This off-season, as Kris Jenkins attempted to return from his second major knee operation, he also conducted an experiment. He told himself, “I’m retiring this year,” and he said he repeated that notion until he believed it.
Jets defensive tackle Kris Jenkins, who turns 31 on Aug. 3, missed all but six games last season after tearing the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee.
When a sense of calm enveloped him instead of panic, Jenkins knew he wanted to return to the Jets for his 10th N.F.L. season. He would do so on his terms, for his reasons, extending what he called the “twilight of my career” for at least this season.
“This is the first year that retirement really crossed my mind,” said Jenkins, a defensive tackle who turns 31 on Aug. 3. “You hear people talk about the end, but you start feeling those emotions, and it’s a trip, honestly. You have anxiety issues sometimes.”
He continued: “Look, I’ve been playing football since I was 8. I’m getting tired. Like, I’m not tired of it yet, but I’m starting to get tired.”
The experiment confirmed to Jenkins his lack of career regrets, and he said he decided to listen to his position coach, Mark Carrier, who told him to look no further than the next season.
Jenkins also considered the new direction of his life, including his first wedding anniversary recently and his responsibility to his three young children. All of that played a role, but with training camp now two weeks away, with a season full of promise on the horizon, Jenkins said that one factor, Coach Rex Ryan, registered as most important.
“The biggest thing was Rex,” Jenkins said. “If it had been any other coach, it probably would have been my last year.”
That speaks volumes about Ryan’s leadership style and magnetic personality. It also speaks to the talent at Ryan’s disposal.
To the top-ranked defense in the N.F.L., the Jets added cornerback Antonio Cromartie, the pass-rush specialist Jason Taylor and safety Brodney Pool. They drafted cornerback Kyle Wilson in the first round. Jenkins is also scheduled to return after missing all but six games last season.
Ryan likes to say that “there aren’t many” players like Jenkins in the league. And in this team, Jenkins said he saw a roster as or more talented than any he had played on. Only some of his early Carolina Panthers teams — in 2002 or 2003, Jenkins said — come close.
With HBO filming the Jets for its annual training camp series, with Ryan’s pronouncements growing bolder in his second season, with expectations that have grown exponentially, Jenkins and the Jets feel a greater sense of urgency.
“When you have magnified expectations in New York, you better get it done,” he said. “We’ve got to win. There’s no if. We have to win. Trash has been talked. Things have been said. We need to make it happen, or we’re going to be embarrassed.”
As Jenkins spoke, he drank diet soda and ate only half of his meal at a Manhattan restaurant, then boxed the leftovers. His friend Tony Washington, a former Panthers teammate, said that was one of several changes he noticed in Jenkins the past few years.
Since signing with the Jets before the 2008 season, Jenkins, who plays at around 360 pounds, has received bonuses before and during each season for making weight. But even this quest took a more public turn recently, when Ryan challenged Jenkins and right tackle Damien Woody to a weight-loss competition that will be decided at training camp.
If Jenkins makes weight there, he will receive a $50,000 bonus. But he would like to win the challenge. To that end, he enlisted the help of Dr. Sanford Siegal, the creator of the Cookie Diet, which Jenkins is now endorsing.
The combination of the diet, weight loss and rehabilitation has Jenkins feeling as healthy as he has in years. He tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee against Buffalo last October.
Jenkins had an operation similar to the one he had in Carolina, in which doctors replaced the ligament in his right knee with part of his hamstring. He recovered to make the Pro Bowl in 2006. At this point, he said that his knee felt fine and that he would be ready for training camp, starting Aug. 2.
As the Jets advanced to the A.F.C. championship game last season, Jenkins watched mostly from the sideline or his couch. He said he took pride in watching the domination by the offensive line he practiced against and in the way the defensive line raised its play in his absence.
The low point came when the Jets lost to the Indianapolis Colts in the conference title game. Jenkins said he thought he could have helped.
Because of that loss, because of the talent that surrounds him, because, more than anything, Ryan is the coach, Jenkins is returning for another season.
