"Santonio Holmes hears the words from Jets coach Rex Ryan almost every day.

The coach wants his receiver's voice to carry a little louder than it did last year. He needs younger players to see Holmes do things the right way, all the time.

"He's constantly grabbing me and pulling me to the side, telling me, 'Tone, I just need you to lead by example. Show these young guys how to do it, show them what they need to do,'" Holmes said.

As training camp moves into its second week, so does the search for new leaders, new voices behind closed doors.

There's a case to be made that every year of the Ryan era has spawned a new crisis in leadership for the Jets.

In 2009, the team parted ways with veteran Laveranues Coles, just a month after Ryan's arrival.

In 2010, it was Alan Faneca, cut the day after the Jets drafted a player to replace him. Thomas Jones left that year, too, when the team became involved in talks for LaDainian Tomlinson.

This year, there was a mass exodus as free agents, defectors and retirees departed, leaving the locker room without Tony Richardson, Shaun Ellis, Jason Taylor, Damien Woody, Trevor Pryce and as of Thursday, Jerricho Cotchery. "