02/01 — It's called Radio Row. It was created by the NFL in the Nineties when sports talk radio mushroomed in every major league city around the country and all those shows needed space at the Super Bowl venue. So their tables and equipment and banners were placed in a row in some long, narrow area of the media center at each Super Bowl venue.

In Phoenix for SBXLII, Radio Row has become Radio Square, and right in the middle of it all is NFL Network, not a radio concern but the league's own TV outfit. And the scene got a little louder and wilder Friday as all the shows were wrapping up their week of broadcasting before Sunday's Giants-Patriots game and players of all stripes were coming and going from the quadrangle.

It was into this maelstrom that I thought I had lost three Jets offensive players who came in for the big day. First I saw Jerricho Cotchery making his way down the long escalators of the Phoenix Convention Center to the media center. Already inside near the WFAN setup was Leon Washington. And D'Brickashaw Ferguson was on his way.

Cotchery and Washington were elusive as always in quickly entering the scrum and being lost to my sight. And I was having trouble seeing if Brick was around and had started making his rounds. But I found Ferguson over by The Sporting News table, just off the top right corner of the NFL Network fencing, and in short order Leon and J-Co came back into view. Here's a report on all three Jets two days before this year's Big Dance.

Washington: 'Kind of a Sick Feeling'

Leon, the Jets' team MVP, was beaming after finishing up an interview with a station from his home state of Florida. He also went to Miami and SB XLI last year. Despite the happy demeanor, his first words expressed some mental distress at what's missing from this game.

"When you get down here, it's kind of a sick feeling because you'd rather actually be in the game," the running back/kick returner said. "I told Jerricho earlier that it would be really nice if we could actually be in this game. That's my intention as a professional with the New York Jets, to work hard toward that goal to get to the Super Bowl.

"It's not an option. As an NFL player, you dream of watching guys like Joe Montana and Jerry Rice, Edgar Bennett and LeRoy Butler with the Green Bay Packers, and before I got to the league, for me, watching the Patriots for a little bit. That's your goal. You don't want to be the guy that's coming in and enjoying the festivities. You want to be the guy playing in it."

If you wonder about Bennett and Butler in Leon's dreams, that's because those two, along with a slew of other NFL names, come from Washington's home town of Jacksonville. And he knows his history.

"Bob Hayes, he was from my side of town, the east side of Jacksonville. He's the first guy to win a gold medal in the Olympics and a Super Bowl," he said. "Shawn Jefferson, LeRoy Butler, Edgar Bennett, Brian Dawkins, Lito Sheppard, Laveranues Coles, myself — and there are so many guys I'm not even mentioning."

Washington is spending time back in that town to relax, chill with his young son and enjoy a little down time. But he agreed that there might be just a little more pressure on him to step up now that he's the Most Valuable Player on the Green & White. And he's ready for the role.

"The main thing in the off-season is you don't want to get in trouble, for one, and you don't want to get out of shape. You want to work out a couple of times a week, get on the treadmill, lift weights, so you come in for the OTAs and the spring practices and you're in pretty good shape. You have to be in shape to get in shape — that's the way it is."

Ferguson: 'This Is All Preparation'

D'Brickashaw is also attending his second Super Bowl, and he seems to enjoy the hoopla, in part because it helps him talk on Radio Row to a wide audience about the causes that he cares about.

"It's innate," Brick said of his community-minded streak. "You grow up, play, go away to college, then you come back to basically the same area you grew up in, and I'm just trying to do the things I do. We have the D'Brickashaw Ferguson Foundation through which we give out scholarships and try to aid the communities I knew about growing up.

"It's not good enough that you do well. You want to see everybody do well. So you've got to touch and help as many people as you can and do what is necessary."

And for the offensive tackle, that includes not only helping kids to "eat right and move more," one of his pet programs, but to help his teammates do well enough to come to a Super Bowl venue not as part of the show before the game but part of the show that is the game.

"I just feel like this is all preparation," Brick said amid the din from hundreds of people speaking at once into microphones. "One day I'm going to be where I need to be, and this is just good practice."

"We are a great team," he said of his Jets teammates. "Whether we do poorly or well during the season, we can always chalk it up as experience. That's something you can't buy."

And who does he throw his weight behind in this game?

"I always feel I like to see New York represented," said the Long Islander, "so I'm rooting for the Giants."

Cotchery: 'I Didn't Expect It to Be Like This'

Jerricho feels the same way, and he's had to state it more than a few times on his whirlwind around Radio Rectangle.

"I've lost count," the wide receiver said of how many shows he's dropped in on this morning. The count was seven, with two more and possibly YES-TV to come.

"And the most common question is who am I pulling for," Cotchery said. "They know it's a tough deal right there, Patriots and Giants — it's come up in every interview.

"Usually, we're rooting for the team that's in our conference, and the Patriots are in our conference and our division. But I still can't root for them. That's something I can't do. And I think New York fans want to see a championship back in their state."

Cotchery would also like to bring a Vince Lombardi Trophy back to the New York/New Jersey area for his Jets, which is why he said he wanted to parachute into the middle of this media melee today.

"I didn't expect it to be like this. There's a lot going on, but it's fun for me," he said, looking around. "I made up my mind last year that either as a player or as a fan, I'm going out there, I'm going to get a feel for the atmosphere."

What does the dry and — this week, at least — brisk Southwest weather do for Cotchery's demeanor?

"It's going to be pretty motivating for me this off-season," he said. "It adds a lot to it. I would encourage any guys not in the playoffs or who didn't make it to the Super Bowl to come out here and experience this atmosphere. I think it would add a lot to your motivation, to whatever you're doing to get yourself ready for the next year."