You cannot help but notice Kevin Swayne when you watch the Jets practice.
The man who’d been just about everywhere before the Jets signed him a week ago has been everywhere on the field.
“Every day he flashes; he does something,” Herman Edwards was saying after yesterday’s situational scrimmage, during which Swayne starred with several key catches. “He obviously has a nice chance of making this football team.”
Those are significant words considering two factors – where Swayne has come from and how much receiving talent the Jets already had in place before he was signed last Sunday.
These are not the Jets of last year, with Wayne Chrebet and a truckload of projects at the receiver position.
This is a team with Chrebet and Matthew Hatchette as potential starters, second-year wideout Laveranues Coles showing himself as one of the most improved players on the team and Santana Moss as the No. 1 draft pick certain to get the ball in his hands often.
So for Swayne, a long-shot free agent who’s never played in an NFL regular-season game and got here via the XFL and the Arena Football League, to have made this kind of impact already he’s carving out a terrific story.
“He’s come here the blood-and-guts way,” Chrebet said with admiration.
Chrebet, remember, made the Jets as a rookie free agent out of Hofstra having to overtake some nine receivers above him on the depth chart in 1995.
“God bless you if you can come out and be the first-round pick or even get drafted, but sometimes it doesn’t go that way,” Chrebet said. “I always tell guys, ‘It’s not where you start, it’s where you end up.’
“[Swayne] is seasoned,” Chrebet went on. “He’s smart, he knows the game, he’s been in a couple of [NFL] camps [San Diego in 2000 and Philadelphia in ’99] and he’s played in a lot of games since he’s been out of college, so he’s got the maturity level that really helps him.
“He’s a quiet guy, but I talked to him when he first got here and asked him where he’s been the last couple of years. He started running it down for me and I was just like, ‘Wow.’ I’ve got to hand it to him.”
Swayne, who’s had nothing handed to him, made several terrific plays yesterday, including a big leaping catch of a Chad Pennington pass along the sideline in a two-minute drill and a leaping TD catch of a Pennington pass in a red-zone drill.
His presence as a surprise performer is particularly good news for the Jets in the wake of Moss likely out for a month or so rehabbing from knee surgery.
“He’s certainly got my attention and I know he’s gotten the coaches’ attention,” Vinny Testaverde said.
Swayne, who caught 131 passes for 1,890 yards and 43 TDs in this past Arena League season, has blended in as if he’d been with the team throughout the entire offseason program.
“What’s unique about this guy is he’s played 28 games and comes out here and runs all over the field,” Edwards said.
“I wasn’t intimidated, I just came in and tried to jump in as fast as I could,” Swayne said. “Standing around is not going to help me out. I’ve just jumped in and am learning on the run.”
Swayne downplayed his flashes in practices, saying, “Until I get into a game and do something, it doesn’t really matter.”
The Jets play the Falcons next Saturday in their preseason opener, a day Swayne cannot wait to arrive.
“It’ll definitely be a fulfilling of a dream,” he said.
It he continues on this path, Swayne will fulfill a lot more dreams before this year is complete.