Head Coach Pat Shurmur
August 20, 2018
Q: How do you decide your captains for the games, and when will you decide your season-long captains?
A: Right now, its random, I’ll pick three new ones this week and three new ones for the fourth game. Once we get to the 53, we’ll talk about who the captains are.
Q: The new running back Jhurell Pressley, what do you know about him, what do you like about him?
A: I was with him before. Good runner, fast, tough guy. We brought him in, he’s got some familiarity with what we do offensively, and we’ll get him in the mix.
Q: I didn’t see Darian Thompson or Connor Barwin out there today?
A: Yeah, they are just rehabbing.
Q: What do you think of your first team offensive line’s run blocking so far?
A: I think we are improving. I think early in the game last week, we probably weren’t getting the yards in the run game that are up to our standards. By the end of it, we found a way. The first group is doing a good job of working together and they are getting better every day.
Q: When it comes to your run game, you are not really working it. You kind of have a few runs then you go to something else?
A: No, we’re working it. I didn’t call the game much differently than I would. We’re working the run game. As you go through, there are ebbs and flows in the game. As you go through the game, there are times when passing the ball makes sense. Late in the game, we were running it almost every play. I think you just need to call runs, assuming the score is the way it needs to be, you need to call runs throughout the game. I don’t know if that helps you with your questions, but the running back needs to touch the ball, you obviously can throw it to him. You need to run the ball for your offense, but also for your defense.
Q: You have five new guys essentially on the offensive line. What’s the realistic expectation for where they should be right now?
A: They should be in a position where they block well, run and pass, that’s what we are looking for. The amount of training we have to together, it is what it is. We all have the same. We’re not the only offensive line with changes. We probably have more than some places. We went through this a year ago in Minnesota, it can be done. We have got players that are playing hard, and they’re playing together. We’ll just expect that they are going to do a good job blocking.
Q: Did it happen for you in Week 1 last year in Minnesota or was it something that takes time and progresses throughout the season?
A: To your point, we saw moments of it, we won the first game. I think it was a winning performance by that group. Any time you do it longer and longer together, you certainly get better.
Q: Do you feel settled with the five guys you have there?
A: I think we are still a little unsettled in terms of determining who that full unit is. There’s a lot of decisions to be made, we’re not done deciding who are going to be the linemen on our 53. We may keep one more lineman than usual, who knows. We have to figure that out. You always know going through, ‘okay, if we had to play tomorrow, who are the five starters, who is the inside swing guy, who is the outside swing guy?’ Maybe there are games when you keep eight active, depending on what the rest of the roster looks like.
Q: What are you seeing from the returners, where does that competition stand?
A: We are a little bit unsettled there, as well. We have guys back there working, we’ll just play It out through the preseason and see where it goes.
Q: You mentioned before about captains. What do you look for in a captain, will you lean on your captains a lot?
A: I think captains are leaders. They have to do the right thing at the right time for the right reasons and not really worry about the consequences. I’m watching these guys constantly. Once we get to the point when we have the voting and we decide who the captains are going to be, I have an idea on how many I want on both sides of the ball and special teams. What’s important is those guys are the doing the right thing all the time. It doesn’t just start when training camp starts, it starts in the off-season. Even though it’s not mandatory, being around is right.
Q: It seemed like Saquon (Barkley) was doing quite a bit on the sidelines?
A: Yes, I didn’t notice it as much, I know that was the plan. How did he look?
Q: What have you seen from Aldrick Rosas this summer and what made you think when you looked back at last year that you could count on him to be your kicker?
A: Clean slate. When I watched him kick, he had a very strong leg. He’s a strong-legged guy. Obviously, he has that as part of his strength, being able to kick the ball out of the end zone, which is important. As we’ve worked with him, him and Marshall Koehn both, they’re getting cleaner and cleaner with their extra point and field goal mechanics. We’re working with them, expecting them to improve, and we’ve seen that improvement.
Q: Last year the Giants offensive line was sort of scattered around the locker room a little bit, you brought them all together in one area. Is that something you did? What did you hope to gain from that?
A: Yes, in fact, that is what I did. It’s that big oval shape in the locker room. I think you should sit with your position groups. We’re going to go as far as that line will block for us, I think it’s important that they’re together in everything that they do. Even if they’re sitting next to one another, they may talk about something that happened in practice or in a meeting that they wouldn’t shout across the locker room about, so I think it’s smart to sit with your position groups.
