11/06 — Conditioning is one of those things that every NFL coach wants, every NFL player knows he needs, and yet some coaches and players may stress it just a little more than others.

The Jets seem to be in that "stress it more" group.

"We're really emphasizing conditioning," head coach Eric Mangini said at today's news conference. "Everybody comes out of camp in really good shape. Then when you go to three days a week, it's easy to lose some of what you've built up in camp. We stress that all the time."

The coach mentioned the Jets' daily work on two-minute drills, something that one of his mentors, Ted Marchibroda, taught him, is a big part of his conditioning program. A few players had some other thoughts on the emphasis on staying in shape through a 17-week regular season.

"If the offense is working on their schemes and you're not participating in anything, you take the chance and run the field," said NT Sione Pouha, who had an active game behind Kris Jenkins with a batted-down pass and a tackle for loss at Buffalo. "You run to the ball. You just look for different ways."

"I think Coach has taken it to another level, and the guys have as well," said WR Brad Smith. "The leadership on the team gets guys together after practice to do extra sprints. Starters hop in there to do scout team reps. I think that's where the guys have taken it."

And the "11 hats to the ball" mantra that Mangini mentioned last week is another way to work on conditioning. If you're across the field and you run to the ball, you're at least getting in some running.

"It's habit-forming," Pouha said. "You run to the ball, you find the ball. You never know what's going to happen. The receiver bats the ball and it goes in the air. The DB comes up and makes a tackle. It's all about hustle, and that comes down to conditioning. We know you can do it in the first quarter. What about the fourth quarter?"

This is not to say anything about the Bills, who are also known for their conditioning. But the Jets' physical stamina was on display at Buffalo. It had to be for the defense to be on the field for 15:08 of clock time on two separate drives and not give up any points.

"It was good for us," Kerry Rhodes said after the game, "but I was tired."

And then it showed up again in the offense's drive of 8:41 to Jay Feely's pivotal final field goal. That's when the Jets did their best running of the game — eight carries for 48 yards — and converted three third downs.

"The ability of the offense to effectively run the ball last game and in other situations late in the game," said Mangini, "that's always a key."

Pouha had a ready metaphor for the shape the Jets are in for their last eight games.

"Conditioning is the engine of the game on Sunday — think about it," he said. "The more well-tuned your engine, the more you're able to function, the more you're able to think. Once conditioning fails, you start to lose focus, all the extra edge things start to work against you."

"You can't get around it," said Smith. "If you're in better shape than your opponent, you have a better chance to win."

And as long-snapper James Dearth summed up: "I think we're a team that's in very good shape."

"Nuge" Watch

Mangini said "I think there's a possibility" that Mike Nugent could kick Sunday vs. St. Louis, but he wasn't committing to the Nuge's return.

"Mike's been kicking for a couple of weeks now to different degrees," the coach said. "He did some kicking yesterday, kickoffs and field goals, but there's a big difference just going through the process of kicking and getting the right speed you need for field goals. We have to see if he can go through that full range of motion and with power."

Jets-Rams: One "Hall" of a Game

The Jets and Rams will be playing a "Throwback Game" on Sunday.

Don't worry, the Jets are not wearing their Titans uniforms for this one. But the game is being billed as the Pro Football Hall of Fame's "Throwback Game of the Week." Each week during the season, profootballhof.com reflects on one of the weekend’s matchups and the Hall's archives staff combs through the millions of documents, artifacts and photos in its collection to help tell the story of that game and series.

You can find the Jets-Rams file here on the Hall of Fame's site.