Jets News3/29

hydro51 · Mar 29, 2006

MANGINI MEETING ALL EXPECTATIONS
http://www.nypost.com/sports/jets/63764.htm

By MARK CANNIZZARO
ERIC MANGINI ERIC MANGINI

March 29, 2006 -- LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. - The question required only a moment of thought before Eric Mangini delivered the answer.

"Has there been a moment on the job so far where you've felt overwhelmed?" the Jets' 35-year-old rookie coach was asked.

"Flying down here and trying to get the newborn and the 2-year-old onto the plane - dual meltdown," Mangini said yesterday during the NFL owners meetings' annual coaches breakfast at the Hyatt Grand Cypress.

"That," Mangini said, "was tough. You can't reason with them. You can't make them run. You can't fine them. You can't cut them. We're prepping for the ride home [Friday]. We're going with a new approach. [My wife Julie] is going on with the newborn [Luke] first and then I'll go on as late as possible with [Jake]. We'll have the DVD player teed up and ready to go."

Surely, Mangini's football life will become more complicated. He's already gutted the roster, gotten the team under the salary cap and, on Monday, addressed the team en mass for the first time.

Mangini has gotten a good dose of advice from many of his peers, beginning with Browns coach Romeo Crennel, Dallas' Bill Parcells and others, including Bill Belichick, with whom he worked most recently in New England.

"The one thing I've heard from everybody is that every day you'll come into the office and there'll be five things you didn't expect," Mangini said. "For me, I'd say it's been five with the arrow pointing up."

Interestingly, one of the mentors whom Mangini has walked cautiously around is Belichick, who was conspicuous by his absence yesterday.

"Our relationship has moved directly toward personal," Mangini said. "Business is business. Now it's more, 'how's the family and kids?' instead of, 'How are we going to set the edge with the running game?' "

Crennel, a close friend of Mangini's and in his second year as an NFL coach, said, "There's no handbook for being the head coach. Things come across your desk that you don't expect to come across your desk, and you have to find an answer for. You cannot make up answers. Eric is going to have to go through some of that."

Herman Edwards, now Chiefs coach after five years with the Jets, has some first-hand experience dealing with what Mangini is facing.

"The biggest challenge for him is to stick to his plan," Edwards said. "And from what I know of Eric - I've spoken to him numerous occasions - he's a strong-willed guy and he's going to need that because he'll be tested. Everything you do is under a microscope.

"The attention you receive when you're in New York is bigger than it is anywhere else. And there's no middle ground. It's generally real good or it's real bad. But you have to know what it really is. You can't let the perception become the reality.

"I think he's going to be good," Edwards said. "I think he's the right guy for the job."

Now, if he can only get those kids on the plane Friday.

*

While remaining noncommittal on the QB situation, Mangini sounded encouraged by Chad Pennington's rehab, saying, "Chad works as hard as anyone I've ever seen. He's just wired that way. Chad is very comfortable with where he is in rehab and with his chances to start, and that's great."

Mangini said his plan right now is to play Pete Kendall at guard. Asked who'll play center, Mangini said with a smile, "We'll work that out."

Mangini sounded very much in Curtis Martin's court when he said, "I've faced Curtis too many times to underestimate him. When you underestimate the guy, he kills you." mark.cannizzaro@nypost.com
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hydro51 · Mar 29, 2006

Upbeat guy
Mangini optimistic about Chad, Martin and draft possibilities
http://www.newsday.com/sports/footb...79964mar29,0,5089001.story?coll=ny-jets-print

March 29, 2006

LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. - If Eric Mangini thought his life was a whirlwind since becoming Jets coach in January, nothing measures up to what happened Friday night on his way to the NFL owners' meetings.

"Probably the toughest moment of all this was trying to get my 2-year-old and my newborn [son] on the plane," Mangini said yesterday at a coaches' breakfast. "It was dual meltdowns. That was tough, legitimately tough. It was a complete disaster. That's when I'm thinking, 'OK, this is tough. This is legitimately hard.'"

PC Richard & Sons
When he and his wife, Julie, couldn't console 1-month-old Luke, Mangini was beside himself. "You can't reason with him, you can't make him run, you can't fine him, you can't cut him," he said.

It's easier to be at the office, where Mangini has managed the difficult task of overhauling the roster and preparing for next month's draft. Here's what he's thinking on a number of fronts:

Chad Pennington: The Jets quarterback continues to rehab from shoulder surgery, although his long-term prognosis remains somewhat guarded. Pennington has resumed throwing, but Mangini wasn't certain when he'd be back to full strength.

"He's doing exactly what's expected of him. There's really no timetable set. Wherever he's going to be, I couldn't tell you. In terms of his program, he's on target, and that's encouraging. His progress has been positive. The fact that he does have more time [than after last year's surgery] is a benefit to us.

"I've only known him a small amount of time, but he works as hard as anybody that I've seen. He's just wired that way. He's working at this rehab as hard as he works at the game plan, and that's what's going to give him a chance to be successful."

The draft: The Jets have the fourth overall choice, but could be in position to move up to select one of the top quarterbacks - Matt Leinart of USC, Vince Young of Texas or Jay Cutler of Vanderbilt. Mangini would not say if the Jets would take a quarterback with their top pick.

"They're all great players, but I want to make sure we're getting a great person, too. This whole block of time will be used to sort that out with the scouts, spending time individually, getting to know them. It will all sort itself out the more we learn about them."

On Young's low Wonderlic scores: He scored 7 out of 50 the first time he took the intelligence test (initially thought to be 6, but incorrectly scored by the test-giver), and got 16 on a re-test.

"I've been around players that have had low Wonderlic scores that have been some of the smartest players I've ever coached," Mangini said, "and that's always the difficulty with looking at that score and defining a player with that score."

On how much Curtis Martin has left: "He understands that it's about competition. He's never shied away from that. That's what makes him so special. Don't underestimate him. Whenever you underestimate him, he kills you. I think Curtis is going to be as competitive as he always has been."

On being the NFL's youngest coach at 35: "It's always been like that. When I was with the Jets the first time [as defensive backs coach], it was me, Bill [Belichick], Romeo [Crennel] and Al [Groh]. I was pretty young compared to those guys."

On what he looks for in players: "It's all the intangibles: smart, hard-working, tough, competitive, selfless, and football is important to them. If [a scout] brings them to me, they'd better have those qualities. Your name is associated with the player you bring to me. If they don't have it, there's going to be a problem."
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hydro51 · Mar 29, 2006

Mangini tested bit prematurely

http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/football/jets/story/403829p-342046c.html

LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. - Eric Mangini's clock management on the field must be better than his clock management off it or the Jets are in trouble.

Mangini, the Jets' rookie coach, missed the birth of his son, Luke, on Feb. 26 when he couldn't make it from the scouting combine in Indianapolis to the delivery room at Long Island Jewish Hospital before his wife, Julie, delivered their second son. It was not his fault. She was three weeks early.

"Julie felt a little pain the night before," Mangini said yesterday. "She is tough and just thought it was false labor."

However, she didn't tell Mangini about the pain when they spoke on the phone that night. "She didn't want to bother me," he said. "She knew we were interviewing players and that it was an extremely important part of the process."

Julie called her husband at 8:30 the next morning. She was in labor and on the way to the hospital. Woody Johnson offered his plane to get Mangini home, but Johnson's plane was not in Indy, and the next commercial flight at 11:15 would get him home sooner than waiting for Air Woody would have.

Mangini was out of timeouts. He didn't have any instant-replay challenges. He was trying to beat the clock. Clock management was not the strength of Herm Edwards, the coach he replaced.

"I thought maybe the labor would go long enough so I could get there," he said.

Luke was born at 9:30 with Mangini not even ready to board the flight. He went home and missed the end of the combine. He wishes he could have been there to welcome his son into the world.

"It was really disappointing," Mangini said. "I didn't think he was going to come that early."

Bad clock management? "That's an unfair parallel," he said laughing. "I didn't know the game was on until it was too late."

Luke has the same birthday as his older brother Jake, who is two and was born five weeks early. The Mangini family was together at the league meetings this week after a tumultuous flight to Florida. Seems neither of his sons was happy during the boarding process.

"There were dual meltdowns," he said. "It was a complete disaster."

Up in the air

Mangini offered no insight whether the Jets will take a QB with the fourth overall pick or move up to get one. He did say the Jets will meet with USC's Matt Leinart, Texas' Vince Young and Vanderbilt's Jay Cutler. He offered these opinions on:

# Cutler: "What makes him interesting is he's at a program that hasn't had a lot of success and then he's able to create a level of success that they haven't seen. It's always intriguing: Why was he able to do it? What qualities did he have?"

# Leinart playing with better talent around him than Cutler: "He may be hurt by the same things that helped Cutler. People may look at him and say: Would he have been as successful at Vanderbilt? And would Cutler have been more successful at USC?"

# Young's poor Wonderlic score: "I've been around players that have had low Wonderlic scores that have been some of the smartest players I ever coached. . . . If you get to know them, you're thinking: 'How could he possibly grade out at this? He's so much smarter than his score indicates.' Then you have dumb smart guys. They've got great scores but they can't figure it out. They would do great if they had to write a paper before each game. As smart as they are and as good as they are in the classroom, they can't put it into action."

No Tuna

Bill Parcells is a no-show again at the league meetings. Last week, the NFL announced all 32 coaches would be present. Parcells, about 90 minutes away at his home in Jupiter, Fla., decided not to make the trip. Well, gas prices are up. More likely, he didn't want to subject himself to Terrell Owens questions. Several people indicated this week that Parcells was not on the same page as Jerry Jones about signing Owens. Parcells didn't fight it, but this was not something he wanted to do, sources say. As far as how much longer Parcells plans to coach, this very well could be his final season, which is why he probably consented to dealing with T.O. . . . The most relaxed person at the meetings: Paul Tagliabue. He has a constant smile on his face. Just a couple of weeks ago, as the labor negotiations dragged on, he looked tired and was cranky. He might get that way again if the owners don't pick his successor in a reasonable amount.

Originally published on March 29, 2006
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hydro51 · Mar 29, 2006

Jets Coach Shifts Focus From Age to the Team
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/29/sports/football/29nfl.html

By JUDY BATTISTA
Published: March 29, 2006
LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla., March 28 — Perhaps it was appropriate that Eric Mangini's table was in the back corner of a meeting room, as if it was the National Football League equivalent of the kiddie table at a family holiday party.

Mangini is the 35-year-old coach of the Jets. His cherubic face and his does-this-guy-even-need-to-shave appearance have done nothing to dispel the wonder at the league's annual meetings about the Jets' youth movement. When Commissioner Paul Tagliabue mentioned in his address to owners that there were coaches who were not born when he started working in the N.F.L. 37 years ago, Woody Johnson, the Jets' owner, realized Mangini was such a coach.

When a reporter asked Mangini at a news conference Tuesday if Texas quarterback Vince Young reminded him of a young Randall Cunningham, Mangini said that he didn't remember a young Randall Cunningham.

For those inside the coaching fraternity, though, Mangini is merely the latest Jon Gruden, once the youngest coach in the league. They have welcomed him by extending a warning. "A lot of guys have said over and over again that every day you'll come into the office and there will be five things you didn't expect to have to deal with," Mangini said.

For Mangini, that might be a conservative estimate. He has made few public statements since his hiring in January, but he spoke to the Jets as a team for the first time last Monday, when players assembled for the off-season conditioning program. If Mangini is concerned about whether his players will accept a coach who is barely older than they are, he doesn't show it.

There are plenty of other worries. The Jets have no starting quarterback, an aging running back who is recovering from knee surgery, a depleted offensive line and a hole at pass rusher where John Abraham once lined up. Mangini has already spent a few nights sleeping on his office sofa. With the draft — and the Jets' fourth overall pick — on the horizon, the youthful countenance may soon be marred by dark circles.

Still, a dose of perspective came last Friday. "The only thing that's been tough was when we were flying down here," Mangini said. "The toughest moment of all this, we were trying to get our 2-year-old and our newborn down here and there were dual meltdowns. It was a complete disaster. At that point, I was thinking, 'This is legitimately hard.' You can't make them run, you can't fine them, you can't cut them."

Members of the league dismiss the importance of age in coaching success. When Mangini was a 23-year-old coach in Australia, nearly everyone on the team was older and he had a 44-year old player nicknamed the Fossil. That worked out just fine. When Mangini was a Jets defensive assistant under Bill Parcells, he was the youngest member of a staff that included Bill Belichick, Romeo Crennel and Al Groh. When he was the secondary coach in New England, he had an older group of players, including Ty Law and Lawyer Milloy.

Still, experience counts. Just a year ago, Mangini was preparing to be a first-time defensive coordinator. The most ready comparison is to Gruden, who was 34 when he was named the Oakland Raiders' coach in 1998, the same age Mangini was when he became the Jets' coach. But Gruden, who won a Super Bowl as Tampa Bay's coach, received the Oakland job after three years as the Eagles' offensive coordinator.

"I think it's the person," said Tampa Bay General Manager Bruce Allen, who worked in Oakland with Gruden. "Jon was always comfortable. Joe Gibbs was a young coach once and now he's an old coach and it doesn't matter. Jon took over a very veteran team in Oakland and they responded to him immediately."

When the Jets interviewed Mangini, the team president Jay Cross said the front office was impressed with his intellect and lack of clichéd answers. Mangini leaned heavily on what he learned from Belichick, a coach lauded for his intellectual approach to building a team.

Mangini wants the same type of players who helped him and the Patriots win: smart, selfless, versatile and tough. Mangini told Jets scouts that if they bring him players who do not fit that description, there will be a problem. And he is committed to sticking with his program, the same way Belichick did in New England even though he started with a 5-11 record.

"It was consistent," Mangini said. "People were trying to get us to move off the program. If we had ever swayed, who knows what would have happened? That's the program we're going to stick with. I've seen it work. I've experienced it. That's what I believe in."

That sounds wise beyond his years.

"It's an interesting thing to talk about," Mangini says of his age. "A lot of coaches don't get jobs because they're too old. I don't know what the right age is to be a head coach."
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jilozzo · Mar 29, 2006

well, EM pretty much told everyone that the jets are drafting a center come next month.....

i wonder who???

mangold is slotted at #29 so do NOT look for that pick to be dealt at all.

jil

vilmatic · Mar 29, 2006

Finally, some real info in the papers. Nice work, Hydro. Unfortunately, his description of what he's looking for could easily be applied to any of the top ten picks.

ThunderbirdJet · Mar 29, 2006

Glad to hear Kendall will play guard.... he was an awful center.

MDBigDog · Mar 29, 2006

ThunderbirdJet said:

Glad to hear Kendall will play guard.... he was an awful center.
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Amen. Having him back at guard helps our line. Plus it reminds the FO that we really need a new Center, especially now that Mawae is gone. Though this Katnick guy sounds intriquing but I'll let the guys who get paid to run the team figure that out.

PinPointPenning10 · Mar 29, 2006

Mangini didn't sound like he liked Leinart too much......smokescreen?

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