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Transcripts: Eli Manning, Pat Shurmur, Dave Gettleman | Giants TV Schedule
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July 17 For the first time in 15 years, the Giants drafted a quarterback in the first round. The presence of Daniel Jones makes this one of the most intriguing story lines in the league, simply because of the debate and the uncertainty of how things will play out.
The Giants have the third easiest schedule in the NFC East and the fifth-easiest in the NFL. However, in the first half alone, the Giants face the defending division champion Dallas Cowboys and Super Bowl champion New England Patriots.

July 16 Giants need Saquon Barkley to be what Odell Beckham was not. Gettleman gave up on the tantalizing vision of Beckham and Barkley terrorizing defenses together for years, gave up on Beckham because he was not his idea of a Stepford Giant.

Former Giants
Phil Simms still thinks he had more wins in the tank when the Giants dumped him before the 1994 season. He doesn't think they will make the same mistake with Eli Manning.

July 15 A way-too-early prediction for Giants' 2019 season: Is this the change Big Blue needed? With stars gone, Giants will have a new look heading into the new season.

July 14 Last year, mainly due to injuries, eight different players returned at least one kickoff and six returned at least one punt. Corey Coleman wound up finishing the season with the most kickoff returns (23) and Jawill Davis with the most punt returns (12). Coleman is still on the team but the Giants parted ways with Davis in May.

July 10 The Giants' offense is now Saquon Barkley's. Star power is alive and well in blue with Saquon Barkley in the fold. The guy is too good to be true, with no missteps on or off the field.
Last season, Barkley led the league in total yards from scrimmage, was second among running backs in receiving yards, while playing behind the NFL's No. 23 ranked offensive line.

July 6 One of the biggest deficiencies of the Giants offense last season was in the red zone, which was a proverbial stop sign for quarterback Eli Manning and Co. The Giants produced touchdowns on just 50 percent of trips inside the 20-yard line in 2018, which ranked No. 28 in the NFL. However, one of the few bright spots for the Giants red-zone offense was tight end Evan Engram.

NFC East News
Ranking how NFC East teams are set up for future at offensive line.

July 5 There is no way to replace the game-breaking threat Beckham brought to the field every time he stepped on it. In many ways, Evan Engram must fill some of that void. He presents more of a matchup problem to opposing defenses than any of the wide receivers.

July 4 Giants training camp opens for rookies and select veterans on July 22, and will offer plenty of opportunity for players near the bottom of the roster to carve out roles for the upcoming season. General manager Dave Gettleman's second offseason saw plenty of turnover in the starting lineup, with potentially 11 new starters and even more turnover lower on the depth chart.

Former Giants
Jared Lorenzen was admitted to the hospital over the weekend and underwent dialysis after falling ill with an infection that affected his kidney and heart. But, after doctors tried to save his life, Lorenzen succumbed to to his ailments and passed away Wednesday.

Jared Lorenzen's role in getting Eli Manning ready for the biggest play of his own career should be remembered, and appreciated.

July 3 During this spring's OTA and minicamp practices, first-round draft pick, No. 17 overall, rookie Dexter Lawrence took the vast majority of first-team snaps. The Giants are counting on him to not only plug the middle against the run but also give an anemic pass rush a boost.

Which NFC East rival poses the biggest threat to the Giants winning the division? Even though the Cowboys will be formidable in their title defense, the Giants have proven they can beat Dallas, either at home or on the road. The Eagles are a different story.

July 1 Wide receiver Sterling Shepard, fresh off signing a long-term contract extension, is in line for an expanded role in 2019 and could be on the cusp of a career-season, following this spring's trade of Odell Beckham Jr. to the Cleveland Browns.

Which 2019 opponent will be tougher than people think? There are a lot of good candidates for this since the Giants play against so many teams with young quarterbacks, who always have a chance to take a jump and elevate their teams.

June 30 Eli Manning says Giants' offense can be better, even without Odell Beckham. Manning acknowledged that Beckham is tough to replace, but he said Saquon Barkley may have an even more productive second season, and the Giants' receiving corps remains strong.

June 29 Special Report - There must be times when Giants' general manager Dave Gettleman would like to pick up one of the voluminous scouting books from his desk and toss it out the window. He is constantly riddled by doubt and uncertainty, not to mention criticism.
Who to release? Who to sign? How much to offer on a new contract? Will another team embark on a raiding mission and snatch away one of the players he is counting on? Will he spend too much to keep that player? Did he do the right thing in the draft?
Was he correct in assuming the seven-year veteran with an existing injury can still play and will be of help to the Giants? The 68-year-old native of Boston, despite all his accomplishments and achievements in a 34-year NFL career, is often criticized and questioned for not only his decisions but the abrupt manner in which he makes them.

Eli Manning is trusting what he has been told, not what he might have heard through interpretation. The Giants told Manning he is their starting quarterback to open the 2019 season, and so Manning is not looking at this summer as an audition to keep the job he first claimed midway through the 2004 season.

Former Giants
Jared Lorenzen is battling health issues that have led to him being admitted to a hospital. After Lorenzen's UK career ended, he played three years in the NFL with the New York Giants and Indianapolis Colts.

June 28 How talented are Giants? Giants general manager Dave Gettleman has prioritized chemistry, culture and youth over proven talent and the accompanying egos. So, where does that leave the Giants right now? With the No. 27-most talented roster in the NFL - sixth from the bottom - according to Pro Football Focus.

Predicting stat leaders for the Giants. Who will be the leader in the following categories? Receiving yards, tackles, interceptions, sacks, catches. Who is a sleeper player to watch this season?

June 27 The huge concerns surrounding the Giants' linebacker corps. Where have all the linebackers gone? Long time passing. It feels like years and years since this area on defense was fortified enough to be considered a positive force.

June 26 This can be Eli Manning's best offensive line in a decade. No position group is more responsible for the demise of the team than this one. Look no further than the failures of high draft picks (Justin Pugh, Weston Richburg and, far more heinously, the one and only Ereck Flowers) to reveal the main reason why Eli Manning was under such duress the past few years.

June 25 Odell Beckham Jr. was targeted an average of 10.5 times a game in his 59 games with the Giants, and those throws must get divided up elsewhere. Sterling Shepard, Golden Tate and tight end Evan Engram figure to command the bulk of the attention when Eli Manning is scanning the field.

What is the No. 1 storyline heading into training camp? Can the Giants find a pass rush? Once the Giants decided to trade Olivier Vernon, and even before that, improving the pass was a priority this offseason.

June 24 How the Giants stack up against Pro Football Focus' Three Key Mantras. How The Giants Stack Up Against Pro Football Focus' Three Key Mantras.

Eli Manning has made a career of maximizing tight ends like Larry Donnell, Will Tye, Jake Ballard, Kevin Boss and others who produced little elsewhere in their careers. With Beckham off to the Browns, Rhett Ellison could move up the pecking order.

June 22 After years of cycling through offensive line combinations and looking for cheap answers, the Giants have one of the best tandems of starting guards in the NFL. Pro Football Focus ranked the Will Hernandez-Kevin Zeitler pairing No. 5 before they take a regular-season snap together.

Former Giants
Odell Beckham Jr. - Giants fit 'wasn't working anymore'.

June 21 Unlike several teams that have almost completely shut the fans out of the training camp experience, the Giants will hold 10 practices this summer open to the public. All practices and parking are free of charge. As a comparison, the Eagles will allow fans in to watch their training camp practice only once this summer.

June 20 Giants announce 2019 training camp schedule open to the public. There is no cost to attend practice sessions. Fans wishing to attend practice sessions must register for complimentary tickets in advance. Fans may register for up to six (6) tickets per practice session.

June 18 Note to Giants: No need to change the uniforms. The most radical changes came during their 'nomad' years of the 1970's when they changed the logo on their helmet from a new version of the "NY" to "GIANTS" and that was to accommodate the team's move from New York to New Jersey. They changed back to the original "NY" used in the 50s, 60s and early 70s in 2000.

At MetLife Stadium this weekend -The Health & Fitness Expo, a free, non-ticketed event open to the general public. Walk on the field, tour the locker room and meet Giants players. There will also be free, on-site parking.

Former Giants
Ereck Flowers is arguably the biggest draft bust in recent Giants history, but the New York castoff appears on track to open the season in the Washington Redskins starting lineup.

June 18 The Giants ended the offseason feeling pretty good about themselves, even though they arguably spent the last five months losing more talent than they gained. They are big believers in addition by subtraction, and they feel they've added some pretty good pieces, too.

Daniel Jones didn't have to throw a pass before being welcomed to The Bronx. The Giants' first-round pick out of Duke attended Monday night's Yankees game against the Rays, and received boos when he was shown on the jumbotron at the Stadium in between innings.

NFL News
NFL stadium rankings 2019: Which team has best venue? Which has worst? Where does MetLife Stadium rank?

June 17 Much of the Giants' success or failure on offense this season will begin up front, with center being a position battle to watch between Jon Halapio and Spencer Pulley this summer to see who will be the line's anchor.
Jon Halapio has worked his way back after suffering a fractured ankle last season. The 27-year-old got hurt in the Giants' Week 2 loss to the Cowboys, missing the rest of the season.

June 16 Of the four quarterbacks on the Giants' roster, Kyle Lauletta and Alex Tanney are the other guys in a room dominated by Eli Manning and rookie Daniel Jones. If Jones can convince the coaching staff he is ready to play whenever called upon, Shurmur might opt to save a roster spot for another position and go with just two quarterbacks.

How disguising coverage can help the pass rush. Offenses are sophisticated, and the counters to basic defenses are well understood around the league. Some times defensive coordinators need to give their defenders a little help in disrupting opposing offenses.

June 15 This group of 7 could make or break Giants defense after 2,000 snaps 'you can't buy'. A popular sports cliche says players make their biggest improvements between their first and second seasons.

Former Giants
Hakeem Nicks said Eli Manning's support helped push him to participate in the XFL's "Summer Showcase" event at Montclair State University on Friday, working out for his old offensive coordinator, XFL New York/New Jersey head coach Kevin Gilbride, and his staff in an attempt to make an unexpected return to professional football.

June 14 The Giants have a long way to go before unveiling their 2019 53-man roster. Numerous factors will go into the team's makeup such as injuries, performance, and players currently on other rosters who might become available and present an upgrade over what the Giants have at a specific spot. But if the 53-man roster were to be unveiled tomorrow, here, based on what was observed during the spring practices, is a very early look at who's in and who's out.
General manager Dave Gettleman and coach Pat Shurmur taught Giants players, fans and media an important lesson last summer. The practice depth chart isn't necessarily indicative of roster standing. When the Giants cut from 90 to 53 players, the Giants cut a handful second-teamers and kept a handful of third-teamers. They put in more preseason waiver claims than any other NFL team. Here is how NJ Advance Media sizes up all 90 players right now.

June 13 Pat Shurmur gives Giants high marks for OTA attendance. There were a few excused absences. An occasional player not being present. But otherwise, the Giants had near-perfect attendance for their voluntary organized team activities this spring, a departure from recent years, when players such as Odell Beckham Jr. and Olivier Vernon were no-shows.

NFL News
Raiders to be featured on Hard Knocks, Were Giants ever serious candidate? There are three acceptable excuses to decline Hard Knocks: A first-year head coach, an appearance on the show within the last 10 years or a playoff appearance within the last two years. The Raiders were one of five teams who could not decline Hard Knocks. The Giants, Redskins, 49ers and Lions were the others.

June 12 The Giants did not embrace Eli Manning only to shove him to the side just because a shiny, new quarterback shares a room at the office with the franchise icon.
Manning, 38, obviously has a huge edge in experience but whenever this is brought up, Shurmur lauds the way Jones, 23, is picking up the offense in his new NFL surroundings.

The next time the Giants take the field will be training camp next month, but battle lines for competitions for jobs and coveted spots near the top of the depth chart have already been drawn.

June 11 Giants players were back at it again on Monday for their seventh OTA. Constant rain forced practice inside the fieldhouse for the first practice in the final week of the offseason program.
The team has three more practices and then it's summer break for the players until the start of training camp at the end of July. Here are the players who stood out at OTA No. 7.

Scouting reports on 3 new Giants from teammate who knows them best - Markus Golden, Antoine Bethea, Olsen Pierre. the Giants have their own reunion going on around defensive coordinator James Bettcher, who was with the Cardinals from 2013-17 and called plays for his final three seasons.

June 10 Corey Coleman finds comfort again in quest to confidently show how good he can be. Humbled and hungry, having turned the page on three seasons of growing pains and potential, Coleman is poised to write a new chapter, and the Giants' hope it will be his best yet.

June 9 The Giants punted on a winning season and potential playoff berth by benching Kurt Warner and inserting rookie Eli Manning in 2004. Twitter, if it had existed then, might have imploded, especially if anyone knew how much Warner had another Super Bowl run in the tank.

Former Giants
Landon Collins - A charitable way for Landon Collins to say goodbye to Giants.

NFC East News
The 10 worst contracts in the NFC East.

June 8 Was hiring general manager Dave Gettleman the biggest mistake the New York Giants organization has made in the past decade?

The Giants will head back to the practice field Monday to begin their final stretch of spring workouts. 5 takeaways from minicamp, including what we've seen from rookie Daniel Jones.

No meaningful partnership is forged overnight. The bonding takes time, patience, and often, a fair share of agita. Just ask Giants offensive linemen Will Hernandez and Nate Solder.

June 7 Giants mandatory minicamp concluded with a third practice at the Quest Diagnostic Training Center on Thursday. It was humid and hotter than the first two days of work, with the sun out for much of practice. It was the shortest of the three practices, with the players departing this afternoon for a three-day weekend before returning next week for their final four OTAs.

Don't tell Pat Shurmur the Giants are rebuilding. Expectations haven't been this low for the Giants in a long time. General manager Dave Gettleman won't use the "R" word, but c'mon, he has been rebuilding on the fly. Shurmur will have to make the gut-wrenching changing of the guard from Manning to Jones. As fond as he is of Manning, he knows he can not afford to let sentiment for a two-time Super Bowl MVP get in the way.

Lorenzo Carter has a leg up on the rest of the Giants' pass-rushers. Or maybe it's two arms up. Unlike speed, strength and technique, the length of Carter's arms is an asset that cannot be improved through coaching, weight-lifting or practice. The 6-foot-5, 260-pound Carter's arms measured 34 inches long with a wingspan of 82 inches at the 2018 NFL Combine.

Most of the Giants wide receivers don't know yet what rookie cornerback DeAndre Baker can do. But Darius Slayton knows. He lived it during two Georgia-Auburn matchups in the SEC. Baker is a physical bump-and-run cornerback who has been forced to play soft coverage off the line of scrimmage to start his NFL career because of the rules prohibiting contact in Organized Team Activities and minicamp.

June 6 Eli Manning believes experience will benefit the Giants' offense this year, and it has nothing to do with his 16 years wearing the team's uniform. The greater significance in Manning's opinion is that he and his teammates are in their second season operating coach Pat Shurmur's offense. He believes that will result in greater understanding, efficiency and production.

There is a difference between what should be done and what can be done. James Bettcher, in his debut as defensive coordinator with the Giants last season, was unable to properly imprint the defense in his image. Anyone familiar with his work in Arizona knows it,
Lorenzo Carter wants to be the answer to the Giants' pass rush question, and if he is that, the second-year pro from Georgia would immediately catapult himself into the conversation of the most influential players that could help Big Blue surprise and become playoff contenders quicker than anticipated.
The Giants replaced five defensive starters in the offseason and got younger both in front of and behind Ogletree. The defensive line will start three high picks from each of the last three drafts, and the secondary will feature five players from the last two drafts, with 23-year-old safety Jabrill Peppers being called a leader.

June 5 The first mandatory minicamp practice is in the books, with more to come on Wednesday and Thursday. As with the previous OTAs, no contact is allowed with the players in helmets, jerseys and shorts. It was a big day for the defense getting its hands on the ball.

On a sun-splashed morning, cool and crisp, Daniel Jones took the ball, reached back to fake a handoff and then rolled to his right, where there were no defenders to prevent him from putting on a display the Giants have not seen out of one of their quarterbacks since ... Jeff Hostetler? Jones kept the ball, planted his foot into the grass and took off.

While every move made by quarterback Daniel Jones as he backs up Eli Manning is being scrutinized, defensive lineman Dexter Lawrence and cornerback DeAndre Baker lined up with the starting defense during 11-on-11 reps in Monday's first practice of mandatory minicamp.

June 4 Special Report - When the Giants drafted cornerback Sam Beal in the third round of the Supplemental Draft last summer, he was 6-1 and 177. The kid from Western Michigan was spoken of as an under-the-radar star, and at least two scouts privately criticized the teams for which they work for not having taken him earlier.
So what happened? Did he become an instant star? Nope, in his first rookie practice he suffered an injury to his shoulder, tried to play through it for a week and finally was told that he needed surgery to repair the damage and that 2018 was going to be simply a learning experience while he healed. Well, guess what? He healed, he has put on weight (he's now 6-1 and 190, and is being projected as a starter.

June 3 All quiet on the Giants front as Big Blue set for 3-day minicamp. June is here, all is quiet, and that is how the Giants want it. This was Gettleman's primary objective in jettisoning outspoken personalities such as Beckham, Landon Collins and Olivier Vernon, after all: to eliminate so-called distractions and keep the focus on the field.

June 2 Golden Tate is playing with his fourth different Super Bowl quarterback. Tate and Eli Manning both are experts in adjusting to new faces. Over Manning's 16 year-career, the face of his receiving corps has changed probably too quickly: From Plaxico Burress and Amani Toomer in the early years, to Hakeem Nicks and Victor Cruz in the middle years, to Odell Beckham and Sterling Shepard of late.

June 1 General manager Dave Gettleman made it clear when he took over at the end of the 2017 season that he would look to build the franchise through the trenches. In a little over a year, Gettleman has overhauled the entire offensive line.

May 31 The Giants intend to start Eli Manning, despite growing sentiment around the league that Manning at this stage is a fringe starting quarterback in the NFL. NBC Sports' Chris Simms has a far less favorable view of Manning, entering the 2019 regular season. Simms ranks Manning below 31 of 32 starting quarterbacks and one backup, listing the Giants' signal caller No. 34 in his preseason rankings.

May 30 Giants defensive secondary takes the lead. If the Giants have any lingering concerns about their newly revamped safety position, the last several practices have begun to eradicate those quickly.

Golden Tate is undisputed best in NFL at this important skill and it could change look of Giants' offense. The Giants' biggest free-agent addition this offseason has led the NFL in forced missed tackles in five of the last six seasons and finished second in the other.

May 29 What Daniel Jones is learning with eyes glued on Eli Manning. "I think you can learn a lot from him on the field, obviously, from a scheme standpoint, he's done it for a long time, he knows that stuff," the rookie quarterback said Tuesday after organized team activity practice No. 4, out on the grass and in the rain.

Kyle Lauletta recognizes the burdened look on the face of NFL rookies when trying to learn everything in May. Lauletta tried to hide it during Organized Team Activities last year, when he was the hyped rookie quarterback catching up to speed with teammates who had months - or, in most cases, years - worth of a head start.

The Giants offensive line surrendered 78 sacks over the last two seasons and was ranked No. 23 in the league by Pro Football Focus in 2018. To put it mildly, there wasn't anywhere to go but up. However, the Giants enter this season with plenty of optimism about a line that was fortified this offseason by the acquisition of veteran right guard Kevin Zeitler and right tackle Mike Remmers.

Giants only hope this is where Corey Ballentine heals from heartbreak. For Eli Manning, for Daniel Jones, for Saquon Barkley, for every other New York Giant, this was another football day in May, another OTA. For the kid wearing Ballentine in white letters above 25 on his blue jersey, this was much more.

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