Giants Latest News | Big Blue Kickoff Live | New York Giants

Giants Latest News | Big Blue Kickoff Live | New York Giants

Hello again everybody and welcome to Monday’s edition of Big Blue Kickoff Live. The energy is a popping in this room. We’ve been off for two weeks, but we are back. I’m telling you now, if we did not make it back today, I might have jumped out of an airplane without a parachute, but we are back and I am so glad. Good to see you, Matt. Good to see you, Paul. How is the time off? Rough, man. Rough. You know, I’m I’m addicted to this stuff and it’s it’s like withdrawal when I’m when I’m not here for two weeks. The calm before the storm. Oh, there’s nothing calm about it for me, man. I I’m a mess. It’s not good. It’s not good. But but we are back. So, we are here for the next hour to talk Giants football with you. As always, the show is presented by Cadillac, the official luxury vehicle of the New York Football Giants. Our number, well, I’m not going to give it to you quite now because we got a little bit of a board problem. We’re trying to fix that. We hope that in the next hour we’re getting to talk to some folks with the Packers and the uh Bears so that we can preview our upcoming opponents for this 2025 season. But as it stands right now, we’re having a little electronical issues here. We got some gremlins in the machinery. So, we’re going to talk to you first up. We can’t take any phone calls at the moment. If you want to hit us up on Twitter at #giants chat, I’ll have uh Matt take a look at the Twitter page. We also have the the YouTube chat open. Is that open as well? If you’re watching the stream on YouTube and the chats there, feel free to chime in with any questions, comments. You will be the monitor. I will monitor. All right, there we go. So again, you can hit us up on YouTube or through Twitter at #giant chat. We will try to do as best as we can given the circumstances that we have been handed uh this morning. Now uh of course this is the Giants podcast studio presented by Hackinack Meridian Health. Keep getting better. Got to keep remembering those things because it’s been two weeks since we’ve announced it. So got to get that back into the brain waves. The Giants did have a piece of news, actually two pieces of news over the two weeks while we were on hiatus. Let’s go to the first one involving the roster. The Giants had put uh tight end uh Darren Waller on the reserve retired list when he walked away from football a year ago. You you know if you know the story uh he had had a lot of personal issues, decided he wasn’t committed to football anymore and then went on to have a uh I guess a good music career. I don’t know. I I saw some of the videos. It didn’t do much for me. I you could call it a classify it as a lot of things. I don’t know if a good music career is exactly how I would put it. Bad news. Well, he he had a couple of videos. Hold on a second. We got to get an update from John. John, what do you got for us? Yeah, no calls. No calls today. No calls today. All right, so the phone lines are down, so stick to YouTube and stick to Twitter and and we will try to do as much as we possibly can. In the meantime, uh, Pearson, if you could hit up our two guests and let them know that we’re not going to be able to, uh, to deal with them today because we can’t get out, right? Yeah. So, we can’t get out. Our lines are completely shot right now. Oh, wait a minute. That’s actually, you know what? If we if we put our guest on speaker No, no, no. Okay. Anyway, in the meantime, uh, let’s talk about Darren Waller for a second. So, he did a few videos. Yeah, he look he put some music out. I personally consider myself, you know, a somewhat of a rap hiphop fan and much more than me. Wasn’t for me. Let’s just put it that way. Okay. So, for some reason, he has decided that he wants to play football again. All right, fine. But because Joe Shane had put him on the reserve retired list, the Giants still own the rights to him. Yep. So, good news. tells the Giants, “I think I want to play football again, but I don’t want to play in New York.” Now, from what I understand, and you got to help me here, Miami is a hip-hop hotbed, right? Is that not a hot music hotb music? Yeah, for sure. I mean, I it I don’t know if he wanted to go to Miami simply to help his music career. I think he might have just wanted to play in Miami. You know, Miami is a, you know, a fun city that a lot of people do. there. Good weather. It’s warm. You know, it does have a lively night life. If that’s what you’re looking for, I don’t know. But, okay, one way or the other, I think this was obviously great for the Giants because this was someone that all of us, to be honest, kind of forgot about for the last year cuz he’s been retired. So, the fact that the Giants were able to get anything in return for him, I think is obviously a win. And, you know, yeah, the Giants got a 2026 sixth round pick. Yes. and they gave up the rights to Darren Waller and a conditional seventh rounder in 2027 comes back to the Giants. So now if he does certain things which we don’t know by the way what those triggers are correct but now in next year’s draft the Giants have their own six round pick. They now have the Dolphins six round pick. And let’s not forget they also have the Cowboys sixth round pick because before the beginning of last se was it last season or maybe the year before the Giants traded Jordan Phillip. It was last year Jordan Phillips the defensive the veteran defensive tackle to the Cowboys and it was did nothing for them. It was a we Giants gave up their 2026 seventh round pick for the Cowboys 20276th round pick, but it was conditional in that he had to be on the Cowboys roster for two games. Well, guess what? He was on the roster for two games and then Dallas decided to cut him. But that’s all the Giants needed. So now the Giants, they don’t have a seventh round pick next year, but there’s three sixth round picks, which at least for for me and my my digital department, we love to hear that there seventh round picks cuz that’s the part of the draft that, you know, is a little difficult for us to prepare ahead of time. And yeah, I get it. And after a very long weekend, you know, you would rather have earlier picks than those very, very late picks. So I think this was, you know, obviously in the grand scheme of things, is it the most monumental trade ever? No. But to get anything for someone that was completely, you know, out of the picture, I think you chalk that up as a win. Well, it’s a good deal because if you’re the Giants, excuse me, and Joe Shane, Joe Shane is very uh much into having assets. He views every draft pick as an asset either because he thinks he’s going to get a player who might do something for him or he can use it as part of a trade. And it doesn’t matter if it’s a five, a six, or a seven, as you just mentioned. He he’s going to look at those third day picks, even those late ones, and say, “I can still do something with those.” Some GMs are a little less emphasizing of third day picks, especially later picks. Not Joe. Joe thinks the more you have, the better. 100%. I mean, we’ve seen over the years Joe loves to move up, move down the draft board. Guess what? Having more picks just makes it easier to be able to make those moves. You know, you might say, “Oh, three six round picks. Like, who cares about that?” Well, if the Giants, let’s say, are trying to move up at the start of day three, move up in the fourth round, guess what? Having those three six round picks, that is going to help them be able to move up and maybe get a player that could step right in and have a big impact. Again, we’re talking about next year’s draft, so this is towards the 2026 season. Yes. Now, obviously there’s a lot to happen between now and then, but still correct. The more picks, the marrier, and especially if you get it slightly earlier than the seventh round. I mean, again, you sign me up for that. All right, so that’s that’s the deal, right? The Dolphins get Darren Waller or the rights to Darren Waller. And by the way, the way I understood it was the Giants had given him permission to talk to Miami, make sure that they were copacetic, and that they had the fit for him, that he was willing to come back and play there. And that’s why the Giants then allowed the trade to go through. Again, they get a six and they get a conditional seven in 2027. I’d love to know what those conditions are. We’re probably not going to find those out for a while. I feel like, you know, the Rapaorts Gallo, someone will tweet it eventually, but regardless, I mean, the Giants have this the six round pick from Miami. That’s not conditional. No, no, they have their pick. Now I guess it’s he needs to fulfill certain requirements otherwise the pick I guess comes back to us but then I don’t get it then we just get a pick for nothing basically. No pick for Waller the six the sixthrounder in 26 is in stone. Yeah. Yeah. That is set and I guess whether we give up the 2027 seventh round pick depends on Waller meeting whatever conditions he needs to with Miami. Otherwise, that pick just comes back to us cuz No, it goes back to them. They’re giving it up. No, no. The Giants gave up the conditional 2027 seventh round pick. The only thing the Giants got in this trade was the 2026 sixth round pick. Look, this is okay from the website. Okay. Okay. So then I got it reversed. So if Waller does not meet whatever the requirements are, what happens to my brain when I’m not here for two weeks? It’s okay. get this out now before training camp. The day, you know, the day it was reported, it was that we the Giants were getting the two picks. Yes. The original How did this How did this change? The original the from whatever was reported right off the bat turned out to be not ex the exact terms, which is why we say all the time these reporters put out reports of deals, whether it’s trades, free agent signings, whatever. You got to wait for it to actually be announced officially. Otherwise, it’s not set in stone until the teams officially announce it. And this is a perfect case because you’re right, it was first being reported that the Giants were potentially giving up a seventh round pick as well. I was on vacation and and I gotten a note about the deal. And so I looked it up and all afternoon it was reported as Giants giving Waller to Miami for two picks. So when did it when did it change? A day or two later? 2 days later? 3 days later? That I don’t know. I was I never saw I was out of the country when this happened. Okay, so I’m not exactly sure. But yeah, I mean the terms again, I never saw an update. These are great terms for the Giants, you know. Sure they are. At the most that the Giants are giving up is a 2027 seventh round pick again because Darren Waller was not playing for the Giants again. So no, so the most the Giants are giving up in this deal is a seventh round pick in 2027. And again, if Waller does not meet whatever conditions are required to fulfill that part of the trade, then the pick comes back and the Giants basically just got a six- round pick next year for basically nothing. So again, not the biggest trade ever, but it is definitely a plus and a small W for the Giants. Oh yeah. Going next year’s draft for sure. All right, so that’s number one. Now, as far as the tight end room is concerned, there’s no doubt. You mentioned the Giants basically had not even given him another thought because he had been retired for a year. Well, you know what? This tight end room doesn’t need him. I mean, let’s be honest. Between Theo Johnson and Daniel Bellinger and Manhurz, you know, uh, Doulich, uh, the Giants, Fedoni, Giants have tight ends from here all the way down to Hoboken. I mean, they’ve got a bunch of them. So, I don’t think they needed him at all anyway. So, even if he wanted to come back and play here, I don’t know that there would have been room for him. Yeah. Look, when Darren Waller is healthy, he is a phenomenal passcatching tight end. There’s no doubt about it. The biggest thing is though, his last couple seasons playing, he was unable to stay healthy. No question. He always dealt with injuries. even when he, you know, he was starting to finally get hot with the Giants when he suffered an injury and then I believe he came back towards the end of the season. And I’ll tell you what, I still thought he was a disappointment. Yeah. Look, I mean, the Giants gave up what the 100th pick in the whatever draft 2023 2024 NFL draft for one season to Darren Wall. Clearly, they didn’t expect it to be one season. I don’t think he gave up a late third round pick for just knowing it’ll be one year. But yeah, obviously that that move did not end up playing out obviously how the Giants would have hoped, but you know, again, they’re getting some sort of asset for him now in again for a player that was long out of the picture for a year now. So, yeah, there there was no way he was suiting up for the Giants again. The Giants I it seems like the Giants are pretty, you know, pretty content with their tight end room right now. I know there’s there’s been so much buzz around Theo Johnson these last couple of months starting with Russell Wilson. I mean again we’ve spoken about this that Russell Wilson loves him and speaks about him all the time and you know the group of tight ends are part of the group that Russell Wilson I’m sure it was Russell Wilson leading the way but the Giants offense basically met last week I want to say in San Diego for a big one of those big throwing sessions. Yeah. And the tight ends were there. I believe it was Manhertz, Theo Johnson, Bellinger, and I want to say Fedoni. I’m not positive if Fedoni was there. I didn’t see the list. What I did see was that there were 18 offensive players, I believe. Yeah, I saw the group photo with Oh, I assume was all of them, if not most of them. Okay. And for sure Bellinger, Theo, and Chris Manhurst were there. I I want to say Fedoni was there as well. I’m just not 100% positive. Mhm. But yeah, the the Giants are happy with the tight end room. They want to see what Theo Johnson could do. I think they expect a pretty big season from Theo Johnson, honestly. You know, he had that foot injury last year, right as he was starting to heat up, but he’s been a full go since the start of spring practices. So, there’s no reason to believe once training camp starts next week that he won’t be fully out there participating and doing everything. And then it’s a big year too for him. And now with what we hope to be more consistent quarterback play, Theo Johnson could be the, you know, one of the players that makes the biggest jump this upcoming season. Oh, there’s no doubt he certainly could be. He has all the tools for it. Uh the other news item that kind of happened while we were gone for two weeks, Eli Manning uh and his group apparently are not going to make any attempt to bid for the 10% of the Giants. Um, which still leaves Michael Strahan and his group in play, but we don’t have any details or any information on any of that other than uh Eli apparently was on a pod or or somebody’s show and um he is no longer part of the group that’s going to be in the running. They they’ve pulled out of it. I think Eli’s quote was something about maybe it’s too expensive. Shocker. Buying a a piece of an NFL franchise too expensive. I mean, that goes for most of us. I was just going to say, I mean, you know, if there’s anybody who might be able to do it, right, but uh not not to be. So, so that was the other piece of news that came out over the last two weeks. Frankly, it was it was really slow and and that’s what you want. Now, I did see and I’m not going to go into any details on this one, but there was another fireworks issue with another player this summer. And I I I I only bring that up and I I don’t want to get into it. I I only bring it up for one reason and one reason only. Because when we tell you at the end of our programming and we go on hiatus for the summer and when we say, “Look, in all honesty, every coach and GM is scared about getting that phone call that somebody did something either accidental or foolish and it turned out to be a bad thing.” Because 95% of the time, if you get a call during this month, the early part of the month, it is bad. it’s usually not good. And lo and behold, it happened. Now, again, I don’t want to get into it because I I I don’t want to make any judgment, pass any judgment on the player who was not a New York Giant, but they’re talking about the fact that uh he had an injured eye. There seems to be some conflicting reports about how serious it is. They are, by the way, on the Giants schedule this year. They do play the Giants. This is the Chargers. That’s what I mean. Yeah. I don’t know if you said the Chargers. I purposely didn’t say because I didn’t say who, but Okay. So, yes, the Chargers do play the Giants this year and this is a predominant player. I mean, this is a name. Okay. And if for whatever reason he can’t play, yeah, that’s a big deal. Now, again, they’re not saying for sure. There seems to be some reports that says it’s not going to be that bad. He’ll be back right away. There’s others that say he might not be. So, but this is why we talk about that. It’s it’s a legit stressor for every coach and GM. Yeah. Look, the the dead period is when mini camp the period between mini camp ending and training camp starting. And we say every year all the time that is the time of year, you know, a fiveweek period as m as much as it might, you know, make our jobs discussing, you know, trying to come up with things to talk about for an hour each day a little more difficult, but that is a time period where you want no news because most of the time if you do get news, it’s not good news. Obviously, there was an exception this year. The the news about the Darren Waller trade came out of nowhere. Yeah. that was during this dead period and it ended up being a positive bit of news. But for the most part around the league, any news that comes out about a player now is not good. You know, whether it’s the fireworks issue with that player, another player got arrested this past weekend, like no good comes from someone making headlines right now. That is why you were completely right. The one thing when mini camp is over that you pray is that all your guys are just staying out of the news until training camp comes around. That’s it. And it, you know, so far at least that has been the case with the Giants. The only news has been, you know, the player offensive players getting together for a throwing session in San Diego. That is obviously perfectly okay. It’s great. But yeah, this is the time of year where you just you want everyone staying out of the news. If you want quiet, let the let the headlines start next week when the players report or even tomorrow when the rookies report. Nothing until then, which again, at least for now, has been the case with the Giants. So, we’ll take it. All right, so that’s where it is right now. Uh, we will go to YouTube. We’ve got a question from Mark Bennett. Wants to know, does trading Darren Waller save anything toward the cap? Uh, it has nothing to do with the cap. Um, this won’t uh this won’t impact the Giants finances at all. No. Now, having said that, uh, anytime that you do make a deal and it’s one of your top 51 players, yes, the cap usually does come into play in some way, shape, or form, but because he was already on the reserve retired list, it does not. Yep. no financial impact other than again when you look towards next year’s draft the Giants now have an extra six round pick to somewhat account for but right that will not be anything that Joe Shane of the front office will be thinking about at least in terms of salary capwise no until after the season until after next free agency even so it’s a while before anyone has to concern themselves with that part all right so SS also hits us up on YouTube he says who is the player that has the most pressure on them to show up in training camp? Well, I think that’s an interesting question and we could probably look at it from a lot of different angles here. Um, I I think to to be frank, the guy who’s coming in with a tremendous amount of hype and expectations, Abdul Carter. I think everybody expects him to come in and erupt right away. There’s a lot there’s a lot of hype on him and justifiable. He’s a great player. He was taken number three overall in the draft. So, I totally understand if you want to look at it from a hype perspective. Um, if you want to look at it from a more realistic perspective, I think Andrew Thomas coming off his injury, we’ve talked about this at left tackle, he is such a critical part of what the Giants do because when he has been out with injury, the offensive line has crumbled. So, there’s a tremendous amount of pressure. It may not be self-induced. Maybe he doesn’t feel it, but there’s a lot of pressure on this offensive line to do well. And Thomas is the lynch pin for sure. I mean, you and I have spoken about that countless number of times on this show. I don’t I wouldn’t put him in that category, though, only because the only thing with Andrew Thomas showing up at training camp is whether or not he’s healthy. If he’s out there, I don’t think any any of us have much concern about his level of play. No, not at all. It’s it’s just put him in bubble wrap and don’t let him get injured. Yeah. Yeah. Whether or not he actually is, you know, out there and participating fully, that is certainly a big question. I don’t that’s not how I read the question. There’s a lot of ways to look at it. The way that I please read the question is just which player needs to I guess I know they put show up, but I think they meant step up and have a strong summer training camp performance. And for me, there’s just three guys immediately that come to mind. And I don’t think it’s frankly close between these three and then the rest. start on defense because there’s only one guy on defense I think is looking at some pressure and that is Deonte Banks because he’s heading into year three. He had a a rookie year that he showed flashes of being, you know, that number one corner for the Giants and then last year did not take the year two step that the Giants and he himself probably hoped that he was going to take. So going into year three, I think he has some some pressure. I mean, the addition of Paul Sanadibbo does help take some pressure off because Paul Adibbo is the team’s number one quarterback now. They signed him to a contract. He’s getting paid to be a number one corner. He will most likely, I would think, be matching up against the other the other team’s top wide out more often than not. I don’t know if he will necessarily shadow across the field. They might just say, you know, Pollson has the left side or the right side and then Deontay Banks or Cordell Flat has the other. But Paulsonbo was clearly brought in to be the team’s number one quarterback. But Deontay Banks, you know, I think going into training camp, he is probably the favorite to be the number two quarterback, but that’s not something that’s just going to be handed to him. He’s going to have to go out and earn that other starting spot over Cordell Flat, over some of the younger guys the Giants have at quarterback. So on the defensive’s side of the ball, I get where you’re coming from with Abdul. But I guess for me, just what I saw from the spring, which as we’ve said many, many times, there’s no contact in spring, so take everything with a grain of salt. But what we did see from Abdul, I don’t have much or any concern about him. I think he’s going to come out next week and almost immediately start showing out. Yeah, it depends on the context. When you say pressure, what’s the context? Yeah, Carter’s got all this hype. That’s the pressure on him. I agree with you in terms of level of play. Banks has to. But by the same token, and you want to look at this a third way, how about Holland and Adibbo who got big money at the top of the free agent market. And if they don’t live up to the contract that they signed, that’s that’s a lot of pressure. That is a that is a fair point. That is a totally fair point. I didn’t again I guess I didn’t think of it that way because yeah there’s a lot of ways to look at this. I I took Yeah, you know, you’re right. I just took it as guys that have not maybe played up to expectations in the previous seasons and that really need to this year. So again, Deontay Banks is the the one guy in when you look at it that way, I think on the defensive side of the ball. And then there are two guys on the offensive side of the ball that fit that same exact bill. Shoot. If we’re we’ll start with the offensive line. Evan Neil obviously ma now finally made the transition from tackle to guard. There is some, you know, encouraging feelings that he will be able to succeed at least more so as a guard than he did as a tackle. We didn’t really get to see much of it in the spring because again, you don’t really get much from the line play in the spring. training camp though when the pads come on and the contact is allowed that’s going to be his first time to really show like hey not only can I succeed in this but I can thrive as a guard and you know he’s going to at least be given an opportunity to earn that starting right guard position you know it seems like it’s going to be a competition between Evan Neil Greg Van Rhoden you know you can maybe throw in even like Jake Kubas some of the other guys in that conversation but Neil’s going to be given an opportunity what he can do with that remains to be seen. But going into was it year four now after the Giants decided not to pick up his fifthear option like there’s no doubt about it. This is a very big season for Evan Neil and it’s you know the time for him to finally show that he can be a successful offensive lineman. So I would say he probably in my opinion is looking at the most pressure going into this training camp to show up. But well it’s truly a make it or break it for him. Yeah. I mean, if he’s going to be a giant and a productive giant, he’s got to do it now or it’s over. Yep. Especially because of the change in position. Yeah. You know, now is now is the time. And quite frankly, not far behind him in my opinion is Jaylen Hyatt. Who’s going into just as big of a year three as Evan Neil going into year four. You know, Jaylen Hyatt, the Giants moved up in the draft a couple years ago to take him in the third round. Last year, he had eight eight total receptions. That’s obviously not good enough for anyone. let alone someone that the Giants had plans for to be a big part of this offense. Uh I will say Jaylen Hyatt looked very good in the spring. You know, those those of us the Giants.com writers kind of all agreed that he was probably the biggest offensive standout in the spring. You know, he clearly showed that him and Russell Wilson have already developed a pretty pretty strong chemistry and pretty strong connection. But again, similar to the offensive line play, know you definitely can gain more from the wide receiver cornerback matchups. But in those matchups, the quarterbacks, there’s no press coverage. They’re not allowed to make contact with the receiver. So once training camp starts and those cornerback, wide receiver matchups can be legit matchups. you know, they can play the way that they would in an actual game. That will be a chance for Jaylen Hyatt to show that the spring, his strong performance in the spring wasn’t just a fluke and that it was the start of what we hope to be a strong year three in the Giants offense. I I totally agree with with Hyatt. Uh in fact, I probably would have put him even ahead of Neil to be honest. That’s totally fair, you know. But in any event, um, Brandon Thomas comes on our YouTube page and does comment. He thinks Jaylen Hyatt as well. And and that makes perfect perfect sense. The the only reason that I might put Hyatt over Neil, and it’s a very small reason, is because quite honestly to this point, Neil’s been kind of a a flame out. And if he doesn’t do anything, I don’t think anybody is going to be really let down by it cuz they’re not expecting much from him. At least the people outside the building. They’re not expecting much from him. They’re not expecting him to win the job. You and I are telling people that he’s in the competition. Most people outside this building don’t think he’s got a chance in heck about winning it. You know what I mean? True. But so there in that regard, yes, there’s self-imposed pressure in the building because they’d love him to be productive, but outside the building, I don’t know that any fan is going to be let down if he doesn’t win the job. I think they will be this let down and disappointed if Hyatt doesn’t do anything in his third NFL season. I agree. But, you know, going into this year, Jaylen Hyatt right now, he’s the the team’s number four receiver. Malik Neighbors is above him, obviously. Mhm. Darius Sllayen just got resigned to a multi-year contract. He’s above Hyatt and Well Robinson is the starting slot receiver. So, no doubt I kind of think that at least right now in terms of lineup wise, they’re in sort of similar positions, Neil and Hyatt, in that they’re not being penciled in as the starters at their respective positions, but they will be given an opportunity this summer to show that they deserve to at least be in the conversation for the starting lineup. I do think Evan Neil has a I guess easier path to the starting lineup than Hyatt. Sure. Because it would be tough at this point in my opinion for Hayyatt to leaprog Darius Sladen and they do have similar aspects to their game. But if Hayyatt can have a strong training camp and show that you know he’s taken a step in year three, the Giants will find ways to get him on the field and he will be given an opportunity to make an impact on the offense for sure. I may not be reading outside correctly here, but I still think that there are people outside the building who have some hope and expectation for Jaylen Hyatt. I think most Giant fans have already given up on Neil. To me, that’s the difference between the two guys. I do think there’s expectations outside a somewhat, you know, again, somewhat, I guess, uprising in uh encouragement about Neil with the move to guard. I hope so. From outside the building. I’m sorry. I’ve just, you know, too many people have just buried him already that I think in a lot of Giants fans minds he’s already forgotten. Yeah. Well, honestly, the best way to think about it now, in my opinion, is just go in with low expectation expectations and if he exceeds them, great. If not, it’s what you expected. All right, it’s dry X on YouTube says, “What do you think our floor is this season given we have the hardest schedule?” I mean, if you’re looking for a one loss record, you’re not going to get that from us because there’s no point in in predicting a number of wins or losses. I think we all in this building and and people on this show in particular believe that the roster is improved. I don’t think anybody can argue against that. This roster is better 100%. Now, how much better That’s hard to say. And then how many wins will it translate into? That’s even harder to say. So, I’m not touching that one unless you unless you have a floor you’d like to offer. No, I don’t want to give a win loss number either. You know, it just doesn’t make any sense. It’s it’s just tough because as as the commenter wrote, the Giants do going into the year have the hardest strength of schedule in terms of 2024. But as we have discussed many times, as we see every year, last year’s records mean diddly squat once the season starts because it’s a new season. So many teams go through big transformations, whether it’s the coaching staff or the rosters themselves. So last year’s record doesn’t really matter that much to be honest. No. But at the same time, if just looking at the opponents, most of the Giants opponents this year made the playoffs last year. That’s obviously tough going into the year. Tough. Thanks for reminding us. It’s just the simple facts. So I I I’m with you. I don’t want to give a a floor. I mean, it it’s it’s going to be a difficult schedule no matter how you put it. no matter how you look at it. But if the Giants can play up to their own expectations, then that difficult ma the difficult schedule won’t matter much. Here’s here’s what I will say. I will give you somewhat of an answer, and it’s a really weak one, but since you asked, I’m going to I’m going to attempt to give you a response. The floor for me is that they will be competitive well past what we’ve seen the last few years when Halloween, Thanksgiving, the Giants were already out of the race. I will say this, I do think the floor is at the very minimum we get to Thanksgiving, you’ll still be interested in looking at the standings and the scoreboard. that I will say I think the team is going to be competitive at least twothirds of the way through the season. I hope for more. I’m personally expecting more, but I’m going to say the floor is for at least twothirds of the season, you’re going to be able to sink your teeth into Giants football without having to worry about being out of it. How’s that sound? I could see that. And honestly, I think just no matter what the win loss record might be throughout the season, this is the year that I feel like everyone is going to be keeping a very close eye on the Giants the entire season because obviously we’ve spoken about Abdul Carter, but there was another first round pick the Giants made, which we don’t know when Jackson Dart will go get into the game action. We went for almost 45 minutes without mentioning his name. We don’t know when he’s going to go in. Obviously Paul and I have absolutely no idea. We can guess, but we don’t have any actual idea. It depends on how the season is going. But chances are he will get in at some point and then whenever he does get in, how he performs that’s going to obviously be a very very big storyline for the Giants and it probably there’s a good chance that it doesn’t happen until much later into the season. So even if the win loss record is not where any of us hope it is, you know, come Thanksgiving break, Thanksgiving time, there is a good chance that either he will have already gone in or the Giants will be preparing him to go in around that time if the even if the season is not going well, which will obviously keep things very entertaining for us throughout the entire season because even if the Giants win loss record, you know, is not that great this year, if Jackson Dart goes goes in, even if it’s for the last month of the season, the last four games after the bye-week, if he comes in and plays well and looks really strong, that will give all of us so much confidence going into next year that this team is ready to take a really big step up. Obviously, we hope it comes this year, but the development of Jackson Dart is one of the most important things. It’s huge. Even if it’s not till the very end of the season, it’s huge. Jeff Smith wants to know, “What will the rookies do next week besides getting weighed and running around in shorts, helmets, and t-shirts?” Paul. Okay, Jeff. Uh, not a whole lot. They’ll get acclimated. Uh, that’s what this is about. This is about getting them back in here this week. They come in tomorrow, okay? And they will slowly be weaned into the process of being a rookie NFL player. It’s just that simple. Uh, next week on the 22nd, the Giants players, the veterans, the rest of the roster is required to report. They will go through conditioning drills, conditioning tests, and then the following day, they will then get out on the field. Now, here’s what I can tell you because this is not a secret. Um, we’re not allowed to give you all the practice plans for the training camp that we cannot do. But what I can tell you is because this is common knowledge around the NFL, that first week of training camp, nobody is in full pads. Nobody. All right? We’re talking shirts, shorts, possibly uh uh shells by the end of the week. Maybe that’s the the half shoulder pads on top of the shoulders. That’s it. So that first week, again, it’s the 22nd is Tuesday, right? The 22nd is next Tuesday. Okay. 22nd is Tuesday. So there will not be any fully padded practices until the following week. That we can tell you because that’s common place around the NFL. Nobody practices in full pads that first week. So, I don’t know if that kind of answers your question, Jeff, but that’s what we’re looking at. I I will tell you though, I believe some of the rookies already came in today. Not not to officially report, but they’re they’re doing they’re doing some work in the weight room and and stuff of that nature as they get some of their conditioning stuff done. Yeah, tomorrow is the big report day for them. the whole rookie class will will be in the building, which will be good, like you said, to kind of just get them back in the groove a a week prior to the rest of the team showing up. Uh yeah, I’m just ready for this to start. Yeah, tell me about it. Tell me about it. All right, so anyway, uh that’s where we are. Oh, let’s see. Oh, we got a couple more questions here. I’m sorry I didn’t see these a moment ago. Uh Darren Andreoli says, “Why is Evan playing left guard instead of right guard?” Well, John Renan uh was still coming off injury. Remember, he got hurt at the end of last season. And because he was kind of unavailable, they’re bringing all the injured guys along very slowly with a very, very turtlike schedule. Uh during the course of the offseason program, Renan wasn’t doing his usual stuff at left guard. Not his usual stuff. He did get in a little bit though. It’s not like he was completely I just want because there were other guys that we saw that did not participate at all in teams like neighbors like Andrew Thomas. Renian did get in a little bit. So very not a lot but minuscule some action at least a little bit. The point is they had to find ways to get those snaps done in in drills and in and in in uh the practices. So, with all that extra snap time available at left guard, Neil did a lot of work in there. Yeah, pretty simple. All right, let’s see. Uh, Voluone says, “I hope we find our identities on defense and offense this season and then build upon that. We have to be realistic and build the team the right way.” Well, uh, I don’t know that anybody would disagree with that. I mean, what did we hear from the coaches? I want to say both Dable Was it Michael who also said at CFKA or was it only Shane Bowen? I’m I’m going to, you know, jog your memory here for just a second. But at least two of the three coordinators talked about how they did pile a lot of stuff on to these guys during the off season as coaches usually will do because they want to know how much these fellas can retain. Um, I got the impression, especially when Dable was talking about Dart, that they really stressed him out by giving him a lot to lift and he did a pretty good job of retaining stuff, at least at that point. Yeah. I mean, at least the first part, Jackson Dart himself said that the team gave him a whole lot and that at the very beginning he felt, you know, maybe a little bit overwhelmed, but then he very quickly was able to adapt and pick things up. and he said it wasn’t long before he was just feeling very comfortable in this offense, which is obviously very great and encouraging thing to hear from a rookie, you know, going into a completely new system. But yeah, just going going to the question Vlone put, yeah, this is completely right. You know, having to be realistic is the biggest thing I take from this comment because let’s like to be realistic, the Giants won four games last year. You can’t expect to go from four wins to, you know, 14 wins overnight. Well, three three wins. Sorry. That’s all right. Yes. Three wins to 14 overnight. We’re both rusty today. You have It’s building It’s a process to build a team the right way. And I do have a lot of confidence that that is what is have been being done the last couple of offseasons and I do think the team is will take a step in the right direction. Now will that be as big of a step as some fans probably hope? May maybe not but I do think that we will be taking a step in the right direction on both offense and defense. I think the identity of this team and the strength of this team is going to lie within the defense. I don’t think that’s, you know, me going out on the stretch. Don’t forget special teams. Special teams as well. That’s going to be a major factor. That was clearly an emphasis in the offseason without a doubt based on some of the free agents that the Giants brought in who are known for being special teams aces. So clearly, you’re right, cannot overlook special teams. But it, you know, I think it’s fair to say the strength of this team probably will will lie in its defense cuz this defense has the potential to legitimately be among the best in the NFL this year. I’m not saying it will be. It has the potential if each level of the defense plays up to, you know, what they easily can play up to. It’s not like I’m saying that, you know, players X, Y, and Z all need to make big jumps in order for the defense to play well. If the guys just play up to what like their like baseline is, the defense will take a big step from where it was last year. And some guys outperform maybe just that baseline expectations, then this ch the unit has a chance to be something really special. And on offense, again, a lot of the pieces of on the offense are the same as last year, which I know has some fans a little concerned, but they revamped the most important position on the field, which is the quarterback position. There was so much work done. You know, we’ve spoken about it endlessly for months now. We don’t have to go into it again, but the whole quarterback room is going to be completely different from last year. You know, right now there’s four guys. The only one that’s returning from last year is Tommy Devito. And we don’t even know for sure if Tommy Devito will be on the roster come week one. That is true. There’s a chance that all three quarterbacks could be different from last year. So that is a monumental change. And then the other part is just having a healthy offensive line, which you know, we still don’t know for sure if if everyone will be back in time for week one where he can’t make any guarantees. But if Andrew Thomas is back and starting at left guard, left tackle week one, and the rest of the guys who seem to be on pace to be starting week one, I mean, the only one I guess would maybe be in question is running, but the fact that he was out there at all in the spring makes me think he should be okay for the start of the season. The offensive line, the first six weeks of the season, outside of the week one disaster against the Vikings, they were solid. It wasn’t an elite offensive line, but it also wasn’t one of the worst offensive lines. It was kind of middle of the pack, which if the Giants were to get middle of the pack play from the offensive line this year with the addition of Russell Wilson at quarterback, what’s my magical word? Functional. Functional. That’s the magical word. Functional offensive line. Functional offensive line. That’s all you need to have. Which if Andrew Thomas is healthy, I have no reason to believe that this line won’t be functional. Yep. And now that might be a big if because we don’t know what the status of Andrew Thomas is. But if he is out there and the rest of the starters are out there with him, I don’t see how this won’t be at least a functional offensive line, which is all this offense needs to take a big big step from where it was last year. Now AJS, and I guess that’s an abbreviation. I don’t think it’s AJ’s. I think it is AJS. As we’re going to the playoffs, teams unproven due to how young they are. This will be a great showcase to see what we can see. He lists Cam, Tyrone, Neighbors, and our dual vertical tight ends. We can score points. I don’t know who Cam is. Is there a Cam on this offense? Scaboo. Oh, okay. I I still still call him Cameron. I don’t call him Cam. He’s Cameron. He goes by Cam Scab. He does go by Cam, but I I kind of know him as Cameron. All right. But okay. I got to ask I got to ask him what he wants to be called, by the way, because a lot of people call him scat. Yeah, that’s true. That’s the other problem. So, uh, in any event, yes, uh, you’re right. This this offense certainly has a lot of ability. They still got to be able to put it together. And obviously, it goes back to the offensive line because that’s the foundation of everything you do on offense. If that line does not jail correctly and become functional, all this other stuff doesn’t matter. Yeah. I mean, look, outside of Malik Neighbors last year, there’s no one else on the offense that you could say. I mean, I guess Tyrone Tracy had a pretty good year as well, but Yeah. Well, Tracy had a good year. He’s not he’s not a headache player. No, but like outside of those two, like no one else you can really say in the Giants offense had a good year of the playmakers. And a big part of that was because the poor quarterback play, which at least in part was due to just inconsistent offensive line play. If the offensive line can just again give you functional play out there, that’s going to make that’s going to raise the floor of this offense because that means that’s going to allow Russell Wilson time to operate in the offense. And we all know he’s been doing it long enough. given some time in the in the back field, Russell Wilson will will be able to operate this offense and have it again is a functional unit for sure. And talking about all these young players, you get solid functional offensive line play that’s going to allow all of these playmakers the opportunity to truly showcase their capabilities. Without the offensive line play, none of those guys are going to have the time or the opportunities to show anything. Well, a Rothman 12 asks on YouTube biggest question going into training camp and doesn’t it always have to be the offensive line until they prove otherwise for over a decade now. I mean that’s just a given. I will say that if again it could be a big if but if the unit is healthy going into this year it will likely be the most confident I felt about the offensive line at least in a while. Mhm. But again, I’m going to have to wait and see Andrew Thomas out there before I can really say that I I feel comfortable with the the one thing that that Joe Shane, the GM, has said time and time again during this off season, he continues to talk about how many bodies they brought in. He’s a big believer, at least right now, that the Giants have numbers there. They for sure do. That’s that’s what he’s hanging his hat on. They’ve got numbers. We don’t know how these guys are going to play out, but he knows he’s got numbers. Let’s see what happens. Yeah. Like look, one of the biggest competitions in training camp to watch will be how does the bottom of the offensive line depth chart play out. And for and for the first time in a in a while, there will be guys competing and there could be guys that don’t make it that will then get picked up by other teams. In years past, when the Giants decided, you know, this offensive lineman’s the first guy out. Mhm. Most of the time that guy did not get picked up by another team, right? And there’s a reason for it. The depth along the offensive line is certainly better than it has been in years. That was clearly a priority. I mean, James Hudson was one of the first moves the Giants made in free agency, and that’s not to be a starting starting lineman. They brought him in to be a very solid backup at tackle. Stone Foresight was another pickup they made pretty early on. Brought Aaron Stiny back. You know, Marcus Bo was used on with the fifth round pick. The Giants prioritize just like they, you know, we talked earlier with bringing in some special teams aces. Clearly having depth along the offensive line so there wouldn’t be a situation like there was last year or even the last two years. Clearly that was a priority for Joe Shane in the front office this off seasonason. All right, we got a couple of more quarterback comments here. Uh Vone says he’s talking about Jackson Dart says he just wouldn’t want to throw him in early when you have Jameus Winston uh and you also have Tommy Cutlets. I like how the Packers handled love at quarterback. had some inconsistencies last year for sure. Did love, but but they’re hoping things will be better this year. And then Brandon Thomas also says he’s speaking to the quarterback room. With Tommy Devito being the only one in the room who knows this offense, what would it be like for this room to go through the season without a system knowledgeable quarterback? Uh he is saying that he assumes Devito doesn’t make it through waiverss. He can’t see the team keeping four QBs on the roster. Well, we’ve told you all along there’s not going to be four on the 53. That’s just impractical. It does not make any sense. I happen to believe, I think you agree, if Dvito gets waved, if if there’s nothing un out of the ordinary that happens, the three quarterbacks on the 53 are going to be Dart and Winston and and Wilson. That’s it. They’re not gonna they’re not going to keep a fourth on the 53. That’s not going to happen. So, if those three guys are fine, Devito is going to get waved. Unless somebody trades for him, he’s going to get waved. Then you got to worry about him getting picked up. I absolutely believe he will get picked up and he’s not going to be able to come back on the practice squad. If he does, hallelujah. I’d be thrilled to see it. I just don’t think he makes it back. I agree. I think he’s won enough games as, you know, a third string quarterback these last two years to deserve a spot on an NFL roster, but given the work that the Giants have done on the quarterback room this off season, barring something unforeseen, I am with you. I don’t think it’s going to be, you know, on this roster. Again, barring some unforeseen changes, which we see every year, that could easily happen. But you know what would it be like for the room to go through the season without a system knowledgeable quarterback? Well, let’s not forget while he is new, Russell Wilson is not new to the NFL. No, he is just about as veteran of a quarterback as you could bring in and has a reput very very, you know, positive reputation around him as a leader and someone that is able to pick up offenses. I mean, this is now his fourth team. Yeah. But here’s here’s the other thing. He’s almost 15 years in the league and Winston I think is like in the league for 11 years. Winston was 2015 NFL draft. Okay. So, you know, you’re talking about between the two guys that’s two dozen years of experience and it’s guys that have already, you know, switched teams and have already been able to pick up new offenses. I mean, we’ve we saw Russell Wilson moved first to first it was Denver. Yeah. And then it was Pittsburgh. And you know, obviously that first season in Denver was not good. No. But that was that the blame does not fully go on Russell Wilson for that. And you know, let me let me say something about Wilson. I want to I want to just put pause one second here because I want to interject this. Most fans think that he was a disaster in Denver. He was not a disaster in his second year in Denver. No, no, not at all. Yeah. The first season was overall a disaster. Everything about the Broncos was messed up. But that second season in Denver, it wasn’t that he was terrible. He got benched because of the injury clause in his contract. Yeah. You know, a lot of folks are under this perception that his two years in Denver were a mess and oh, he he was terrible. He got benched. Nobody wanted him. That’s not what happened. He played well his second year in Denver. He was benched because of an injury clause much like the Giants had the same situation with Daniel Jones. They didn’t want to have to pay guaranteed money the following season. So that you got to keep him out of the lineup because if he gets hurt hurt, you’re on the hook for an injured player. And he’s he still started 15 games that year. This we’re only talking about the very last two games of the season that he did not play. And in those 15 games that year, 26 touchdowns to eight interceptions. Tell me you wouldn’t take that. I would sign up for that in a heartbeat. Are you kidding? Absolutely. So yeah, I’m with you. The second season was not bad at all. just it was clear that was Shawn Peyton’s first season in Denver. It was clear that he had already decided in the offseason that the team was going to move on from Russell Wilson. They wanted to bring in a quarterback in the draft which they ended up selecting Bon Knicks and and all that. But yeah, him getting benched that year had nothing to do with his level of play cuz I’m with you, he was very solid in that second season as Denver. And he was solid last year in his first season with the Steelers in a very heavy run first offense where reports have come out since that there may not have been the best connection between him and the offensive play caller, which you know could have also played a role in, you know, the passing yards maybe not being as high as some people would like. But Russell Wilson has shown that he is able to go to a new team and pick up the offense pretty quickly and get comfortable with it. Yep. So if if Tommy Devito ends up not being on the 53man roster and the Giants have three quarterbacks that are in their first year in the system in Brian Dable and Mike Kfka system, that does not concern me because they also have had all offseason. All three of the, you know, Russell Wilson and James Winston have been on this team since March. Jackson Dart joined a month later. you know, it’ll be months that they’ve had to learn the whole playbook, have meetings with Brian Dable and Mike Cafka, Shay Tierney, get everyone on the same page. So, if that ends up being the case where the Giants have three new quarterbacks in their quarterback room, which seems like the likely scenario, that does not concern me at all. And I think it also helps that your offensive coordinator is a former quarterback himself and knows the position. So all of that I think helps me feel pretty confident in that having a quarterback that you know is beyond year one in this offense that won’t really matter come the start of the season. These QBs have actually talked about the fact that Kfka was a QB and they like that. They love that. Yeah, that’s big. So that’s not just talk. That’s something that they’re they’re actually believing in. A couple items as always. The Giants TV uh app is available. It’s free. You can get all kinds of nice fun things on there and some highlights. It is uh always there on all of your iPhones and all of your Androids if you want to download the Giants TV mobile app. Giant season ticket memberships for the 2025 season are also available. You can catch the season here at Metife Stadium as well as during non-game days. All you have to do is go to giants.com/tick to get information about your membership. The Giants huddle has a ton of interviews. John did a bunch before we went on break. They have been pumping them out like left and right uh on the website. What is up there right now? Do you know? I don’t know if it’s been posted yet, but I sometime today if it’s not already up, there will be John’s conversation with some of the edge rushers. Mhm. Uh I forgot exactly who cuz I know there’s at least one of them is getting his own standalone interview that’s dropping I believe tomorrow, which is Brian Burns. Okay. today would be several of the other edge rushers, maybe Kavon and someone else. I’m not sure if it’s up yet, but yeah, John sat down with a couple of the edge rushers that will be going up today. Oh, it is up. Okay, it is okay. What do you got? Let’s see real quick. Uh, it just says Giants edge rushers. Everything about this day has been discombobulated. We are totally thrown off course by being out of practice for two weeks. So, we do apologize for that. But also on Friday over the weekend, we d uh released the latest episode of the drive, which has been Sean O’Hara sitting down or going on a little drive with some of the assistant coaches. On Friday, we posted Marquan Emanuel who’s in charge of the DBs, talking about all the the team’s DBs, expectations for the group. And I believe the next one, which is either going today or tomorrow, will be Liddell Betts, the running back’s coach, talking about that room. So, those have been very interesting and entertaining to watch and kind of we don’t get to hear much from the assistant coaches. We don’t hear them from them too often, especially sort of in-depth interviews like this. So, I highly recommend giving those a watch. Okay, folks. We hope to have all of our technical difficulties squared away by tomorrow uh when you come back to Big Blue Kickoff Live. It’s presented by Cadillac, the official luxury vehicle of the New York Football Giants. As always, you can catch an archive of the show on the Giants mobile app, podcast platforms everywhere, and at giants.com/mpodcasts. We have come to you from the Giants podcast studio presented by Hackinack Meridian Health. Keep getting better. That’ll do it for today’s show, folks. Thanks for sticking with us. Thanks for your patience. For Matt, I’m Paul. We’ll see you again next time.

Paul Dottino and Matt Citak discuss everything you need to know going into Giants training camp and take fan questions from the comments. Presented by Cadillac.

00:00 – Latest news
15:00 – Fan Questions
23:00 – Camp players preview
31:00 – Season predictions
49:15 – Quarterbacks

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