Disgruntled Jets cornerback Darrelle Revis skipped several drills late in this morning’s minicamp practice to protest his contract situation, then escalated the rhetoric afterward.
“It was just something to let them know I can play or I cannot play,” Revis said.
Revis initially told reporters he begged out of the drills because he was light-headed, then quickly admitted he did it to make a statement about the lack of progress on a contract extension.
Revis is looking to become the highest-paid cornerback in the NFL, topping the $16.2 million average salary of the Raiders’ Nnamdi Asomugha, but the sides haven’t exchanged proposals since Revis said the Jets insulted him with an offer last month that did not include guaranteed money.
“It’s about loyalty,” Revis said. “[They’re] not showing loyalty in terms of keeping your core guys. If you want to build a dynasty, you’ve got to start being loyal to some of your players around here.”
The Jets could be treating Asomugha’s contract as an aberration, but Revis said, “This guy has set the bar.
“Football in the 1950s, you weren’t getting paid a lot of money and every year the market goes up. Nnamdi set the bar, and me and my team are going to do the best job for me to get what I deserve.”
Asked if he’d be satisfied with $1 more than Asomugha, Revis said, “It could be 50 cents more. Give me 50 cents more, and we’ll be OK.”
“The number? That’s the number. He set the bar. I feel that if I’m fighting to go over that, that’s what it is.”
The comments set the stage for a confrontation with Rex Ryan, who told reporters he was under the impression Revis didn’t practice because the player wasn’t feeling well.
“I’ll talk to Darrelle,” Ryan said when told Revis said he sat out due to his contract. Asked if he would be disappointed if the absence was contract-related, Ryan said, “Yeah, that would disappoint me.”
“If his situation is that he’s got something on his mind and he’s not focused 100 percent, then I really don’t want him out there,” Ryan said. “We practice hard. We go full speed. If that focus isn’t there, then I don’t want to put anybody in jeopardy.”
Revis said he is isn’t ruling out a training-camp holdout, even though the fines and potential contract penalties would be severe.
Another Jets training-camp holdout could be center Nick Mangold, who is in the final year of his contract and is unhappy because he has received no offers from the Jets on an extension.
Mangold is participating in this week’s mandatory minicamp after hinting last week he could boycott it, but he did not make himself available to reporters afterward.
“How they’ve been going on about it doesn’t look good,” Revis told ESPN.com. “We’ll see. It’s not just me. It’s Nick Mangold. It’s D’Brickashaw [Ferguson]. It’s David Harris. They tell us we’re the core guys of this team, so why are you not treating us as one of the core guys?”