The Extra Point

Blessuan Austin has waited for this chance from the moment he was drafted by the Jets in the sixth round in April. So, when the rookie cornerback finally got cleared by team doctors and practiced for the first time in the NFL this week, he couldn’t help but get fired up on the field. “I’m in love with the game,” Austin said. “I’ve got that 9-year-old love for the game again. You go through so many years playing the game, you kind of take it for granted, subconsciously. So, to be away from it for a little while — a long time, actually — and to come back, you appreciate the little things. You know, go out there, put your helmet on, buckle up your chin strap and this is the highest level you can do it at.”

Austin had been rehabbing a knee injury suffered in his final season at Rutgers — the second straight year a torn anterior cruciate ligament in the same knee kept him away from playing the game he loves.

“It definitely tested my patience,” said Austin, from Queens in New York. “There were definitely a couple of times throughout the process where I felt like I could go and then two days, three days later, something new popped up and they’d be like, ‘OK, maybe in another week, you’ll be all right.’

“From that to now, to finally put that behind me and shelf it, it’s something I’m happy with.”

Austin remains on the Jets’ reserve/non-football injury list, but being cleared for practice means the team has three weeks to decide whether to put him on the active roster or place him on the season-ending injured reserve list if he’s not fully ready to play.

But, he certainly made a good first impression on the coaching staff.

“That was a guy that was excited to be at practice, I know that,” coach Adam Gase said.