[The Jets' game Friday against the Vikings will pit one former Australian Rules Football League player against another. The Vikings have punter Darren Bennett, whose leap from the Australian Football League to the N.F.L. in 1994 paved the way for the Jets' rookie punter, Ben Graham.] It's one of the reasons I'm looking forward to Friday night, ... It'll be great to say G'day to him and catch up. |
He's got the ability to get over it as quickly as anyone. |
I feel like I'm 18 years old and lining up for my first game in the AFL. |
I'd never done it before, but to play our sport we have to have good hands, |
I'm doing pretty well so far, ... It's been a long journey. |
I'm probably not the right person to ask. I've worked extremely hard on everything I've needed to get to this point. I'm still here. I'm not sure how the next week or two is going to pan out. |
It was something I intended on doing down the track, ... Now, if I had been a player in Australia who wasn't having a great career or was at the crossroads, I would have probably jumped at it when I was 25 or 26. But my career went the way that I would have liked it to have gone. |
It's a privilege to be asked, ... People I talked to asked me, 'Do you know how special that is?' |
Paper comes in one end and the finished product goes out the other. |
The crowd loved it when I kicked the ball long all the time, so every opportunity I got I would do it, ... I had a deal with the coach that when we were a certain amount up in the game late in the quarter, and I had the opportunity, I'd let it fly. |
The holding is the most foreign part of the job. But the skills we use in the [Australian Football League], we have good hands. |
This is kind of the cornerstone of our expansion. It's the first one of its kind in North America. |
We took it down to the ground and up to the ceiling. Everything in this building is new. |
When they first handed me my helmet and pads, I jokingly asked, 'Do I have to wear these?' ... Without being up close to the game ? television is so far away ? is that you don't appreciate how physically fast and tough and strong and how much more they can impact the body because they have got shoulder pads and helmets. Ours is a different physically tough game. |