The fourth week of training camp has come and gone for the New York Giants, and summer is beginning to wind down. Before we know it, it will be fall and the Giants will be bracing for a Week 1 battle against the Dallas Cowboys.
But before we get there, there’s much that needs to be settled in East Rutherford. And over the past week, a clearer picture of this team has begun to come into focus.
Here’s a look at 10 things we learned during Week 4 of training camp.
Daniel Jones has poise
For much of the summer and during a Week 1 preseason game against the New York Jets, rookie quarterback Daniel Jones faced little to no adversity.
In a Week 2 preseason game against the Chicago Bears, that changed in dramatic fashion as Jones lost two fumbles — one on an exchange from center Jon Halapio and the second on a strip-sack.
Jones could have let the miscues eat him alive, but instead, he channeled his inner Eli Manning and just moved on, finishing the day 11-of-14 for 161 yards and one touchdown.
“I don’t think he ever took a snap under center in college. That’s just part of the growing, but he didn’t panic. He dropped the ball a couple times, but he didn’t call his parents. He just went back to work and did a good job at getting us in the endzone,” head coach Pat Shurmur told reporters following the game.
A strong arm, accuracy, a short memory and poise. It’s hard not to like the entire package that is Daniel Jones.
Eli Manning is still the man
As impressive as Jones has been throughout training camp and over the first two preseason games, Manning has been that much more impressive.
Manning has sported a stronger arm, improved accuracy and an unprecedented fire since the moment the team returned to East Rutherford this spring. And if there had been any QB competition, the two-time Super Bowl MVP ended it in short order.
While some may continue to push the narrative that a battle rages or that there’s some sort of power struggle behind the scenes, the reality is that things are as clear as day. Just let Shurmur tell it.
“John [Mara] owns the team, right? We’re on the same page. There is really not much more to say. I think I’ve been saying it all along. I just get a sense once in a while that when I answer those questions nobody believes me. Well you heard it from the owner,” Shurmur told reporters on Friday night.
From co-owner John Mara to general manager Dave Gettleman to Shurmur to offensive coordinator Mike Shula, no one has wavered. Manning is the man in New York still.
Saquon is always looking out for teammates
Although healthy, Saquon Barkley has been relegated to cheerleader this preseason. The Giants don’t want him injured prior to Week 1, so Barkley has passed time whipping the crowd into a frenzy, coaching up his teammates and looking out for them when they slip.
Such was the case in a Week 1 preseason game against the Chicago Bears when rookie running back Jonathan Hilliman broke the goal line for his first-ever NFL touchdown.
However, Hilliman got lost in the moment and tossed his souvenir football to the side.
Luckily, Barkley was there to save the day, gathering up and returning the football to Hilliman along with some sage advice.
“I was in the moment and I should’ve kept it,” Hilliman said, via NJ Advance Media. “I just kind of flicked it.
“That’s a good guy. He got it for me and said, ‘This is a special moment. Congratulations, man. Continued success, don’t let it stop you or get your head too big, keep fighting, and you’ve definitely got some respect around here.'”
Edge, OL and RB all have a heartbeat
After a Week 1 preseason victory over the Jets, there were some legitimate concerns surrounding the Giants’ ability to rush the passer, protect the quarterback and rush the ball behind Barkley.
Against the Bears, those concerns subsided. In some cases, substantially.
With Barkley again sitting out, the likes of Rod Smith, Paul Perkins and Jonathan Hilliman broke out to the tune of 133 yards and one touchdown — all while averaging more than 4.1 yards per carry. Beyond that, they all displayed a knowledge of their pass protection assignments and an ability to pick up the blitz.
Meanwhile, the starting offensive line was dominant, with Mike Remmers, Kevin Zeitler and Will Hernandez all supplying “wow” moments. Behind them, the likes of Chad Slade and Nick Gates also stepped up and played well.
Finally, the pass rush showed some signs of coming to life as Markus Golden, Oshame Ximines and Olsen Pierre all recorded sacks, while several others were credited with QB hits and/or pressures.
Hustle defines these Giants
You often see players slacking throughout the preseason — even those fighting for a roster spot — but not these Giants. Not this year.
Wide receiver Alonzo Russell is the prime example, having chased down a Bears defender following an interception of quarterback Alex Tanney that was undoubtedly going back for a touchdown.
Russell’s hustle showed up again later in the game when he raced down the field to cause a fumble on a kickoff return, but he wasn’t the only player out there getting after it.
Several other players made their presence felt with hustle plays, including Nick Gates. He laid out to recover a fumble, while Lorenzo Carter ducked under a defender in order to draw a holding penalty.
Ball security is an unexpected issue
The Giants may have defeated the Bears soundly on Friday night, but there were some concerning issues that came out of the game. Chief among them was a lack of ball security.
In the 32-13 victory, the Giants fumbled four times (losing two), dropped three passes, had a dropped interception, a muffed punt and a poor center-quarterback exchange between Manning and Jon Halapio.
The morning after, a very displeased Shurmur addressed ball security.
“I thought we were loose with the football,” Shurmur said. “We dropped a punt, we had a chance at an interception which we didn’t get, we did cause a couple of fumbles, which was good, but on the flip side, Daniel Jones had two fumbles, Rod Smith had one, we had three drops, and then Eli (Manning) had a little exchange problem. That was not up to our standards. Those are all correctable, every one of those, and those are the things that we will continue to focus on as we go through camp.”
Kamrin Moore should return soon
Giants safety Kamrin Moore remains on the Commissioners Exempt List due to an investigation into an alleged domestic violence incident, but that could soon come to an end.
A New Jersey judge dismissed an order of protection against Moore stemming from an incident in July in which a woman claims Moore stepped on her throat and knocked her unconscious.
Court papers say “the plaintiff’s allegation of domestic violence has not been substantiated,” and the New York Post reports the entire case could get tossed in the near future.
If that happens, Moore will return from suspension, although it may be too late in the game for him to earn a roster spot.
Giants are clever with bookkeeping
The Giants unexpectedly released tight end Scott Simonson last week, but they didn’t really. Rather, general manager Dave Gettleman made a strange adjustment to Simonson’s contract that required him to be cut and re-signed within the course of seconds.
Dan Duggan of The Athletic explains:
Simonson, whose phone happened to break at that exact moment, got a chuckle out of the entire thing.
“I was a little nervous at first when my agent said, ‘The Giants want to do this,'” Simonson told NJ Advance Media. “But it was no skin off my back. It sounds much more complicated than it actually was. I didn’t miss any meetings or anything.
“My agent even said they gave me an option. It wasn’t a must that I had to do it. They weren’t going to release me if I didn’t do it. I did it because it helped them out.”
Punting job may be wide open
The Giants are determined to get a little Jeff Feagles out of their punter in 2019, and many assumed that would come by way of Riley Dixon.
“Riley did some things in the offseason to work on his consistency and his ball striking, he’s doing a good job, he’s getting better with his directional punting and he’s a young talented guy and he’s doing a really good job, he really is,” special teams coordinator Thomas McGaughey said earlier this month. “He’s working hard at it and we’re just trying to put him in a position to where he can replicate it time after time after time and be like a Jeff Feagles in the long run.”
But perhaps Dixon isn’t the guy.
Although Ryan Anderson had appeared to be performing at a high level, the Giants replaced him in the competition early last week, claiming Johnny Townsend off of waivers from the Oakland Raiders and releasing Anderson.
Townsend was a fifth-round pick of the Raiders in the 2018 NFL Draft following a record-breaking career at Florida. He was even likened to Shane Lechler and Marquette King courtesy of Raiders head coach Jon Gruden.
This battle is worth keeping an eye on.
John Mara fully supports Dave Gettleman
Giants GM Dave Gettleman continues to take heat from just about everyone and anyone this summer, but it hasn’t swayed co-owner John Mara’s opinion one little bit.
Despite several controversial and suspect moves, Mara maintains that Gettleman’s historical success proves he’s a man that knows what he’s doing, and a man who has courage in his convictions.
“I think the best thing for me about Dave is he makes decisions that he feels are in the best interest of the franchise and he doesn’t give a damn what people think about it, be it the media, or be it fans, or anybody. He has the courage of his convictions, and you have to have that,” Mara told reporters on Tuesday. “He’s set about to try and rebuild this team and change the culture a bit in the locker room. I think, as I said before, our last two draft classes were pretty strong, and that’s what gives me confidence going forward. I think we’re moving in the right direction. Again, until we start winning games, it’s hard to sell people on that notion, but that’s what I believe.
“I wouldn’t say I had any — there was never any doubt in Dave’s ability or in what his motivation was, or what his skill level was. You don’t like to see all that talent go out the door, but let’s face it, we had one winning season in ’16 and the other five or six years, nothing, not since we won the last Super Bowl, so we needed some drastic changes. Again, he had the courage of his convictions, he knew they would be unpopular moves, but he went and made them anyway.”
