Head Coach Pat Shurmur
August 16, 2018
Joint Practice with Detroit
Opening Remarks: Good situational work today. We got some special teams, we actually shortened what we planned to train a little bit, but we got through some good situational work really to cap off what I think was a really, really good week. Very competitive. As I mentioned all week, it’s always good to go against another team and now we’ll try to get their legs back, get them ready to go and get after it tomorrow night. I’ll take your questions.
Q: Does the fact that Odell (Beckham) played during these practices have any impact on whether he’ll play in the game tomorrow night?
A: Again, I’ve got a plan, so it will get revealed tomorrow night.
Q: Is it fair to say that the guys that were working on the side, Saquon (Barkley) included, that they’re not going to play in the game now?
A: We’ll have to see. You guys can all guess and surmise as to who’s going to be in the game. As we go along here, I’m just not going to talk about it. I have ideas and plans, and certainly the health of a player may affect that at some point.
Q: What do you think you’re going to do with how you’re going to handle the quarterbacks in this game?
A: Again, you guys will see when the ball gets snapped.
Q: This is going back a little bit, but when Odell came out and you were the (offensive coordinator) in Philadelphia, what do you remember about that draft process? Did you interview him and did you foresee what he would become?
A: I did. I was at his pro day. At the time I was in Philadelphia and I traveled down there with Chip (Kelly), and we really thought highly of him. Certainly he was a player we were hopeful was going to be there when we picked, and it didn’t go that way; but now that I’m a Giant, I’m glad it went their way.
Q: I know you still have a game to play, but what do you leave these practices having learned about your team?
A: I think every situation, especially the uncontrolled situations, aside from the tactics of football, you just see the way the guys respond to adversity, see the ways guys respond to playing in a different setting, and that’s what I learn. Then, if for some reason they don’t respond as well as we would like, we address it with them and say, ‘Hey listen, the next time this comes up, you should be thinking this’. So, when you can do it against another team that you’re not going to play this season unless we meet in the playoffs, then it’s a really good thing for the player, and so that’s why I think this is valuable.
Q: I am sure you haven’t watched Hard Knocks-
A: I don’t.
Q: Carl Nassib has offered some interesting financial advice to his teammates. Do you talk to your players about their financial planning?
A: Simple interest stuff, huh?
Q: Simple interest stuff, yeah. How much do you preach financial literacy to your players?
A: Financial literacy? (Laughter) You know what, I think times have changed. The agents do a really, really good job with that and most of our players have advisors. I think in the old days that was more of a concern, but we just tell our guys basically to do the right thing on and off the field and that means taking care of their money. But I always remember the (Rule of 72) – 7 percent money doubles in 10 years, and 10 percent money doubles in 7 years. That’s the one thing I remember about graduate school, I guess.
Q: Saquon and the injured guys were here the whole time. Are these three wasted days for Saquon, or can he get something out of watching?
A: No, not at all. That’s a good question, but no. Anything you see, you can learn from, and this isn’t the first time a guy tweaked a hamstring. So, no, it’s very important to watch. There were a lot of things that happened out there on the field today. We’re going to go back and we’re going to dig into it and make sure that we’re ready for all the situations. We were really good with what we did today, but there’s a couple errors in there that we need to fix, and I don’t know if I’ve ever spoken about it in this setting, but there needs to be a shared situational awareness among our coaches and players so that when we have 10 seconds left and no timeouts, these are the types of plays we’re going to call and if we’re on the flip side of it, this is the type of situation and are these the types of plays the other team is going to call. So, that can help you at the end of a game.
Q: We saw (Saquon) run a little bit. It was the first time we saw him out there running. How’s he doing, making progress in that regard?
A: Yeah, he’s doing fine. He tweaked his hamstring and he’s day to day and he’s coming back as fast as he can.
Q: Do you expect Davis (Webb) to be much better having played last week, maybe not at home, that kind of thing?
A: Better as compared to last week?
Q: Yes.
A: Yeah, I think young players tend to improve. It was his first time in our system, playing really in a new system. So yeah, I certainly hope he’s better.
Q: What’s your philosophy on keeping two or three quarterbacks generally speaking?
A: Well, we want to keep the best 53 guys. Dave (Gettleman) teases me that I’m a body collector. I like having lots of players around, and certainly I think the quarterback position is important, and they’re hard to develop, so if you’ve got a guy worthy of being on the 53, we’ll keep him. If for some reason there’s a player in another position that’s more valuable at that time, then you keep two.
Q: Do you keep a general idea of where the 53 stands as you go through training camp – who might be on the right side, or is that stuff you don’t decide until September 1st?
A: Personnel is a daily, constant conversation. We’re always kind of in our mind thinking, we ask the question frequently during training camp, ‘if we had to play tomorrow, who are our guys?’ But you put it in pencil and we’re allowed to change our minds, because guys either perform better or worse than we thought as we go through the preseason, and then you pick it based on that.
Q: You said last week coming off the game that as coaches you could do a better job of getting Davis to tone down his excitement or whatever he was, amped up. Have you done that, and how do you do that?
A: As coaches, we try to do that, and the fact that he cares is a good thing. It’s just like steering a ship, we’ve just got to guide him through and part of that is helping him, just reminding him, ‘hey listen, just settle down, it’s all good’. Nothing more complicated than that.
Q: How important is it to get him in with the ones? Is that something you’re going to try and do this week, or you’d like to do?
A: We’ll see. You’re backing into my thoughts game-wise. I appreciate the question, but we’ll see.
