06/08 — Eric Mangini had words of praise for Shaun Ellis, Kerry Rhodes and Jonathan Vilma at this morning's news conference before the OTA practice, and it wasn't just for general excellence in the weightroom but specifically for their leadership on the field during the workouts.

Specifically, the coach remains impressed with Ellis, who's becoming more of a professional DE all the time.

"I think Shaun's just continuing to improve in each area. Looking at the off-season as a whole, weightlifting, conditioning work, in the classroom, on the field, his body of work has been very good," Mangini said. "He's a really good player, pound-for-pound one of the strongest guys on the team. He has a lot of experience and a lot of experience in the system. He's valuable for a lot of reasons."

Mangini was asked again about WR Justin McCareins and revealed that McCareins received one of the coach's awards this week, for his work during last week's four OTA periods.

Rich Cimini of the Daily News brought up an interesting point about the helmets the Jets are wearing during practices — they're wearing all-white hats (except for two stripes from front to back) with no Jets or NY logos on the side.

"I haven't really decided what I'm going to do with that yet," Mangini said. "I just thought with this many players we could do it one way or another. We're doing it without decals now. I haven't really envisioned or finalized it."

A Cleveland Browns look except white instead of orange? At least for now.

Following up on Thursday's word that Vilma was attending his sister's graduation from Harvard, Mangini revealed today that Mike Nugent would be graduating himself, on Sunday from Ohio State with his degree in logistics management.

More reports today, plus planned stories on CB David Barrett, WR Chansi Stuckey and rookie free agent LB Jason Trusnik.