Head Coach Pat Shurmur
August 28, 2018
Opening: Today, as you watched, practice was like a Friday. Put the guys through the paces and glad we had the heat one more time and I think they pushed through it. We actually had a little bit more with the idea that we have a game 12 days on the horizon and I think they did a good job with it.
Q: How relieving is it to get this Odell (Beckham Jr.) deal done and have that sort of in the background?
A: I mean, that’s been in the background, but for those of you that have been here all the way through, you’ve seen that he’s practiced hard, he’s been training like he was going to play and this was obviously significant, but it was an issue of the day yesterday. I’ve been pleased with what he’s done, getting himself ready to play and I’m sure for him, it’s a relief to have it done.
Q: How did you approach your relationship with him as soon as you got this job?
A: Well, like any player, I just wanted to get to know him and he certainly is an outstanding player and he’s going to help us win games and so I just wanted to get to know him like I did with the other players. That was it, just normal communication between a coach and a player and you’ve heard me say it before, we’re here as coaches to help the players be the best they can be. Part of that starts by understanding who they are as players.
Q: Was there anything in that getting to know him process that kind of surprised you? That maybe the world didn’t see that you were able to take and build on?
A: I’ve said it numerous times, but he’s super passionate about football. What I’ve seen in this building and what I’ve learned early on is he really cares about what he’s doing. He trains extremely hard. All the things that you need to do, you want to be great and I think I saw that quickly and really haven’t been disappointed in any of that along the way.
Q: What about balancing the passion though? Sometimes that’s what gets him in trouble. How do you work with him to kind of balance that?
A: We all need to control our bodies and our minds and I think that’s – We talk about that with the players constantly, making sure they keep their composure. There’s a real fine line from being competitive and then crossing that line. He’s no different than any other player and we all wrestle with it as competitors. When I was a player, I was involved in a fight or two myself, so I understand mentally how that plays out.
Q: I know he hasn’t played in the preseason. If he had played, would you have run vanilla sort of plays because he’s such a dynamic player? And as you get prepared for the game plan and for the regular season, are you kind of excited that you can really put him into use in the game plan?
A: First off, this contract stuff was running parallel to a player coming back from injury, so all along I wanted to be smart with the player and that’s what I did all along and what we were doing all along was to try to bring him back at the right pace and get him involved in as much as we could at the right pace. The contract thing was running parallel to that, but they were really two independent deals.
Q: Is there any doubt he’s ready to go come week one?
A: There’s no doubt in my mind he’ll be ready to go against Jacksonville.
Q: When did you get to that point? When did you see he looked like what he was in the past?
A: Along the way, just watching film.
Q: Was the Detroit week big in that process?
A: The Detroit week was big. He got a chance to compete against some really fine corners and he did it in practice at a high level in really an uncontrolled setting, so we were able to see it then.
Q: Do you feel as though he has max level energy from what you were able to observe in Detroit going into week one?
A: Odell will be ready to go week one.
Q: Any update on Olivier (Vernon)?
A: No update. Same as yesterday, so we’re just working through his ankle.
Q: Are you going to give your first team O-line any work in Thursday’s game to get the run game going?
A: We’ll see.
Q: That’s not a no.
A: That’s not a no. We’ll see.
Q: What do you want to see from Davis (Webb) as this may be the last time he plays for a while?
A: Yeah, we’ll see as we get ready to play the game. I think anybody that goes in there, we want to see them play good football. I think that’s the most important thing. On the short horizon here, we want the players to go in and play good winning football against New England and that’s what we’re looking for from all the players.
Q: Is there anyone specifically you’re really looking to get a long look at in this game as being that, you said before, a lot of your guys aren’t going to play?
A: We’ll see. I don’t mean to be cryptic about this, but we’ll see. Really when you come down to it, I want to let our list of injuries kind of settle here and then we’re going to go in as a staff. We haven’t finalized who’s playing in the game and before we do that as a staff, I certainly don’t want to tell you something that’s inaccurate.
Q: What I’m getting at is more usually this time of year there’s a couple guys at the end of the roster that this game means probably more than for other guys. Do you have any positions that you’re specifically looking at at least?
A: No, I think it’s important where we’re at, we’re a new staff, we’re a new team, that everybody goes out and plays well.
Q: You said Odell is ready. Do you feel like the Giants are ready for the regular season?
A: Well, we’re going to find that out. I feel like we’ve done a lot of good things. I think we’re on the right path. We’ve certainly got a lot of work to do between now and first week and then teams improve as the season goes along, so this is a game – it’s the ultimate team game, you have to practice this game and between the practice sessions, you play games. You do what you can to beat the opponent you’re playing on that Sunday and then you move on. It’s really a journey for a team to try to get enough wins to be in the playoffs and as you go through it, you hope as a team you stay healthy and then continue to improve.
Q: How did (Connor) Barwin come through yesterday?
A: Connor did well and he did a little bit more today as well. He’s on the right path as well.
