with the Browns) and spent two decades in the college coaching ranks besides.

” ‘Details make you dangerous’ — that’s one of his sayings,” Smith said. “He’s fantastic. The tight ends room is already littered with quotes from him. He’s a very intense guy with a great message and he’s delivering his message well.”

Familiar Voices, New Choir

Mike Westhoff, the Jets’ venerable special teams coach who just retired after last season, and Ray Lucas, the former Jets QB who’s been a mainstay of SNY’s Jets postgame shows for five years, have been added to ESPN New York 98.7 FM’s pregame show, joining host Don LaGreca and analyst and former Jets LB standout Greg Buttle.

“Our radio broadcast is an integral part of our fans’ game-day experience,” said Jets president Neil Glat. “We’re confident that adding two veterans, Ray Lucas and Coach Westhoff, to our already strong roster of on-air talent should enhance our fans’ knowledge and enjoyment of our games.”

Westhoff and Lucas will also make regular appearances on ESPN’s studio programming throughout the season, and Lucas will continue in his role with SNY.

Holt from Downtown … Colorado Springs

Speaking of a Rocky Mountain high (Smith played college hoops for Denver’s Metropolitan State) reminds me we want to wish a fantastic career to John Holt, who was our intern and reporter for most of the last year.

John had a great sports background and writing experience from North Carolina and Ole Miss, and he put that to good use from last year’s training camp all the way through doing the lion’s share of the work on our eight-part predraft position-by-position series. But John’s love is basketball and he’ll get the chance to pursue that goal with USA Basketball’s Web site. Hopefully, he and his dad have safely and successfully concluded their two-thirds-of-the-country drive from Newark to, yes, snowy Colorado Springs.

It wouldn’t surprise us to find a great rivalry spring up in the next few years between John and Nick Gallo, our previous intern/reporter who for the last two seasons has been working with the Oklahoma City Thunder.

All the best out West, Holty.

Of the 15, there are four wide receivers, three offensive lineman, two tight ends, three defensive linemen, a linebacker, and two defensive backs.

Last season, NT Damon Harrison was an undrafted free agent out of William Penn who eventually earned a final roster spot.

The process will soon begin, a week from Thursday for the start of the rookie minicamp at the Atlantic Health Jets Training Center, to see if any of these undrafted prospects will be running out of the tunnel at MetLife Stadium when the regular season opens Sept. 8 against Tampa Bay.

Wide Receivers

Zach Rogers (6’0″, 172 / Tennessee / Nashville, TN) — In 2012 Rogers was part of a stellar Tennessee receiving corps that featured first-round pick Cordarrelle Patterson and second-rounder Justin Hunter. As a senior, Rogers started six games and finished second on the Volunteers with seven receiving touchdowns. He also was fourth with 491 receiving yards and fourth with a career-best 32 receptions. Not only did Rogers excel on the field during his time in Knoxville but he also was a model student in the classroom, earning a spot on the All-SEC Academic teams in both 2010 and ’11.

Ryan Spadola (6’3″, 200 / Lehigh / Howell, NJ) — Spadola finished his college career with 232 receptions for 3,611 yards and 24 TDs. His father, Don, passed away when Ryan was in high school and he mentioned in a Sunday article in the Express Times that he and his dad attended Jets games together when he was growing up. The article also quoted Spadola  expressing how he was glad that he no longer had to wait on getting a call from a team. “I’m relieved I have a home and can finally focus on what’s most important,” he said.

KJ Stroud (6’3″, 205 / Bethune-Cookman / Brooklyn, NY) — After spending his first two collegiate seasons at Rutgers, Stroud transferred to Bethune-Cookman, where he played his junior and senior seasons and helped the Wildcats to a 9-3 finish in 2012 with 26 receptions for 293 yards. His most impressive performance came Oct. 20 when he hauled in four passes for 60 yards and one TD in B-CU’s 48-3 thrashing of Norfolk State.

Antavious Wilson (6’1″, 198 / Marshall / Pahokee, FL) — After an impressive 60-reception, 724-yard freshman receiving campaign, Wilson’s numbers declined his sophomore and junior seasons. He responded as a senior, though, with his best season — 69 catches, 741 yards and nine touchdowns. In a 45-38 loss to C-USA foe Tulsa last October, Wilson caught seven passes for 123 yards and two TDs.

Offensive Linemen

Dalton Freeman (6’5″, 285 / Clemson / Pelion, SC) — Freeman joins the NFL ranks after garnering 49 starts in 53 collegiate contests, with the starts, all at center, tying for the most in Clemson history. Besides his great experience, he was a two-time All-ACC first-team selection, a two-time Rimington Trophy finalist, and a 2012 AP All-America second-teamer.

Trey Gilleo (6’6″, 280 / Northern Arizona / Kingman, AZ) — Gilleo started the final 33 games of his career and as a senior earned All-Big Sky second-team honors. He also allowed only one sack in 2012. At Northern Arizona’s end-of-season banquets the past two years, he was recognized as the John G. Yost Memorial Award recipient as offensive lineman of the year and the winner of the Competitive Greatness Award.

Mark Popek (6’7″, 299 / South Florida / Plant City, FL) — After redshirting as a freshman back in 2008, Popek started 21 of 24 games over his final two seasons. The three games he missed during that span were due to an ankle injury. He earned All-Big East second-team honors in 2012 and enters the NFL with his degree in criminology.

Tight Ends

Chris Pantale (6’6″, 255 / Boston College / Wayne, NJ) — Pantale had a terrific four-year career in Chestnut Hill. His junior season was his most productive as he earned the BC College Coaches Award as well as garnering a spot on the John Mackey Award Watch List. He also finished 2011 third on the Eagles with 236 receiving yards. His senior campaign wasn’t as noteworthy, primarily because he missed the first five games with a foot injury.

Mike Shanahan (6’5″, 225 / Pittsburgh / North Huntingdon, PA) — Although he maintains the same name as the current Redskins head coach, there is no relation between these pair of Shanahans. Despite that, Pitt’s Shanahan of Pittsburgh may be the most highly regarded of the Jets’ undrafted free agent bunch. He exited the Big East school as an All-Big East second-team honoree and four-time Big East All-Academic Team selection. As a senior he helped lead the Panthers to the BBVA Compass Bowl, where they lost to Ole Miss, and ended the year with career highs in catches (62) receiving yards (983) and touchdowns (six). After previously earning a bachelor’s degree in history, Shanahan is pursuing his master’s in Pitt’s School of Education.

Defensive Linemen

Spencer Nealy (6’5″, 277 / Texas A&M / San Antonio, TX) — Nealy was a key contributor at DE for the 2012 Aggies, who captured the Cotton Bowl and upset No. 1 Alabama in Tuscaloosa. His junior season was his most memorable as he led the A&M D-line with eight tackles for loss and earned All-Big 12 honorable mention. His father, Ed Nealy, played 10 seasons in the NBA, enjoying stints with the Kansas City Kings, San Antonio Spurs, Chicago Bulls, Phoenix Suns and Golden State Warriors. With the Bulls, Ed was a member of the Bulls’ 1992-93 NBA Championship team.

Roosevelt Holliday (6’3″, 297 / Eastern Illinois / Bolingbrook, IL) — As a senior, Holliday finished sixth on EIU’s defense with 58 tackles from his DT spot, including 8.5 for loss. In the process he helped the Panthers capture the Ohio Valley Conference title and was an All-OVC selection. The previous year, he started all 11 games and totaled 41 tackles. With his signing to the Jets, Holliday joined TE Dirk Androff, a UDFA in 1983, as the only EIU players believed to have signed to play for the Green & White.

Jake McDonough (6’5″, 290 / Iowa State / Urbandale, IA) — McDonough’s career at ISU got off to a rocky start. As a redshirt freshman, the D-tackle played only one game due to a concussion, hamstring injury and illness. Things slowly progressed, though, and McDonough’s senior year turned out to be pretty special. He had a season-high seven tackles during an October 37-23 Cyclones win at TCU. In the final game of his collegiate career, a Liberty Bowl loss to Tulsa, he had five tackles. Aside from football, McDonough has a strong passion for producing music, as described in this Sept. 14 Des Moines Register article. You can bet at some point he’ll talk tunes with another musical artist on the Jets, S Josh Bush.

Linebacker

Troy Davis (6’2″, 249 / Central Florida / Lawrenceville, GA) — Davis capped his four-year career by being named to the All-C-USA first team. Even though Conference-USA is not highly prominent in college football, Davis capitalized whenever the Knights faced bigger schools. Against Big Ten powerhouse Ohio State on Sept. 8, he racked up seven tackles, a half sack and a fumble recovery. As a senior, in 14 starts he led the Knights with 11.5 tackles for loss and eight sacks.

Defensive Backs

Mike Edwards (5’10″, 180 / Hawaii / Cleveland, OH) — Edwards’ college journey had its share of ups and downs. Enrolling at the University of Tennessee out of high school, he played in eight games and had five tackles as a freshman. Shortly following the season, following an arrest, he transferred to Coffeyville CC in 2010. Then he finished his college career with two seasons at Hawai‘i. In 2012 he showcased his versatility, leading all college football players with 1,215 kickoff return yards and a 30.4-yard average. He also had a UH single-season-record three kickoff returns for touchdowns and was named the Mountain West Conference’s Special Teams Player of the Year. In Cleveland, Edwards attended Glenville High School, where he was teammates with Jets CBs Donnie Fletcher and Royce Adams.  

Rontez Miles (6”1’, 210 / California (PA) / Braddock, PA) — Miles was one of the top players at the Division II level over his final two seasons. In 2012 he had four interceptions and totaled at least 10 tackles in three games for the Vulcans. As a junior, he had five INTs and received numerous accolades, including AFCA All-American first-team, AP Little All-America first team, and PSAC West Defensive Player of the Year. On a side note, he was Woodland Hills HS teammates with Patriots TE Rob Gronkowski.

That’s what second-year Jets Demario Davis and Stephen Hill, the third- and second-round picks respectively in last year’s draft, are doing at this time.

Davis and Hill have been cast in the upcoming film “Draft Day,” which has been filming since Thursday at this year’s draft. The two Jets will play fictional potential first-round draft picks in the Green Room on draft day awaiting their selection, and both were reported to be filming their scenes at Radio City Music Hall this weekend.

If you think this is a dinky little college cinema-class production, think again. The film stars Kevin Costner, Denis Leary and Jennifer Garner and is directed by Ivan Reitman. The NFL has given its imprimatur to the production, meaning that while all the league people in the film are fictional, actual NFL team names and league/team marks will be used. No Miami Sharks here.

The film will also have roles for real live members of the NFL Network and ESPN crews covering the draft. And for a couple of young actors by the name of Davis and Hill.

Geno’s in the Building

Second-round pick Geno Smith checked out the Atlantic Health Jets Training Center once, during his predraft visit. Now he’s here today taking in things in a different light, as a new Jets employee. He’ll speak with reporters here this afternoon and that news conference will be streamed live on newyorkjets.com with an expected start time of 1 p.m. ET and then archived for viewing at your leisure.

We’ll hear more about Geno in the coming days, weeks and months, but for now here are some athletic family connections from his Wikipedia page:

Smith was born in Miami to Geno Smith Jr. and Tracey Sellers. His great-grandfather, Cyril Smith, was a bodybuilder and boxing referee from the Bahamas. His great-uncle, Danny Smith, was a record-breaking All-America hurdler at Florida State. And his cousin, Melvin Bratton, was a top RB at “the U” in the mid-Eighties who also played two seasons for the Broncos.

Dee and Sheldon Trending

Dee Milliner joins the Jets’ exclusive Alabama Alumni First-Round Club. Joe Namath, the top pick of the 1965 AFL Draft, began the club, and two other members, QB Richard Todd in 1976 and DE Marty Lyons in ’79, joined it before Milliner’s entry Thursday night.

Milliner was also the member of another fraternity at the top of Round 1. After the Jets took the corner at No. 9, the Titans went with G Chance Warmack at 10 and the Chargers reeled in T D.J. Fluker at 11. That’s three Alabama players in three picks, the first time that’s happened in Round 1 of an NFL draft since at least 1967, which as we all know by now was the first common draft between the AFL and NFL.

And Milliner and Richardson at No. 13 were part of another first-round trend. The Southeastern Conference had 12 players drafted Thursday night, the most of any conference in. Since 2000 the SEC has a solid lead on the conference field with 540 total draft picks. (Missouri joined the SEC last season.)

That’s the sound of your favorite draft countdown clock. Or if you don’t have that countdown clock on a computer screen in front of you, it’s the internal draft clock echoing down the college canyons of your mind.

The NFL Draft finally arrives tonight, and for Jets fans it can’t come soon enough. GM John Idzik said the draft will be the Green & White’s lifeline, and with beginning with picks 9 and 13, the team will begin to pull itself toward 2013 with, at the moment, eight selections from tonight through late Saturday afternoon.

We say at the moment because there’s no need to tell Jets fans that all draft picks (except compensatories, of which the Jets have none this year) can be spent on other picks. It’s possible the Jets could package 9 and 13 and move into the top five in this draft. It’s also possible that the I-Team will entertain phonecalls from other teams about wanting to trade up to one or both of the Jets’ high first-round positions and thus that they could trade down and pick up at least one extra pick for each move down.

Purely as a mental exercise using one of the now ubiquitous Draft Trade Value Boards, if the Jets were to drop from, say, No. 13, just a few spots, the trading partner would need to send over something high in Round 4 to the Jets for the privilege. A Jets tradedown to around No. 20 would be in the high-third-round neighborhood. A move to the mid-20s might bring a mid-second-round choice in return.

But just as surely the Jets could stand pat at Nos. 9 and 13 and pluck the top-ranked player on their value board at that time for the move into the future.

Here’s one more bit of trivia for draftniks as we wait for the last few hours to slip-slide away. Since the first AFL-NFL common draft in 1967, the Jets have spent the No. 13 pick on a player twice:

■ In 1973 they tabbed Miami safety Burgess Owens, who had a solid 10-year NFL career, the first seven spent patrolling the Jets’ deep middle.

■ In 2000 they selected South Carolina DE John Abraham, one of the best pass rushers in franchise history for at least six seasons, which is the amount of time he spent in green and white, accumulating 53.5 sacks before he was traded to Atlanta in 2006.

Similarly the Jets also have used the No. 9 pick on a pair of players since ’67:

■ In 1972 they chose Jackson State WR Jerome Barkum, who went on to play both wideout and tight end in his distinguished 12-year Jets career.

■ And in 1995 they grabbed Penn State TE Kyle Brady, who unfurled an efficient 13-year pro career, the first four seasons with the Jets, then eight with Jacksonville, then as a contributor to New England’s Super Bowl team in 2007.

I remember Brady getting a bit of a boo-bird ballad cascading down from the Jets fans in the Paramount Theatre at Madison Square Garden that year, and Brady saying later, slightly mystified, that he didn’t quite expect that kind of reaction.

Certainly that is possible at any draft from the Jets faithful, but I just have a feeling that the reaction will be favorable tonight — two picks in the top 13 with all but a handful of the best college players available for the picking at either spot. At 10 minutes maximum per pick, we’d expect the Jets to make the first selection of the Idzik regime somewhere around 9:30 p.m. EDT.

Before-Show on NewYorkJets.com

If you’ve got that computer, SmartPhone, BlackBerry, etc., available at any time from 6:30-8 p.m., check out the Jets Talk LIVE predraft show. Eric Allen, my partner, hosts the festivities from the season ticket holders draft party at MetLife Stadium. He’ll have a whole bunch of Jets players and other celebrities for on-camera interviews, recorded features, and several guest phone-ins (one of whom will be yours truly reporting from Radio City Music Hall just before the start of the draft around 7:45 p.m.).

Here at the Jets we do a great job of putting on a predraft televised special (if I do say so myself), and this year’s before-show figures to be the best yet.

And on Sunday, Some Good Cheer

As if the draft isn’t enough in the Jets universe, the team will wrap up the weekend with the 2013 New York Jets Flight Crew audition finals at MetLife Stadium. Director Denise Garvey will welcome 54 finalists to the audition — 26 Flight Crew veterans and 28 preliminary- and semifinal-round contestants.

In the early afternoon the finalists will present dance routines and kicks taught to them during the semifinal round. And by 4:30 p.m., Garvey plans to announce up to 40 members of the 2013 New York Jets Flight Crew.

The audition finals are closed to the public, but we’ll let you all know who made the Flight Crew Class of ’13 as soon as we can on Sunday.

But positions in the NFL Draft? Now we’re talking.

That’s just what the Jets have at the moment in Thursday night’s first round of the draft at Radio City Music Hall. Their own pick at No. 9 and the No. 13 they acquired from Tampa Bay in the Darrelle Revis trade give them a prized position among the 32 teams, most of which will be spending one pick in Round 1 and none of which have two picks in the top 13 as the Jets do.

We mentioned the other day that the Jets have had that distinction, spending two picks in the top 13 in one draft, just once before since the start of the common draft in 1967. That was 2000, the draft of the “Four Aces,” when DE Shaun Ellis was tabbed 12th and DE John Abraham 13th (ahead of QB Chad Pennington at 18th and TE Anthony Becht at 27th).

But what is the track record of the entire league with two picks in the top 13 of a given draft? There aren’t a lot of examples, but generally those teams that do spend two such high picks fare fairly well in the coming season.

Interesting enough, the last NFL team with this distinction was … those same Jets in 2000 (with an asterisk). In the past 12 drafts, no team wound up using those two picks once it came time to push the chips forward in Round 1.

The asterisk I refer to above is that the Jets weren’t alone in that ’00 selection meeting with two high picks. The Redskins, you may remember, held Nos. 2 and 3 and went for LB LaVar Arrington and T Chris Samuels. Then the Ravens (with a younger Rex Ryan on that coaching staff) spent Nos. 5 and 10 on two offensive players, RB Jamal Lewis and WR Travis Taylor, who weren’t nickel-and-dimers.

Since 1990, that two-in-the-top-13 situation came up 10 times. And a trivia note about those 10 teams is that in the season after they spent those picks, they posted an average improvement in their previous season’s record of 2.5 wins. Eight of the 10 improved their previous record, four made the playoffs (Atlanta ’91, Dallas ’91, Miami ’92 and Baltimore ’00), and the ’92 Colts in part used their 1-2 punch of top pick Steve Emtman and LB Quentin Coryatt to improve eight games, from 1-15 to 9-7.

Splitting the 9 from the 13 for the moment, Since 1990, players selected at No. 9 (… No. 9 … No. 9 … ) have fared pretty well. Not every nine was a winner, but T Richmond Webb (Miami, ’90), RB Fred Taylor (Jacksonville, ’98), LB Brian Urlacher (Chicago, ’00), DT Kevin Williams (Minnesota, ’03) and RB C.J. Spiller (Buffalo, ’10) are among the best.

As for players who were plucked at lucky 13, there are TE Tony Gonzalez (Kansas City, ’97), LB Takeo Spikes (Cincinnati, ’98), John Abraham by the Jets in ’00, WR Lee Evans (Buffalo, ’04), and LB Brian Orakpo (Washington, ’09).

Clearly, this is no guarantee that the Jets will hit a two-run homer with both their picks or improve anywhere from 2.5 to eight wins over last year’s 6-10 mark. And if they trade one of those picks and move out of the top 13, then all of this trivia is for naught.

But the Jets have a good, experienced college draft team now led by long-time scout Jeff Bauer, and a new man at the top in GM John Idzik who has said that this draft and every draft will be a lifeline to how the team does in the season(s) ahead. And their 9-13 exacta could be just the ticket for the next favorable development on the road to the 2013 season.

Pace is a 10-year veteran who spent the past five seasons working the Jets’ outside ‘backer position. He’s been durable while wearing the green and white, playing in 78 of the Jets’ 86 games, including playoffs, with 77 of them starts. And he’s led the Jets over the past five regular seasons with 28 sacks, including a career-high eight in 2009 and three last season, and 12 forced fumbles.

His sacks are the most by a Jets LB in a five-year span since Mo Lewis put up 33.5 sacks from 1997-2001.

Pace, word of whose signing was reported last week, returns to compete for the starting job and playing time alongside Garrett McIntyre, Ricky Sapp, recently signed unrestricted free agent Antwan Barnes and other outside LB candidates who already on the roster and who will be arriving via the draft and free agency in the coming weeks and months.

Next week’s draft is a big event for the Jets’ extended family. Fans are aware that CB Desmond Trufant out of Washington is Isaiah’s younger brother and Matt Elam, the Florida safety, is Abram Elam’s kid brother. But that’s just the start of the draft prospects with a little green and white in their blood.

Austin Peay QB Jake Ryan is the son of Pat Ryan, the Jets’ 13-year backup and sometimes starting QB from 1978-90. Pat, in fact, was 12-9 as a starter during Ken O’Brien’s stay with the Green & White, and that included starts in both of the 1986 playoff games, the win over Kansas City and the double OT loss at Cleveland.

Penn State RB Michael Zordich’s dad, Mike, also a Nittany Lion, went on to play 12 NFL seasons as a safety, the first two of which came with the Jets in 1987-88 after he was drafted in the ninth round of the ’86 draft by San Diego. The elder Zordich’s big green play was an interception-return touchdown to crown the Jets’ 1988 home-opening win over the Houston Oilers.

Then there’s North Carolina OL Brennan Williams. His father, Brent, began his NFL career as seventh-rounder in that same ’86 draft by New England, then went on to play 11 pro seasons. His last five games came as a member of the Jets in 1996.

And one name that initially got past me and the NFL’s media department but not past Radar regular GaryC is T.J. McDonald, the Southern Cal safety and son of Tom McDonald, not an ex-Jets player but a celebrated Trojans and NFL safety who came on this year as the Jets’ new DBs coach.

Where do all the Jets’ relatives figure to go? Desmond Trufant is possibly the third-best corner in this draft and should go in the second half of the first round. Matt Elam is perhaps the top strong safety prospect in this draft and could go low in Round 1 or in Round 2. T.J. McDonald and Brennan Williams are potential third- or fourth-rounders. Michael Zordich and Jake Ryan are possible undrafted free agent signees.

Familiar Names at Predraft Play 60 Clinics

A number of current and former Jets are slated to be involved in the NFL Play 60 Youth Football Festival being held next Wednesday and Thursday at Chelsea Waterside Park between 23rd and 24th Streets in Manhattan.

TE Jeff Cumberland, LB Demario Davis, WR Clyde Gates and RB John Griffin will be involved in conducting some of the clinics on Wednesday afternoon. Former Jets S James Ihedigbo, now with the Ravens, will also be a clinician, as will retired QB Mark Brunell, in town as we mentioned a few days ago to announce the Jaguars’ second-round pick from the Radio City podium on Friday night.

The players will team with third-through-ninth-grade students from schools in New York and New Jersey as part of the league’s youth health and fitness campaign. Students will learn NFL FLAG drills and Heads Up Football skills from USA Football coaches and will participate in activities with the players.

For the first time in this annual predraft event, two Thursday evening clinics are open for public registration. A parent or legal guardian may sign up his/her child (ages 6-13) at www.1iota.com. Space is limited.

Chrebet will be one of 32 legendary NFL alumni, one for each team, who will announce their teams’ selections in the second/third rounds of the draft.

Chrebet, of course, is the Jets’ iconic wideout from Garfield, N.J., and Hofstra University who signed as an undrafted free agent after the 1995 draft and rose from 10th on their training camp depth chart to make that ’95 team as well as the next 10 Jets teams before retiring following the 2005 season.

No. 80 is second in franchise history with 580 receptions, third with 7,365 receiving yards and third with 41 receiving touchdowns. Playing in 152 regular-season games with 104 starts, he set the Jets mark for rookie receptions with 66 in ’95 and established career highs with 84 catches in ’96, 1,083 yards in ’98 and nine touchdown grabs in ’02.

Two other players with Jets ties are among the 32 alumni who will be making these team draft choice announcements a week from Friday. QB Mark Brunell (2010-11) will announce the Jacksonville Jaguars’ second-round pick and DT Tony Casillas (1994-95) will reveal the Dallas Cowboys’ No. 2 choice.

This year’s announcements of draft picks by NFL greats is a continuation of the program that began in 2011. DT Marty Lyons, the Sack Exchange stalwart and Jets’ radio analyst, made the second-round call in 2011 and Wesley Walker handled the second- and third-round announcements last year.

Bradway, the Jets’ senior personnel executive, annually informs reporters on some predraft statistics. He did so once again this afternoon.

“We have 1,426 players we’ve evaluated,” Bradway said. “We visited 271 schools. We wrote over 5,000 reports, conducted over 300 interviews at the [Senior Bowl] all-star game, combine, our 30 visits and also our local day. So we’ve spent a lot of time with these players, getting to know them not only as players but as people.”

Bradway described the entire process as beneficial and said that his staff has narrowed its big board down to 220 prospects.

“I think this is a draft that is very deep in the mid-rounds, especially,” he said. “I think there’s going to be some players late in the draft and good quality college free agents that will be available to us as we go through this.”

Bauer is approaching the one year mark from when he was named director of college scouting last May 18. For the prior 11 years, he had served as one of the team’s college scouts, covering the Midwest region. From his perspective, it’s been special establishing a relationship with first-year Jets general manager John Idzik.

“When John came here, he stressed that it’s the group, every scout has a voice,” Bauer said. “I think we’ve had healthy discussions about all the players, everyone.”

Bradway echoed Bauer’s remarks.

“I think the thing that’s been impressive with John is he’s respected our process of the evaluations in the fall, the all-star games, the crosschecks, the February meeting, the combine, and so on,” he said. “He’s been able to add a lot to that also. We’re excited about that, because any time you have change, I think you get invigorated. We’re excited about what we’re doing, and we’ll get a chance to keep building on that as we keep moving forward, too.”

At the present time, Idzik said he and his staff are finishing the detailed evaluations and developing final alternative plans and “what-if” scenarios. He also credited head coach Rex Ryan for the head coach’s input since he arrived in January.

“Obviously, Rex is the head coach,” Idzik said, “so he’s very influential in what we do, especially when it comes to acquiring talent through the draft, free agency and what not. you want your head coach feeling good about what you’re doing and the decisions you make. By his involvement and his staff’s involvement in what’s been going on so far, we’re completely confident that’s going to happen.”

With the first round just eight days away, Bradway, Bauer, Idzik and Co. are prepared to select the best player available when the Green & White get on the clock with the ninth pick.

“I think all of us, as a group, the whole staff is excited for next week,” Bauer said. “We feel we’re going to get good players and we’ve done a great job researching and getting in the right spot.”

All three voices have been silenced in recent years, most recently Summerall, who died today near his longtime home in Southlake, Texas.

Summerall, 82, was a fine placekicker for the Giants back in the Fifties, when kickers often struggled with the 50% mark on their field goals. And he’ll forever be remembered for his basso voice and authoritative delivery and for his work alongside two partners in the pantheon of NFL broadcasting teams — Tom Brookshier, with whom he worked from 1974-80 on CBS, and of course Pro Football Hall of Famer John Madden from ’81-93 on CBS and then from 1994-2002 on Fox.

“I was so lucky I got to work with Pat,” Madden told the Dallas Morning News. “He was so easy to work with. He knew how to use words. For a guy like myself who rambles on and on and doesn’t always make sense, he was sent from heaven.”

George Allen Summerall was born in central Florida in 1930 and was raised by an aunt and uncle, who took to calling him Pat. Once he turned professional, he would always joke that only one person ever called him George again, “and that was on rare occasion.” That person: Jim Kensil, the late former Jets team president and aide to former NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle.

As a Dallas resident who specialized in NFC games, Summerall didn’t get to call many Jets games, just 10 in the regular season and one in the preseason. His first actually was as a three-men-in-the-booth color analyst alongside Brent Musburger, with Jack Whitaker handling the play-by-play, in the Jets’ 28-20 loss to Atlanta in 1973.

His first Jets game as the play-by-play man was the 1975 season finale, a 31-21 loss to the Cowboys. He called Jets victories over Tampa Bay in 1982, the L.A. Rams in ’83, and New Orleans in ’86.

Summerall’s last regular-season Jets game was the 35-30 loss to Philadelphia in 1993, the game that turned on Eagles CB Eric Allen’s 94-yard return of a Boomer Esiason interception with 8:43 to play.

And the last Jets game of any kind that he worked was the Jets’ 2004 preseason win at Indianapolis, when he filled in for Mike Patrick on ESPN’s broadcast of that game.

We extend our condolences to the Summerall family for their loss, and to fans of the NFL, the Cotton Bowl, the Masters and other sporting events who retain memories of the magic that still lingers in the very voice that Pat Summerall brought to the booth.

The new season has hit another milestone with the start of the Jets’ voluntary offseason program.

Among the players on hand are the roster’s entire quarterback contingent plus key players from both sides of the ball — DE Muhammad Wilkerson, LB David Harris, CB Antonio Cromartie and tackle D’Brickashaw Ferguson — to get started on Phase 1 of the program, a two-week period during which activities are limited to strength and conditioning and physical rehabilitation only, under the guidance of strength coach Justus Galac and his staff, Paul Ricci, Pierre Ngo and intern Jason Oszvart.

“For us it’s really about reducing the injuries and creating an atmosphere for the player to train in that is exciting,” Galac told Eric Allen for Jets Talk Live recently. “They come in there and they’re ready to work. For the players, my job is to make them bigger, faster and stronger — we all know that.

“But it always comes back to being an explosive player, not only working on our explosive power for the big guys and the hips and the hang cleans and the jumps, but the speed work, and that comes back to the skill players and working with plyometrics. Really building a foundation program where, when they walk out after the workout, they feel more explosive, they feel stronger, they feel bigger, and they feel like they got a good workout in.”

The Jets’ program is one of 32 around the NFL that is getting under way these days. Eight teams got started April 1-2, while three won’t get cranking until a week from today. For the other 21, today’s the day to welcome players back to facilities start sweatin’ to the sounds of 2013.

Article 21 of the Collective Bargaining Agreement establishes an official, voluntary nine-week program for each club that is conducted in three phases. After Phase 1, Phase 2 for each team’s offseason schedule consists of weeks 3-5 during which on-field workouts may include individual player instruction and drills as well as team practices conducted on a “separates” basis. No live contact or team offense vs. defense drills are permitted.

Phase 3 consists of the final four weeks of the program, during which teams may conduct a total of 10 days of organized team practice activity — OTAs. No live contact is permitted, but 7-on-7, 9-on-7 and 11-on-11 drills are permissible.

The Jets’ OTA workouts have been scheduled for May 20, 22-23, 28 and 30-31, and June 3-6. The Green & White’s mandatory minicamp is set for June 11-13.

RFA Tender Offers Signed

The Jets announced today that RT Austin Howard has signed his tender offer as a restricted free agent. This comes a week after TE Jeff Cumberland signed his RFA tender offer to remain with the team. Howard was tendered at a second-round level. Cumberland was a right-of-first-refusal tender.

The Jets following a special teams workout have signed free-agent placekicker Derek Dimke and free-agent punter Ryan Quigley.

Both are first-year men who had foot-tastic college careers, then got their feet wet with NFC North teams last offseason and preseason.

Dimke didn’t miss a placement with Detroit last preseason, hitting a pair of field goals, from 40 and 31 yards, and three extra points. Of his six kickoffs, two were into the end zone, and the average return was only to the opponents’ 18.8-yard line. Jason Hanson held onto his Lions job, no surprise, for the 21st year. Hanson just announced his retirement this week.

Dimke came out of the University of Illinois, where he was the Illini’s all-time leader in accuracy for both field goals (39-for-46, 84.8%) and extra points (89-for-89).

Quigley got in a lot of action during the Bears’ preseason, hitting 16 punts for a 41.4-yard gross average and a 37.0 net with six inside-the-20 kicks and no touchbacks. He had one punt blocked. Then-sixth-year pro Adam Podlesh held onto his job with the Bears for the second year, although Quigley did make it onto Chicago’s opening-day roster, was deactivated for the opener, then released.

That 6-to-0 I20-to-TB rate is no surprise for Quigley, who no doubt goes occasionally by the same nickname as Quinton Coples. As a Boston College senior, he was fourth in the FBS with 28 punts downed inside the opponents’ 20.

This afternoon the Melatollah of the Value Board held another conference call with interested reporters and the Jets came up several times in relation to questions about certain players and where they might go in the upcoming draft. As a Radar public service, here are the questions and Mel’s responses:

Q. How long do you think it will take Barkevious Mingo to develop into an every-down player if he’s in a 4 3 defense?

Kiper: I look at him as a developmental defensive end. He has to get a little stronger to play that position, get a little bulk to his frame. I look at him as a 3-4 outside linebacker, an attacker off the edge. I think he’d be a factor right away at that spot. The majority of outside linebackers in that situation are.

I would say Mingo immediately as a 3-4 outside linebacker would be a major league factor. He gets from Point A to Point B lightning-quick. I would like to see him be more productive this year. If he would have been, maybe he would have been the top-three pick. If the Jets can get him at No. 9, that’s a real nice value pick.

Q. Tavon Austin to Percy Harvin seems to be a natural comparison. How well does Austin stack up to Harvin when you compare them, and is Austin a reach for a team such as the Jets at No. 9?

Kiper: He’s 5’8½”. You think about where he can be in the NFL — he’s got great potential to be an electrifying performer the way today’s NFL is.

Durability is the problem with Percy Harvin. Let’s hope, he’s never had an issue. Tavon Austin, you can put him in the backfield, in the slot, in the return game. Gives you a lot of versatility. With the ball in his hands, he’s electric. Very tough to corral.

So is it too early You could debate that at 5’8½”. Is it too early at 16? No. If you’re getting a great player at 16, can you make a great player at nine? Sure, you can. It’s a case where, hey, I always believe that you had to take a guy where he was slotted. Now if the guy can play, he can play. If he can play at 16, he can play at nine.

The Jets have a ton of needs. They need a playmaker. If they wanted to take a versatile kid like Austin who is going to change that scoreboard, I don’t think anybody would have a big issue with it. They may say it’s a slight reach, but so be it. Slight reaches sometimes turn out to be great players.

Q. Concerning Jarvis Jones, his stock has fluctuated quite a bit. Where do you feel would be the best fit for him?

Kiper: He was productive. He just didn’t run well. Some don’t. Look at Terrell Suggs. I think he goes in that top-15-to-17. I think he could go to New Orleans after 15, Pittsburgh at 17, maybe even as early as the Jets at nine. But if I had a say right now, it would be New Orleans at 15 or Pittsburgh at 17.

But Jay’s never left his Long Island base and he never stopped keeping tabs on the Jets. And he continues to teach the game to Jets fans and their kids as well as those who wear colors different than the green and white.

Fiedler’s latest endeavor in the football camp field is the Prime Time Football Offense and Defense Passing Skills Camp, which will be held on Sunday, April 28, at Randall’s Island Field No. 8, with former Jets Bobby Jackson and Bruce Harper serving as coaches. We’ll provide more details on the camp a little farther down in this blog.

“My dad, Ken, has been running summer camps for 50 years,” Fielder told me. “My brother, Scott, took over the Prime Time sports camps seven or eight years ago, and I’ve run my own Brookwood football camp for the last 15 years in Glen Spey, near Port Jervis, N.Y.

“Just these past couple of years, I’ve expanded and done a lot more year-round stuff, local clinics, quarterback/wide receiver clinics. I started talking with the people of the Yorkville Youth Athletic Association and they wanted me to come in and do something for them. So we came up with the idea of running a one-day clinic out on Randall’s Island.”

Being in the heart of the city is right up Fiedler’s alley. He grew up in Oceanside on the Island and starred as a quarterback, point guard and decathlete at Oceanside High. He stayed in the Northeast and had an outstanding Ivy League career as Dartmouth’s QB, then moved on to the pros. He actually coached receivers for a short while at Hofstra, the Jets’ former HQ, before stringing together seasons with Minnesota and Jacksonville and then a five-year stay as a starter with the Dolphins.

Jay’s Short Stay in Green

Fiedler came to the Jets as an unrestricted free agent in 2005 and made it to the third game of the regular season. That, of course, was the disastrous affair against the Jaguars, when he and Chad Pennington suffered devastating shoulder injuries within two second-half series of each other. Despite rehabbing the shoulder well enough to get consideration from several teams, he never played in the NFL after that.

“No doubt I wanted my Jets stay to be much longer,” he recalled. “Being a local guy and having the opportunity to play for the team, even as brief as it was, I still made some connections with other guys I played with and other alumni. Also, just being involved in the local football market, I’m involved with a lot of former Jets and see them at a number of events.”

Fiedler talked about his post-football pursuits, among them owning a minor-league basketball team and a concert-promotion company. These days he handles a regional market of the energy service company started by Pro Football Hall of Famer Thurman Thomas.

“As much as you hated Thurman as a Jet, he was some back,” Fiedler remembered. “Probably one of the smartest players I came across in my 10 years in the league.”

Fiedler, needless to say, has the smarts, too, to earn his degree from Dartmouth. And if you recall that school from recent Jets stories, well, yes, it’s true that he is a fellow Green Wave alumnus along with current Jets GM John Idzik.

“I didn’t know John from Dartmouth, but when I was coming out as a player, he was with the Tampa Bay organization,” he said. “My coaches put me in touch with him and he was definitely helpful throughout the process when I was being scouted, going to the combine. We weren’t in close touch but when we played against teams he was involved in, we made it a point to reach out to each other.”

And Fiedler, like many longtime fans of the Green & White, likes what Idzik has been doing in his first months on the job.

Moving in Right Direction

“For him it’s just about getting down to business, building the team from inside the locker room rather than on the sports pages,” he said. “I think they’re doing a good job of refocusing the organization and how they want the team to be run. We’ll see how it plays out over the next couple of years. There’s definitely a few holes they have to fill, but I think they’re moving in the right direction, and I’m excited to see how things progress.”

As for the progress of Fiedler’s April 28 camp, it’s designed for teaching age-appropriate fundamental passing, receiving and coverage skills and drills. Fans of all NFL teams are invited, although the staff has a Jets alumni flavor. Harper, the Jets running back from 1977-83 who easily remains the franchise’s all-time kick-return yardage leader, will coach offensive skills. Jackson, the team’s 90-game left cornerback starter from ’78-85 who was a top interceptor and a defensive team captain, will work the defensive side of the passing game.

“Bobby and I over the past couple of months have been working on some weekly clinics throughout Long Island. His son, Ashun, who was a college wide receiver, comes in and helps out along with Bobby,” Jay said. “And everyone loves Bruce from his days as a player. I’ve gotten to know him at events the past couple of years and I love the way he interacts with fans. Certainly he can teach people a great deal.”

Additionally, Fiedler has invited other former NFL players to coach and make appearances. All the former clinicians will be supported by experienced high school and youth coaches from around the area.

The afternoon schedule has been set up for three age groups. The Pee Wee Clinic for Grades 1-4 ($50 advanced registration/$60 cash only at event) will run from noon-1:30 p.m., the Youth Clinic for Grades 5-8 ($75/$90) will run from 1:30-3:30, and the High School Clinic for Grades 9-12 ($99/$120) goes from 3:30-6 p.m. Youth and high school quarterbacks can receive a video analysis of their footwork and technique for an additional fee. All participants will receive a T-shirt courtesy of Modell’s.

Click here for more information on the clinic and here for a helpful set of FAQs for the afternoon.

He had on his navy blue New York Yankees cap and his navy blue Florida International sweats. And everything underneath was green and white.

“It’s a pleasure,” Barnes said in his first public remarks — other than via Twitter — about becoming a Jets linebacker via unrestricted free agency. Signing with the team, he said, was “something that I wanted to do. Rex was trying to get me two years ago but I turned him down. So when the opportunity came up again, I told him I wasn’t going to turn him down this time.”

Barnes’ relationship with the Jets head coach goes back to his first team, the Ravens, who drafted him in the fourth round, 134th overall, in the ’07 draft and added him to their defense, then being coordinated by Rex.

“This is pretty much the only team I wanted to talk to,” Barnes said. “I didn’t see myself going anywhere else,” Barnes said. “From the outside looking in, they needed a pass rusher and I was thinking I could come here and compete and be a pass rusher.”

Barnes, the 6’1″, 251-pounder who grew up in Miami, has some pro personnel analysts who look at his 23.5 sacks in six pro seasons and say, well, he might be able to supply some of that to the Jets. But others take note of the 18.5 sacks he had in his last three seasons with the Chargers — including the eye-opening 11 he had in ’11 as he moved into the starting lineup for a while for the injured Shaun Phillips — and think he’s a rusher on the rise.

AB definitely is a confident player, but he’s also well aware of the competition mantra around Florham Park these days.

“Me being in my seventh year in the league, sometimes you’ve just got to play your role,” he said. “Whatever role they have for me, I’m going to play to the best of my ability.”

One of his abilities is his speed. He tips his hat to his alma mater, FIU, in reflecting back on the 2007 NFL Combine, when he hung up a 4.43-second time in the 40-yard dash that is still amazing.

“I still have that speed,” he insisted. “They gave the [fastest-linebacker] title that year to one guy. I thought I had the fastest time. I just wanted to represent FIU well at the combine.”

Quincy Black, just released by Tampa Bay last month, was that LB who nosed out Barnes by an unofficial one-hundredth of a second, 4.42 to 4.43, in the ’07 combine. Those were not only the two best times for linebackers in Indianapolis that year but remain the best two times by all linebackers in the last eight combines … combined.

Barnes has done his tour of the country, from the East Coast to the West Coast and back again. He sees new horizons opening for him here in North Jersey.

“I’m going from sunny-no-rain-clear-skies-every-day San Diego to hard-core, snowy New Jersey,” he said. “My daughter already knows the Jets chant — she’s 4 years old. My family are Dolphins fans but they told me they’re going to switch over and be Jets fans now.

“This is pretty much what I need,” he said with his quiet, confident smile. “I’m looking forward to it.”

You can hear all of EA’s interview with Barnes, plus his chat with Rich Cirminiello of College Football News.com about the Jets’ draft needs, beginning tomorrow at 3 p.m. ET on newyorkjets.com when the JTL segment first airs.

Another NFL Coaching Competitor Passes

One day after we remembered Jack Pardee, whose teams had a few head-to-head battles with the Jets over the years, we must take the heavy duty of eulogizing one more coaching competitor in Chuck Fairbanks, 79, who died Tuesday in Scottsdale, Ariz., from brain cancer.

Fairbanks first burst on the football scene as Oklahoma’s head coach. After six years of leading the Sooners to the upper echelons of college football, he moved on to raise the fortunes of the New England Patriots. From 1967-72, the Patriots were 22-62-1. In six seasons under Fairbanks, they improved to 46-40 with two playoff appearances, although the last, in ’78, was tarnished by Fairbanks’ attempt to leave before the postseason for the University of Colorado.

Fairbanks’ Patriots were 6-6 against the Jets’ collection of five head coaches during that period — Weeb Ewbank (2-0 in his last season at the helm in ’73), Charley Winner (2-1), Ken Shipp (1-0), Lou Holtz (0-2) and Walt Michaels (1-3).

“Idzik’s 20-year NFL career leaves him quite familiar with the experience and pressure of working for a franchise desperate for a turnaround,” Banks wrote. “He did, after all, get his start in the league as part of the remarkable collection of front office talent that Tampa Bay amassed in the mid-90s. …

“Incredibly, Idzik is the seventh member of those mid-90s Bucs to come to power in an NFL front office, tabbed to lead Woody Johnson’s Jets after 11-plus years spent in Tampa Bay’s front office, three more in Arizona, and the past six seasons in Seattle’s well-respected personnel operation.”

Besides Idzik, the other six members of the Tampa 7:

■ Current Falcons president/CEO Rich McKay, the former Buccaneers GM from 1993-2003 who hired Tony Dungy as head coach in 1996, starting the process toward the Super Bowl XXXVII title.

■ Jerry Angelo, the longtime Bucs director of player personnel (1987-2000) whose 11-year stint as the Bears’ GM was highlighted by their 2006 Super Bowl run.

■ Current Titans scout Tim Ruskell, who spent 17 years in the Bucs front office and was Seattle’s GM during its lone Super Bowl season of 2005.

■ Mark Dominik, entering his fifth season as the Buccaneers’ GM and a member of the Bucs front office since 1995.

■ Current Tennessee EVP/GM Ruston Webster, now in his fourth season with the Titans after spending four years in Seattle’s front office and 18 years in a variety of roles with Tampa Bay’s (1988-2005).

■ Current Lions GM Martin Mayhew, a starting cornerback for the 1995-96 Bucs, the final two seasons of his eight-year NFL playing career.

It’s a good read as always by Banks, although he clearly didn’t get a hold of Idzik, who remains publicly quiet while privately working hard at retooling the Jets for 2013 and beyond. But back when the I-Man was first hired, he had this to say about his Buccaneer years and what all of his NFL stops have meant in getting him to this point in his career:

“Rich McKay, Jerry Angelo, Tim Ruskell, Ruston Webster — we went on quite a journey in Tampa. We saw it from the bottom to the top. It was very special. To me, all of those experiences have solidified the power of ‘we’ over ‘me.’ That’s something that is going to be very strong here in New York. As it goes there, it goes here in New York, too. It will be based on a collaborative effort. It will be inclusive, it will be well-thought-out and researched.”

There’s a long way still to go before Idzik’s first Green & White team takes the field, but so far, so good.

Antwan’s New Number

We’ll preview new Jets LB Antwan Barnes’ interview with Eric Allen and the Jets Talk Live Crew on Wednesday — EA’s chat with AB will air Thursday on JTL — but for now we can say Barnes has settled on uniform No. 95 with his newest NFL outfit.

“There were a couple of options open, but I’m going to stick with a 90s number,” said Barnes. “I may not be the size for a 90s number, but I can sure play like it, though.”

We didn’t think there was a linebacker size requirement for the 90s as opposed to the 50s, and Barnes looks, if not immense, big enough at 6’1″, 251. He started out at No. 50 with the Ravens (assistant coaches: Rex Ryan and Dennis Thurman) in ’07, but Garrett McIntyre’s got that one here, and he wore 98 with the Chargers (plus two games as an Eagle), but that’s Quinton Coples’ deal here.

The last Jet to wear 95 on the field was NT Martin Tevaseu in last year’s preseason finale at Philadelphia. Now it’s Barnes’ turn.

So Long to an NFL Legend

A head coach that Idzik’s father, John, ran into back when he was offensive coordinator of the Jets in the late Seventies has passed away. Jack Pardee, 76, died Monday of gall bladder cancer.

Pardee was a legend in the game, from his time as one of Bear Bryant’s “Junction Boys” at Texas A&M in the mid-Fifties through 15 seasons as a solid, one-time Pro Bowl linebacker for the Rams and Redskins through 11 seasons as an NFL head coach of the Bears, ‘Skins and Oilers.

The Jets didn’t run into Pardee much as a player, since they didn’t start to play NFL teams until the end of his career. He was the LLB starter and team captain for the Rams in a 31-20 Jets win in L.A. in 1970, and the starter again on the left side for Washington in a 35-17 Jets loss at Shea Stadium in ’72.

They fared worse against him as a coach, losing four of five meetings with his teams. The first was in ’78, when Pardee’s ‘Skins whipped the Jets of Walt Michaels and OC Idzik Sr., 23-3. The only Green & White win came in Bruce Coslet’s first year at the helm, at Houston by 17-12 in 1990. But the Jets paid for that by losing twice the next season to Pardee’s Oilers, 23-20 at home in the regular season and 17-10 in the Astrodome in the ’91 playoffs.

Wherever the game took him, it always seemed to bring him back to the Lone Star State. He coached the “run-and-shoot” offense with the USFL’s Houston Gamblers, then the University of Houston, then the Oilers before ending his NFL coaching career in ’94.

“We lost a great coach and, more importantly, a great man today,” Mike Munchak, current Titans head coach and a player and assistant coach for Pardee, said in a statement. “I truly admired his passion for football and was especially inspired by his love of the history of the game. He often shared stories of his NFL playing days to motivate his players, which has greatly influenced the way that I now coach my players. Coach Pardee will surely be missed.”

Today is, in fact, the Jets’ 50th anniversary, if you consider their birth to be March 28, 1963, when the sale of what was left of the New York Titans franchise to the five-man ownership syndicate of David A. “Sonny” Werblin, Townsend Martin, Leon Hess, Donald Lillis and Philip Iselin was reportedly completed.

Werblin became the new club’s president and CEO. He presided over the renaming of the original AFL franchise as the Jets and the naming of Weeb Ewbank as the new head coach, both listed as occurring on April 15, 1963 (so there’s another two golden anniversaries waiting to happen). And Sonny was the pointman, with the AFL draft late in 1964, in ushering in the Joe Namath era, which of course led to Jan. 12, 1969. Say no more, say no more.

Since that day, of course, the Jets have not returned to the NFL’s championship game. Many would argue about the number of highlights and great players and coaches in the first 50 seasons of Jets football. Certainly the record shows that in that half-century the Jets have had 27 seasons of .500-or-better ball, 18 winning seasons, 13 postseason appearances and 11 playoff wins.

However, I have always been of the opinion that cheering hard for any team, pro, college or high school, is a lot like being a member of an extended family. You may not always like all the members of your family or the events and outcomes that occur from the actions or inactions of some of those characters.

But when under attack from the outside, it’s time to circle the wagons and let folks know you’re now and always a member of the Green & White family. It’s the only family (or at least one of the only families) you’ve got. You’ve lived your life with them. And the current incarnation of the family has seen that things need to improve and they’re hard at work on improving them. It’s time to celebrate the good.

So in advance of the season ahead, when the Jets organization will celebrate the first 50 years of Jets football, let us know at any time of your favorite all-time Jets and your top Green & White memories. Naturally you can refer to your less-favorite reminiscences as well. But at this moment we’re focusing on the good times of the last 50 years and the good times of the next 50 years.

Now where’s that gold-plated party horn?

And Rex wasn’t about to be pinned by the Kay-La Greca tag team. The Jets head coach declined to discuss any Darrelle Revis speculation or to entertain notions that he’s coaching for his job in 2013.

The best of his take on Revis: “I’m on board with any Jet decision, any decision that’s in the best interests of the New York Jets. I’ve always been on board with it. Any decision we think as an organization is the best move for the organization, I will be behind it 100 percent, regardless of what that move is. And that’s not saying any specifics about this player or that player.”

And his best take on his quarterbacks wasn’t terribly new but was a further firming up of the competitive nature of the beast at every spot on this John Idzik/Ryan creation. It came when he was asked if he knew who his opening-day QB will be.

“No I don’t. It’s going to be a position where we’re bringing in competition,” he said. “That old thing about competition making the best of us all, I think that’ll be true. I don’t think there’s a clear-cut favorite in my opinion. I just think it’s going to be competition from day one.”

Does this hint at a loss of confidence in Mark Sanchez?

“I haven’t lost confidence in Mark, but I do know this: The play at quarterback has to get a lot better, there’s no doubt,” Ryan said. “Whether it’s Mark or somebody else, we know we have to improve in that area. I guess we can file that in the ‘no kidding’ category, but that’s it — it has to get better. I believe Mark will play a lot better. But I also believe there’s going to be some stiffer competition than maybe there’s been in the past here.”

Rex had a few bullet-point opinions on some of the newest Jets. On G Willie Colon: “He’s a huge person, a guy that can knock people off the ball, a mauler, very physical.”

And the thing he liked about RB Mike Goodson besides his explosiveness and speed was that “He was targeted 16 times last year in the [Oakland] passing game and caught all 16. That’ll give you an idea how effective he is out of the backfield.”

That’s a statistic that’s worth expanding on just a little. True enough, Goodson was 16-for-16 for the Raiders, according to Stats Inc., not a lot of passes but nice production with what he got, especially considering his 12.2 yards per catch on those 16 balls.

For his career with the Panthers and Raiders, Goodson caught 59 of the 78 passes thrown his way (75.6%) for a solid 8.9-yard average and a 10.4-yard average after the catch.

It’s certainly not a fair comparison, one player’s four-year career vs. a number of backs’ one season in the same offense, but the Jets’ backs last year unofficially had 80 balls targeted for them and caught 44 (55%) for an average of 7.8 yards per catch and 6.6 YAC.

Of course, those numbers won’t mean much once the Jets take the field in the coming months. This team figures to be vastly different than any of Ryan’s four previous teams. We’ll be pointing out the positives as we are wont to do, but there will be many negatives and bumps in the road as the Jets get themselves back on track.

Yet if that’s the hand you’re being dealt, don’t grumble about it and blame the football gods. Play it the best way you know how. And that’s what Ryan appears to be gearing up himself and his team to be doing soon. That came through in his answer to Kay’s question about his possible lame-duck status heading into ’13.

“I totally disagree with that,” Rex said agreeably. “I believe we’re going to have a football team that’s going to play a certain brand of football that I don’t think we’ve played yet. I think there’s much more for our players to give and I think we’re going to get it out of them.

“We’re going to be committed to that style of football, and quite honestly to playing that style of football that can make our fans proud. We understand that. It was a rough season on the fans as well as on our team. They deserve better than that, and I think we’re going to give it to them.”

Next week we’ll begin to crank up our annual draft preview here on newyorkjets.com with position-by-position previews by reporter John Holt and myself, a piece on the Jets quarterbacks on the roster and perhaps available in this draft from the independent personnel analysts at Real Football Services, and blogs from Eric Allen and myself. For now, enjoy the free agency, the NCAA hoops, and the rest of this weekend.

Bengals LB Vontaze Burfict was the chart-topper with his $299,465 bonus in the NFL program that compensates players for playing time based on their salary levels. About $110.72 million will be distributed to players for their performance during last season.

Players have been paid nearly $700 million cumulatively since the inception of the Performance-Based Pay program, which was implemented as part of the NFL’s 2002 CBA with the NFL Players Association. The pool returns this year after not being in effect for the 2010 and ’11 league years.

Under the system, a fund is created and used as a supplemental form of player compensation based on a comparison of playing time to salary. Players become eligible to receive a bonus distribution in any regular season in which they play at least one official down.

Performance-Based Pay is computed by using a “player index.” To produce the index, a player’s regular-season playtime — total plays on offense, defense and special teams — is divided by his adjusted regular-season compensation — full season salary, prorated portion of signing bonus, earned incentives. Each player’s index is then compared to those of the other players on his team to determine the amount of his pay.

Unofficially, Howard participated in 1,073 of the Jets’ 1,074 offensive plays, missing his one play in the 29-26 overtime loss at New England in October. With his special teams work added in, he was in for 1,132 plays, the most by an offensive player on the Jets last season and second-most on the team behind LB David Harris’ 1,196 plays.

New Rules in the Books

The NFL passed six new rules for the coming season, with several worth noting here. The famous or infamous Tuck Rule, depending on your rooting interests, is no more, or at least has been modified so that when a passer loses the ball as he brings it back toward his body, it is now a fumble rather than an incompletion. Reportedly the rule passed, 29-1, with Pittsburgh the only team voting in favor of keeping the old Tuck Rule and New England and Washington abstaining.

Another rule that has drawn attention is the restrictions placed on ballcarriers and defensive players regarding forcible contact with the crown of the helmet. A number of current and former players have voiced some concerns and criticisms of this rule, but Jeff Fisher, Rams head coach and competition committee member, said after a 15-minute conversation with Eddie George, his former power back on the Titans, George changed his mind and said he would be in favor of that.

New Jets RB Mike Goodson also agreed. On his conference call with Jets reporters this afternoon, he said about striking a defender with the crown of the helmet, “I never thought you were supposed to do that anyway, so that probably won’t affect me that much.”

The 32 new picks will supplement the 222 choices in the seven rounds of the draft, which will kick off in primetime for the fourth consecutive year with Round 1 being held beginning Thursday, April 25, at 8 p.m. ET, Rounds 2-3 for the next day at 6:30 p.m., then Rounds 4-7 on Saturday beginning at noon.

The NFL reminds that compensatory free agents are determined by a formula based on salary, playing time and postseason honors. The formula was developed by the NFL Management Council. Not every free agent lost or signed by a club is covered by this formula.

The league also mentioned that two clubs this year, the Giants and the Colts, will each receive a compensatory pick at the end of Round 7 even though they did not suffer a net loss of compensatory free agents last year. Under the formula, the compensatory free agents lost by these clubs were ranked higher than the ones they signed (by a specified point differential based upon salary and performance).

The most important aspect for the Jets regarding this year’s comp list is that their positions in the final four rounds on April 27 have now been firmed up. Here is an unofficial revised list of the Jets’ picks based on the number of compensatories awarded this year from Rounds 3-7:

Round 1 — 9th in round, No. 9 overall

Round 2 — 8th in round, No. 39 overall

Round 3 — 10th in round, No. 72 overall

Round 4 — 9th in round, No. 106 overall

Round 5 — 8th in round, No. 141 overall

Round 6 — 10th in round, No. 178 overall

Round 7 — 9th in round, No. 215 overall

The Jets have made one “snap decision” and one other “big little” transaction today with the re-signing of long-snapper Tanner Purdum and the signing of unrestricted free agent linebacker Antwan Barnes.

Barnes first. The 6’1″, 251-pound outside ‘backer from the Chargers has been reunited with his old D-coordinator, Rex Ryan, and DBs coach, Dennis Thurman, of course. He played the first two of his first three NFL seasons on Rex’s Baltimore defenses in ’07 and ’08. After ’09, he was traded to Philadelphia, released, then signed by San Diego, which used him at OLB behind Shaun Phillips from ’10 through most of last season.

Barnes has a nice 23.5-sack total for only 78 games and five starts, and that was pumped up by his big 11 sacks in ’11, nine of which he hung up in the Chargers’ last 10 games after they game to North Jersey and lost to the Jets in October.

Barnes tweeted on his verified Twitter account several hours ago, “Green and white it is…just want to thank coach rex coach DT and mr idzik for the opportunity…and to the fans I won’t let  down.” A short while later, though, he corrected himself: “Wait a minute…not official yet…in talks now…”

But just a minute ago AB returned to fait accompli mode: “Now its official#jetnation.”

Regarding Purdum, we say small in the paradoxical sense. The deal is not small to Tanner and his family, nor to recently re-signed K Nick Folk and incumbent punter/holder Robert Malone, nor by extension to the point production and field position desires of Ben Kotwica’s special teams, Marty Mornhinweg’s offense, Dennis Thurman’s defense, and HC Rex Ryan’s team.

That’s because Purdum for the past three seasons has been pur-fect, at least as far as looking upside down through his legs and putting the ball fast and true through a small window snap after snap.

He’s played in 55 games as a Jet, including three playoff games in 2010, and has made 488 snaps, 275 on punts and 213 on placements. We won’t say there hasn’t been a snap slightly high, low or wide, but not one of the 488 has skipped to his holder or sailed over his punter’s head.

Even though the NFL’s snapping quality seems about as high as its placekicking quality, snaps do go awry and thus get charged as fumbles to the snapper and rushes for no yards to the player who ends up with the peripatetic pigskin. Purdum’s been charged with no fumbles in his three seasons, and the only times a punter or holder took off with the ball, it was on purpose instead of out of self-preservation.

The last mishandled Jets mis-snap, whether due to snapper or holder, that we can recall was when James Dearth fired a field goal snap to holder Steve Weatherford back in Week 6 of the 2009 season against the Bills.

All of this in no way should imply that Purdum is the lone exception to GM John Idzik’s dictum of “Competition through and through.” At the moment his competition on the roster for the long-snapper’s job is Travis Tripucka, signed as a reserve/future free agent in January.

Tripucka played his high school ball in Mountain Lakes, N.J., 15 minutes up the road from the Atlantic Health Jets Training Center, then was the long-time long-snapper for UMass and a top defenseman for the Minutemen’s lacrosse team. He was signed by the St. Louis Rams to long-snap last year and made it to a late-August cut.

Two things about Tripucka: He’s from the athletic Tripucka family — dad Kelly played hoops for Notre Dame, the Pistons, Jazz and Hornets and was a Knicks color analyst for four seasons. And grandfather Frank was an original AFL quarterback who threw eight touchdown passes in six games for the Broncos against the New York Titans from 1960-62.

The other: Tripucka, like Purdum three years earlier, comes to the Jets after a summer look from one of the NFL’s Missouri teams. Purdum was a cut of the Chiefs back in ’09.

Antwan Barnes Photos

Tanner Purdum Photos

Po‘uha was the Jets’ third-round selection, 88th overall, of the 2005 draft out of Utah. After a slow first four seasons with the team, including the ’06 season that he spent on IR, his career picked up speed in the middle of the Jets’ defensive front.

He started 50 of the Jets’ 54 games from 2009-11 (including the six playoff games) and put up solid numbers each of those seasons (61 tackles in ’09, 46 tackles; two sacks, 12.5 tackles for loss/no gain, three fumble recoveries in ’10; 55 tackles, sack, one forced fumble, two recoveries and a safety in ’11).

Also during this time he became the elder statesman among the D-linemen and a go-to locker room guy with his thoughtful, sometimes even lyrical comments on himself, his fellow linemen, his defense and his team.

A year ago, Po‘uha could have become an unrestricted free agent but was happy to be able to re-sign with the Jets.

“Every player that approaches the last year of their contract and enters the screen door of free agency, there’s always a possibility,” he said at the time of not re-signing with his only NFL team. “But in my mind I always wanted to stay with the Jets, be with the Jets. Me and my agents, they had an understanding that I always wanted to be with the Jets, and I’m just glad it worked out that way.”

However, last season didn’t play out as planned as Bo, 33, bothered by a balky back from the offseason, sat out the preseason and four regular-season games and averaged only 25 defensive snaps in the 12 games he played. He finished with 38 tackles, a four-year low, and no tackles behind the line for the first time since ’07.

The Jets had no comment on whether Po‘uha could return after the initial wave of the NFL’s unrestricted free agent signing period dies down. In general, first-year general manager John Idzik stated his philosophy about cutting and then re-signing players during a conference call with the club’s season ticket holders earlier this month.

“I don’t think we ever shut the door on anything, especially when it comes to your own players,” Idzik said. “You get in free agency and it’s constant change day to day, it’s a little unpredictable, but you just have to let it kind of take its form and let it play out and see what you’re able to do as the pieces start to fall into place, and hopefully you’re able to retain some of your guys. So we go in with that mindset, that we never close the door and we’ll see what happens.”

Restricted Free Agents who received Qualifying Offers from their Prior Clubs and are subject to the First Refusal/Compensation system of the NFL CBA

T Austin Howard, Round 2

TE Jeff Cumberland, right of first refusal

The Round 2 designation for Howard is the pick a new club, if it were to sign Howard to an offer sheet, must send to the Jets, its own choice or a better choice in the round for the April draft. In Cumberland’s case, there is no compensation for a new club that would like to sign him to an offer sheet but the Jets still retain the right to match the offer and retain Cumberland. Offer sheets may be submitted up until Friday, April 19, one second before midnight.

Unrestricted Free Agents with four or more accrued seasons

S Yeremiah Bell

DT Mike DeVito

WR Braylon Edwards

K Nick Folk

RB Shonn Greene

RB Lex Hilliard

TE Dustin Keller

S LaRon Landry

G Brandon Moore

WR Chaz Schilens

G Matt Slauson

LB Bryan Thomas

Players with fewer than four accrued seasons who received no Qualifying Offer or minimum tender from their Prior Clubs

TE Dedrick Epps

LS Tanner Purdum

The fourth category is players who have been designated Franchise Players, but the Jets did not so designate anyone.

The newly signed veteran Jets QB chatted with beat reporters in a conference call this afternoon, and one of the first questions involved those two parts of his anatomy, which in part led to his not playing the previous two seasons.

Brian Costello of the New York Post came in with Question No. 2 regarding Garrard’s training room scene on last year’s Hard Knocks.

“Yeah, that was a tough situation for me,” the personable Garrard said. “I feel like I had come back great from my back. My back is no issue. I was really battling down there, having a lot of fun, being on the field, doing what I do. Then my knee starts creeping up a little bit swelling up. I needed [arthroscopic] surgery.

“But my knee is great now. I’m really excited to get back in the league, playing ball. I’m very thankful the Jets have given me this opportunity.”

Needless to say, the opportunity can head in several different directions. One topic on Jets fans’ minds regarding the signing is the state of his body. Is he starting to break down, as virtually all athletes great and small do at some point? Indeed, in that key Hard Knocks episode, Garrard reported to the Dolphins trainer that turned to watch one of his children swimming in the pool and “felt something crunch in that knee.”

“Didn’t bang it on anything, didn’t fall on it or anything,” Garrard said then. “Maybe it’s father time.”

Today he had no reservations about his health. Perhaps it’s March machismo, but Garrard, who is a good-sized (6’1″, 239) QB, says despite the “nicks and knacks” of the past two years and the celebration of his 35th birthday last month, he’s still got what it takes to maneuver the ball down the field.

If I have to get a first down, I can, I can tell you that much,” he said. “As a quarterback, as you continue to get older, you have to be smarter with your body, smarter getting the ball out. Really the No. 1 thing for me as I continue to grow in this league, I’m realizing if I can get the ball to my back or dump it to the tight end, they can probably get as many yards and maybe more and I take less of a beating. That’s just the way the game is. As a quarterback, they don’t want you to be all broken up, sore, can’t move around in the pocket. I’m definitely smarter with the ball.

“But if I have to get a first down to keep chains moving or get the ball in the end zone, I’m going to do what I have to do.”

Yet the most healthy thing of all, on first listening to Garrard’s first public remarks as a Jet, is his outlook on the Jets’ starting job. He’s clearly for winning it, but first and foremost he’s clearly for his new team’s success.

“I just expect to go out and compete and really try to help this team out in any way possible,” he said. “If the way I play on the field allows that to happen, then I think great. If it doesn’t, I’m going to still be the best teammate I can be and help out this team as much as I can. It’s a team spot. not just me and the other QBs. It’s everybody pulling together, helping this ballclub out as much as possible.”

“All I know is I can compete and I’m going to have fun and make the team better.”

David Garrard Photos

The 35-year-old quarterback (no, not 38 or 37 as some have speculated) was born in East Orange, N.J., about 20 minutes from the Jersey Meadowlands in February 1978, which was about 6½ years before the Jets even moved there.

Now after his upbringing in Plainfield, N.J., and Durham, N.C., his college ball at East Carolina, and his nine-year playing career with the Jacksonville Jaguars, plus a small stop last offseason with the Miami Dolphins, Garrard has signed on with the Jets to provide competition for Mark Sanchez and the rest of the Green & White QBs.

“I definitely think it’s the ideal situation,” Garrard told SiriusXM NFL Radio last week about the Jets after his visit. “It was a great workout. Every drill they had me do, I did great in. I felt like my old self again.

Word of Garrard’s possible signing grew cold publicly for a while, because it was reported the Jets had to do some cap work if they wanted to bring him to their roster. Whatever had to happen has been done because the team announced the signing late this afternoon.

New offensive coordinator Marty Mornhinweg had his first conference call with Jets reporters today at 1 p.m. ET and was not asked about Garrard. But about competition in general for Sanchez, et al, MM said that while “Mark will probably have a little bit of a leg up, it would appear,” he also said, “We like competition at all spots, and certainly at that spot. Competition just makes everybody better.”

When Garrard was at the peak of his game, he was nicely competitive for the Jaguars. From 2005, when he finally started to get playing time, through 2010, he assembled a portfolio that sported a 38-35 record as a starter, 62.1% completion accuracy, and a decent 22.0% touchdown drive rate (the NFL average is about 18.5%).

Garrard faced the Jets exactly once since being drafted in the fourth round of the 2002 draft by the Jaguars out of East Carolina as the eventual successor to, yes, Mark Brunell. That meeting was at the old Meadowlands on Nov. 15, 2009, and it was a microcosm of his only Pro Bowl season that year. On a cloudy, cool fall day, he completed 16 of 26 passes for 221 yards, one touchdown and no interceptions. He also ran for an 11-yard score.

And after the Jets, led by then-rookie Sanchez, had come back from a 21-10 first-half deficit for a 22-21 lead on a Thomas Jones power TD with 5:04 to play, Garrard led the Jags on an 11-play, 80-yard drive with 4-for-6 passing — including that crushing 33-yard catch-and-run by TE Marcedes Lewis — and Maurice Jones-Drew’s clutch kneeldown at the Jets 1 with a minute to play, setting up Josh Scobee’s game-winning chip-shot field goal as time expired.

Even though Garrard’s ’09 season was one of his better showings, it wasn’t his best. He took the Jags to a 9-3 record and a playoff road win at Pittsburgh on the strength of such skills as his 64.0% completion percentage and 18 TD passes to just three interceptions.

That 6.0 TDs/INTs rate, by the way, is the fifth-best season in NFL history among qualifying QBs, trailing only Kansas City’s Damon Huard (11.00, 11/1 in 2006), New England’s Tom Brady (9.00, 36-4 in 2010 after 6.25, 50/8 in 2007) and Green Bay’s Aaron Rodgers (7.50, 45/6 in 2011).

Many Jets fans are skeptical as to how much competition a QB out of the NFL for the past two seasons could give a fifth-year incumbent and several more signalcallers this offseason and summer. But just keep in mind that he had that strong  tryout with the Jets recently, and some say he was poised to begin last season as the Dolphins’ starter — that is, until he injured his knee, missed the entire preseason schedule and was released as the ‘Fins began the Ryan Tannehill era quicker than maybe they had planned.

All of this is tank-half-full/tank-half-empty talk, of course. Is DG the catalyst to getting the Jets offense back on its feet? Or will he be one-and-done, whatever “one” is defined as? Will No. 9 beat out No. 6 in the coming offseason/preseason competition, or will Sanchez be spurred on to new professional growth? What about Tim Tebow, Greg McElroy, and whoever may arrive in the draft?

We’ll learn a little more Tuesday, when Garrard is scheduled to talk with reporters on a conference call, and then as the veterans return to the offseason conditioning program, OTAs and the veteran minicamp from mid-April to mid-June.

For now, though, assuming Garrard’s health and competitive juices and considering what we know of the Jets’ situation, it looks like a good fit as an able body has been added to help with the ongoing construction project.

Each man — Marty Mornhinweg for the offense, Dennis Thurman for the defense, Ben Kotwica for the special teams — presents a different personality on air and in the building as they continue to work with their staffs while the players are still five weeks away from reporting back to the complex for the offseason strength and conditioning program.

Marty brings a light touch to his teaching, plus a modesty about his résumé that sounds as if it goes all the way back to his own background as a signalcaller.

“I’ll tell you what, I’ve been really fortunate, that’s first. I’ve coached some of the greatest quarterbacks ever to play this game,” he said. “Brett Favre was a great, great player. Of course, Steve Young in San Francisco, a first-ballot Hall of Famer. And then Donovan, that was one reason that Philadelphia at the time was so enticing, because Donovan McNabb was there. What a great quarterback he was. And Michael Vick in 2011 had just an astronomical year.”

Mornhinweg likes to refer mugs of joe when he’s talking about short-lived events. Even though he was with the Eagles for the last decade, he was aware of Favre’s “cup of coffee” with the Jets in ’08. And he described his own time playing for the legendary Mouse Davis in the Arena League as “half a cup of coffee.”

MM’s the only coordinator completely new to Rex Ryan’s staff. DT has been here with Ryan since ’09 and for six seasons coaching alongside Rex on the Ravens. He’s the kind of guy who has that football edge to him, like let’s stop screwing around and do it the right way, yet he also has that bit of playfulness to his persona.

“I’m outgoing, upbeat, love to have fun. But I also know the fun that comes with winning,” Thurman said, adding about his step up from the DBs room to running the entire defense: “I can’t change who I am. It’s just a matter of instead of having 11 or 12 guys, I’m now responsible for probably 30 guys. But it’s no different. Everybody has to do their job, they have to know their job, they have to understand their job, and then they have to go out and perform their job.”

Kotwica’s been with the Jets the longest of the trio, since Eric Mangini brought him out of the Army and on to the specialists under Mike Westhoff. He’s armed with the Westhoff experience plus his own straightforward sense of being able to command a football unit because of his military service as a decorated combat attack helicopter commander and training officer.

“I don’t go too far with the football-is-war approach, but there are parallels and carryovers. Even in the military, you are a coach,” the new Coach K said. “Mike and I are different guys, but first and foremost he was a great mentor to me, not only tactically with X’s and O’s but strategically. And he’s a great friend. I’m very grateful for what he’s taught me.”

It’s no surprise that each coordinator will bring a different approach and style to his unit, different from each other and different from the men they’ve succeeded. But all three will have one very similar guiding principle. They’re all involved in framing a new house on the existing foundation, and they all expressed enthusiasm for the hard work ahead.

“I love challenges,” Mornhinweg said. “This is a great challenge. That’s why I love doing what I do because I get to work with some of the great athletes in the world, really.”

“Leadership is something you either have or you don’t,” said Thurman. “I don’t think you can cultivate it or manufacture it. So we’ll let it play itself out. Yeah, we lost some veteran players, some experience, but some of the guys are going to have to step up and play. And they can be leaders in their own right.”

“Special teams isn’t a solo job. It’s a team effort, and we’re looking forward to it,” Kotwica said. “Things are going to be OK in 2013.”

Enjoy EA’s conversations with the threesome on Jets Talk Live in a few hours.

Bradway’s a go-to guy on this subject. He’s been the Jets’ senior personnel executive since ’06 but from ’01-05 he was the Jets GM.

Needless to say, he wasn’t going to compare Idzik with Mike Tannenbaum, with whom he had a close relationship in the Jets’ front office for the previous dozen years. But John has brought his own past, procedures and personality with him from Seattle and Bradway has been impressed with the way the I-Era of Jets football has begun.

“Throughout his career he’s always been able to go out to a certain degree and cover players,” Bradway said, “and he’s been very involved in both free agency and the draft any place he’s been. He’s really is a good football guy.”

Idzik is also a people person, which obviously has come out early, from the team’s February personnel meetings through the combine. He’s formed opinions on many of the players who participated in the Indianapolis workouts, but he wasn’t going to dominate the discussions with the Jets scouts.

“John was very respectful of the scouts in terms of their presentations,” Bradway said. “He’s a great listener and I think he’s going to be able to generate great discussions and opinions as we come up with what we feel will be the final grades and evaluations on these players as we go into the draft.”

A small enhancement to the evaluations was an expansion of Bradway’s personal “+/N/–” combine grading system he’s used over the years. He puts a quick grade on each participant in each drill he watches each year — either a plus, “looked good,” an N, “looked average,” or a minus, “didn’t look good.”

This year he was joined in his grading by Idzik and new director of college scouting Jeff Bauer.

“This was the first time we’ve done it as a group,” he said. “It’s subjective, but it’s the eyeball test. It’s not the numbers — ‘Oh, he vertical-jumped 39′ — but it’s here’s how the guy moved, here’s how he did his position drills.”

If you haven’t seen EA’s interview with Bradway yet, the first half of the session was archived on NewYorkJets.com last night, and the second half should be available on the site this afternoon.

They also present us with a bunch of big mockers, and what I thought was interesting with this week’s set of six mock drafts is that five different players are tabbed as preferred choices for the Jets at the No. 9 spot in Round 1. Here is a summary of their early views on whom the Green & White’s should take.

LSU OLB Barkevious Mingo is the one player who got two votes this week, from Pat Kirwan — one of my favorite NFL talk-show hosts, holding forth with Tim Ryan on Sirius XM NFL Radio most afternoons — and Dane Brugler.

“The Jets don’t have any outside linebackers for their pass rush,” Kirwan states. “Mingo has a solid 40 time of 4.58.”

“The Jets have struggled to put pressure on the opponents’ backfield,” Brugler offers, “and Mingo is one of the most athletic defenders in this draft with undeniable upside.”

But Mingo is far from a majority candidate at this early stage. Clark Judge, whom I still give kudos to for his remarkable first-round mock two years ago, logically tabs Texas S Kenny Vaccaro for the deep middle, writing that “The Jets could go almost anywhere with this pick, but with both their safeties unsigned I’d start here.”

CBSSports veteran football writer Pete Prisco is in agreement not with Mingo, whom he sees going much higher, to Jacksonville at No. 2, but with the position he sees the Jets zeroing in on as he projects BYU OLB Ezekiel Ansah to them: “They can stand him up and finally have a dominant edge rusher.”

Rob Rang chimes in with a pick that he admits will take some getting used to for many Jets fans: USC QB Matt Barkley: “While it might seem unrealistic that head coach Rex Ryan would gamble on a Southern Cal passer as a potential replacement for [Mark] Sanchez, don’t be so sure. Clearly this is a team in need of better play at the position immediately and Barkley is the most pro-ready of this class. Furthermore, new general manager John Idzik might have a greater appreciation for Barkley, considering his time working with Barkley’s former head coach, Pete Carroll, in Seattle.”

Finally, Will Brinson checks in with a selection that is the same as former Jets GM Mike Tannenbaum made in one of his first appearances on the NFL Network set last week: Tennessee WR Cordarrelle Patterson, who Brinson says “is raw and doesn’t have a ton of experience playing at a high level, but his athleticism is pretty jaw-dropping.”

We’ll have our own draft coverage in the two months ahead here on NewYorkJets.com, both in written form from John Holt and myself plus others and in video from my partner Eric Allen and our all-over-it multimedia department. Let us know what you think of these picks and any others, as you’ve been doing, and stop by our home page to cast a vote in our “QBs in the Draft” poll.

In theory the NFL Combine is a place to talk with, talk about, time, measure and analyze the draft-eligible college players heading into the draft two months down the road.

In reality, John Idzik and Rex Ryan held an impromptu Darrelle Revis news conference when they spoke with reporters at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis this afternoon.

The new general manager and the fifth-year head coach had the same bumper sticker for the media, fans and the NFL: WE ♥ REVIS ISLAND.

“Darrelle Revis is obviously a great football player, a great New York Jet and a tremendous asset to our team,” said Idzik at the podium shortly after 4 p.m. ET. “I don’t know that anything has really changed. We’ve always wanted Darrelle as part of our team. That has not changed.”

Idzik declined several times to respond to questions about Revis rumors, contract matters or trade terms. But, he stressed, “In respect to Darrelle, our focus is to aid him any way we can in his rehabilitation so he can return to the player we all know he is.”

Ryan followed Idzik to the microphone — each talked for about 16 minutes — and recounted a phone conversation he had with Revis, who’s rehabbing the knee injury that ended his season in Game 3 at Miami, about trade rumors that surfaced the day before Idzik held his introductory news conference at the Atlantic Health Jets Training Center.

“I told him it’s not accurate,” Ryan said. “If he’s going to be involved in a trade, I think he and his agents would know about it, as would the GM and myself. There’s no validity to it. I don’t know where that gets drummed up. … I provided him the answer that I know to be true, which is that was not accurate.”

It was certainly likely that the game of Twit-for-Tat between Revis and Seahawks CB Richard Sherman the past day or so would be posed in the form of a question to Ryan. Rex declined to get into the middle of that Twitter war while still strongly supporting his former All-Pro corner.

“I will say this: Obviously the guy [Sherman]‘s a heck of a football player. I don’t know him well enough to compare him to Darrelle Revis,” Ryan said. “But if you’re putting yourself in that company, that’s the company you want to be in, that’s for sure.”

The two-fer news conferences were about more than Revis. Both Jets officials were asked about their quarterbacks, specifically Mark Sanchez and Tim Tebow.

Idzik had a new turn of phrase to describe the way the teamwide 2013 depth chart will shake out.

“I don’t think you isolate it to any one or a few positions. We’re going to have a general mantra here with the New York Jets and it’s going to be ‘Competition Through and Through,’ ” he said. “That’s going to be true this year as we enter free agency, it’s going to be true as we go into the draft, it’s going to be true as we come out of the draft, it’s going to be true as we go into training camp and into the regular season. And if we have success and we win a championship, it’ll be true after we win a championship.

“I think everyone, Mark included, recognizes that he, our offense — shoot, our team as a whole — has to perform better than we did in 2012. And we’re going to do that. We’re going to do everything to increase the competition so that he plays better. We’ve got a new offensive coordinator, we have a new quarterback coach, we have staff changes that I think will be healthy for Mark and so that we can again get the juices flowing and turn the page into 2013, not look back to 2012, start anew and get rolling.”

“We’re bringing in competition at every position, not just the quarterback position,” Ryan said. “That’s what we want to do here. To say Mark Sanchez, this quarterback, that quarterback — clearly there’s going to be competition at that position.”

Tebow’s situation arose only late during Ryan’s time at the mike.

“Tim’s under contract to be a New York Jet,” the head coach said, “and we’ll see how things go in the offseason.”

We’re expediting the processing of transcripts of both Idzik’s and Ryan’s remarks today and they’ll be up on newyorkjets.com shortly.

Draft Order Update

The NFL has released its tentative round-by-round order for the 2013 draft. The order is tentative because it doesn’t include compensatory picks, which will be awarded at the bottom of Rounds 3-7 and announced next month. So the Jets’ first three picks are fixed and the positions of Rounds 4-7 will change depend on how many compensatories are inserted at the end of each prior round. Here are the Jets’ picks at the moment:

Round 1 — 9th in the round, 9th overall

Round 2 — 8th in the round, 39th overall

Round 3 — 10th in the round, 72nd overall

Round 4 — 9th in the round (103rd-plus overall)

Round 5 — 8th in the round (134th-plus overall)

Round 6 — 10th in the round (168th-plus overall)

Round 7 — 9th in the round (199th-plus overall)