Jets notebook: Nick Folk continues to shine despite injury

Managing a hip injury is no easy task for an NFL player, especially for a kicker. But for Jets kicker Nick Folk, it’s all about managing workload as he attempts to finish out the season strong.

Folk hurt his hip two weeks ago in the Monday night loss to the Dolphins, an injury that occurred while he was practicing his kicking into a net on the sidelines. He said he felt the tightness in the third quarter in a game where he missed two-of-four kicks, his first game with multiple misses in the season. But after a week with a reduced workload and plenty of treatment, he rebounded to make all five field goal attempts in a loss at the Vikings this past Sunday.

It could be argued that Folk, who signed a multi-year contract this offseason, is the team’s MVP.

“It feels a lot better than that game. It was a lot tighter than,” Folk told Metro on Wednesday, referencing the Miami game. “And it felt better on Sunday than it did the game before, I’ll tell you that much.”

He kicked roughly half the balls that he normally would on Wednesday in an effort to rest the hip, doing enough to keep it loose without taxing it. Special teams would normally practice kickoffs on Wednesday, something they will push back to later in the week to help preserve the healing process.

As for his form on Sunday against the Vikings, Folk didn’t change anything to compensate or over overcompensate for the hip injury.

“I would never do that in season,” Folk said. “Nope, I just continued on as normal.”

Folk has made 25-of-29 kicks this year, including nine from greater than 40 yards.

Jets notes:

– Muhammad Wilkerson did not practice with the team on Wednesday but he did work on the side as he continues to recover from a toe injury. Head coach Rex Ryan said he was hopeful Wilkerson would get some reps on Thursday. A team source told Metro that the likelihood of Wilkerson playing against the Titans was “80/20 he will be on the field.”

– Wide receiver Percy Harvin did not practice on Wednesday with an ankle injury. The same team source told Metro that Harvin “likely won’t be playing this Sunday but I don’t think he gets shut down [for the season].”

– Former Jets running back Shonn Greene was inactive for the Titans last week, perhaps not a surprise given his play this year. Two weeks ago against the Texans, the last game where he was active, Greene carried the ball just twice and netted zero yards. But according to Titans head coach Ken Whisenhunt, the decision to keep Greene in street clothes had nothing to do with his recent performances, which have been not so good. Whisenhunt said that “Last week was a decision based on special team play” and that Greene was caught in a numbers game. “We needed that spot to be able to play special teams,” Whisenhunt said. “It was nothing against Shonn.”