07/28 — The third practice of training camp this afternoon began with a bang. Head coach Eric Mangini called for his first full-contact tackling drill of camp (Friday morning's session was "thud" tackling), and Cody Spencer complied by depositing a major hit on RB Alvin Banks.

The head-on contact separated Banks from his helmet and drew cheers from the crowd of 4,000 at the Hofstra soccer stadium.

Banks and Danny Ware got most of the reps behind Thomas Jones with the absence of Leon Washington from practice for personal reasons.

Ware had a couple of nice plays. In red zone drills, he made a 15-yard inside run, putting his shoulder into S Jamie Thompson to get across the goal line. Then he got free on a swing pass around end as Eric Barton and Bryan Thomas collided trying to hem him in.

Chad Pennington continued to look cool, calm and collected in the hot and humid conditions (mid-80s but at least with a breeze from the north). Chad's best pass: a TD to Jerricho Cotchery down the deep middle, beating CB Justin Miller to the ball.

S Rashad Washington made a nice end zone deflection of a Marques Tuiasosopo pass intended for TE Sean Ryan. But on the next play, Washington was victimized on a deep out-route from "Tui" to WR Wallace Wright.

For the special teams, Ben Graham looked sharp, especially in plus-territory punting, when he turns to his wonder from Down Under. His final drop punt of the period bounced straight in the air at the 2-yard line, where Rayshaun Kizer downed it.

But Mike Nugent couldn't conclude the two two-minute drives that ended practice with successful field goals. The situation for both Pennington and Kellen Clemens was to move the offense from the Jets 40 into FG range trailing, 21-20. Pennington's drive ended with TE Chris Baker getting shaken up after a catch and Nugent missing wide right from 51 yards.

Clemens got his unit a little closer, but this time "Nooge" was wide left from 43. To be fair, it must be stated that the goalposts Nugent was kicking at are Arena League width, not NFL width.