New Jersey Opens for Sports Training

So the Governor of New Jersey has opened to the state for Sports Training. That clearly means that training camp can happen, but can the players start training at the complex again?  Or do they have to wait on the league and the union?  Interesting, but they can stop worrying about finding a place to have training camp.

Joe Judge Hires Another Sabanite

Joe Judge has plucked another coach from the Saban Tree. Nick Williams, was an Alabama WR when Joe Judge was coaching there and since has followed in his father's footsteps.  Nick father is long time Saban Assistant Bobby Williams who was Joe Judge's direct boss during his Alabama years. Nick had spent the last three years coaching WR's at SIU. His Giant job is being listed as Seasonal Assistant or O. Sounds like a tryout or maybe a favor. Or maybe  Judge realizes he's got a loaded staff and could start losing guys after one year and wants to have some guys he can promote,

New York Opening for Team Training

New York will open to sports team training on Tuesday How this will effect the Yankees, Knicks Giants and Rangers will be up to the leagues and unions. That said, this definitely gives the Giants and option to hold training camp in New York State, perhaps in Albany or at one of their other past campuses.  The Yankees train in Tampa, so that's just waiting for an agreement.  The Knicks might be able to do some things, and the Rangers might want to consider traveling back to the area as a playoff structure should get locked into place this coming week.

It will be interesting to see how quickly the Giants can get out there. It's been insanity since everything went virtual

This Week on the Blog

This is the end of another sports less week. Leon Rose is apparently building a formidable front office - which will be a refreshing change. And the NFL told teams to keep keeping it distant till at least the end of the month. Baseball and Hockey really seem to be taking their time coming back. Let's look at what could be next.

Yankees: The Yankees are just twiddling their thumbs while MLB and the players union slowly iron out all the issues arising from an 82 game schedule where some home teams will need road homes. The Yanks will only have 3 picks in the 6/10-6/11 5 round draft, and limits on what they can do afterward. Still raw about that. Hopefully their IFA class is again robust with high end talent. We'll talk a little more about the Yankees down this post.

Giants: DeAndre Baker's legal issues are winding their way through the system, and the Giants are obviously very much concerned. They have been collecting CB's, but Baker was their only first and is a very similar guy to Bradberry, who could really help him if he can play. They're still waiting on Markus Golden to either sign with them or sign elsewhere.  And they should be getting a deal done with Leonard Williams any time now. He's worth nowhere the franchise tag he'll be paid if they don't.

Rangers: The Rangers, like the Yanks, are waiting for the League to finalize a  plan. Then they'll go.  They have 19 picks over the next 2 draft so whenever the NHL announces that they're going to really keep building - even if they are involved in the 24 team playoffs,

Knicks: Rose is adding impressive executive pieces and seemingly jettisoning the flotsam. That's a huge step in the right direction. But there is a huge brand problem they still have to connect.  Ever notice how the Yanks and Rangers are the most desired destinations for both big league free agents, like Panarin and Cole, as well as amateurs like Fox and Dominguez? Even the Giants,  can get whomever they want when there's cap room, and that's why it's surprising that Williams hasn't re-upped.  But the Knicks - oh those Knicks - the Knicks have been shutout twice in the past 10 years.  First with LeBron and then again last year with the Durant. Why is Yankee, Ranger and Giant money so much more valuable?  Heck, Panarin took LESS to sign with the Rangers, and even with the Rangers strong system and 19 upcoming picks - college free agents were willing to sign with them,  The Knicks can't get into that position until they - at least - have a plan. Rose has now hired the guys who can formulate said plan.  Let's see if it's marketable, because they'll have lots of cap room again whenever the suspended season ends - and picks,

So there it is, no games and just logistics. Hope you're finding some fun. Have a great holiday weekend - even if your in the 10th week of only weekend.

Leon Rose is Hiring Frank Zanin

Early yesterday it seemed like the Knicks were just riding out the lockdown.  Since then Leon Rose has thoroughly remade both the amateur and pro scouting departments. Walt Perrin, who was announced yesterday, will run the draft and amateur scouting. Frank Zanin, a Philly guy like Rose, will run pro scouting and recommend or dismiss freea gents. These guys are both likely to get assistant GM posts.  And Brock Aller will run the cap. It's interesting that these hires are being made while Perry is still the GM. They are supposed to be culture changers, but right now, the Knicks have a pretty cluttered culture.

This Week on the Blog

Okay, last week, a one time Yankee GM died, a Giant got arrested, the Rangers chilled, and the Knicks did nothing. Let's take a look at what could be coming up this week.

Yankees: MLB could reach a deal on a return any day now. That would be huge for our country - but honestly - MLB has not lead the way as it should have and might have under a real commissioner.  Instead, they've wined and needlessly truncated their annual rule 4 draft - when the could have turned it into a much bigger event. The NFL draft garnered record ratings for their virtual draft and the other leagues should have done likewise. Baseball used to lead the way. Now it's Football.

Giants: Deandre Baker gor arrested for armed robbery. This is horrible, but will not put Dave Gettleman in danger for trading up for him last year. The reasoning?  Because he was able to first draft a franchise QB without trading up, and then was able to grab a possible impact defender at 17.  So he was playing with house money when he traded up for Baker, and he probably favored Baker because he profiled like a better version of Bradberry, whom he's drafted with the Panthers.

By the way, something like this shouldn't  happen again, given the amazing connections Coach Judge and his staff and their willingness to use them.  The Giants have drafted Lorenzo Carter, Deandre Baker and Andrew Thomas from Georgia over the past 3 drafts. But only Thomas was drafted with have consultation from Joe Judge who is very friendly with Georgia Coach Kirby Smart. It seems like the Giants might have grabbed the falling Baker without consulting Smart. If you have watched The Art of Coaching, which is a documentary about Belichick and Saban, there is a whole section about coaches who don't call Saban before taking one of his players - and some don't have Saban's blessings.  That likely happened with DG, Shurmer and the Baker pick.  It won't happen with Judge.

The League could announce new guidance as soon as today.

Rangers: The NHL seems to be making progress on restart that will feature a 24 team playoff format. The Rangers would be one of those 24 teams and it would give them super valuable experience, while possibly taking them out of the draft lottery. Hopefully, they won't change the draft rules, but luckily, the Rangers still have 2 firsts and 2 thirds and could possibly move up.

Knicks: Leon Rose doesn't seem to be doing much. The Lakers are already working out, no Knick news.

UPDATE: I spoke too soon - the Knicks are finalizing a deal to hire Walt Perrin, the Jazz VP of Player Personnel. He'll be an assistant GM for the Knicks and has a great rep as a talent scout.

Stay safe, but seriously, let's get our sports back..Be well.

Giant Trouble

For those of us who envisioned having two long armed CB's on the outside of Graham's initial Giant Defense it seems we may be out of luck. That said, this blog believes in the due process and the presumption of innocence, so we won't try to adjudicate anything here. For those of use who felt the Giants been throwing too many picks at CB's, let's now be grateful that they have.  Also, there are still a number of FA CB's who could be willing to sign a one year deal - if the new staff is unimpressed by what's in the pantry.  Sam Beal has had some moments, and it's completely possible that he can pick up the system.  Ballantine and recently drafted Chris Williamson could are also full sized CB's who could compete on the outside.

So, the first advantage is that this happened now. The second advantage is that it's a new system  for everyone, so the Giants won't be losing an experienced player if Baker is banned, suspended or cut.  Third, as mentioned before, there are place holders available and the Giants were probably going to draft another CB or two next year anyway - because that's what they do.

Some people are upset that the Giants traded up for a guy who may be a criminal.  He was gang affiliated when drafted, so they really had no idea that anything like this could happen. Also, and can we stop using the term draft capital?  It's always and only a pretentious way to say, "picks."  So, yeah, they sunk multiple picks on Baker and missed out on some OL's - which a lot of us thought they were moving up to take before Baker was announced.  Anyway, since draft was capped, all picks are devalued, and and mistakes are, necessarily, smaller than they once were.  Still is it could to gamble on a starting corner - yes.

Finally, the supplemental draft is coming up - likely in July - and one of the laws of the universe is that DG will use a third before next year's draft. Now, it will likely be used on a CB, if there's another Beal type in the supplemental.  Hopefully, there's a C.

Baseball Could Be Back in Early July

The owners have agreed on a plan that will be submitted to the players tomorrow. The plan would have an 82 game regular season of regional play.  Rosters would be increased to 30 men, from 25, with another 20 players as a taxi squad. It's unclear what will happen to the minor leagues. But there will be 7 playoff teams from each league, and a universal DH, which we have knew was starting eventually.  The season would start in early July. I've been guessing 4th of July weekend all along.

The players will have to agree tomorrow, and that, as always will depend on dollars. But, they must want to play.  Get er done!

This Week on the Blog

Alright, Baseball screwed us all, but we'll get to that.  The Yanks did nothing, the Giants kept their virtual offseason going, the Rangers signed Tyler Wall, and the current Knicks did nothing. Let's take a look at what's coming up.

Yankees: The Yanks are being victimized once again by MLB. MLB announced that their annual Rule 4 draft will only be 5 rounds long, with limits on the signings of UDFA's. The Yankees only have 3 picks, thanks to free agent activity. They knew that was be the case, what they didn't know was that they would have an additional 35 rounds to uncover gems and backfill the calculated risk they took in signing Cole.

The NFL garnered record ratings when it executed it's virtual draft last month. Now baseball is dialing their's way back and that seems both self-defeating and cowardly. Also, it puts to waste a year of hard work by scouts and their support and destroys the chances for a few thousand kids who've spent their lives playing for a chance at the annual draft. The NHL looks like they will follow the NFL model, and also eat MLB's lunch.

Giants: The Giants continued their virtual offseason program as the NFL announced their schedule. Coach Judge continued praising DJ's preparation and leadership under the new conditions.

Rangers: The Rangers signed G Tyler Wall, while Henrik Lundqvist said he intends to finish out hit current Ranger contract.  That probably means the Rangers will have to trade Georgiev or Wall. And since Wall is now pro, it probably also means the Rangers will spend a pick re-stocking the lower end of the organization.

Knicks: The Knicks did nothing and the NBA seems muddled and confused right now. But, MSG did give us lock-in's a treat by replaying the Willis Game from 1970 and visiting with Clyde, Dollar Bill, Willis and Doc Barnett. Did you know the Championship Knicks still call each other on Christmas?  That's family and that what we haven't had since. What an amazing group of players. 46 years later and they haven't come close to rebuilding what they had during that Championship Era.

So that's about it, MLB chickened out, the Giants and Rangers are business as usual, and the Knicks are waiting for league dictates. Have a great and safe one!

50 Years Ago Today

An extremely injured Willis Reed hobbled onto the court at MSG - hit his first two shots - then watched the teammates his courage had inspired absolutely destroy the Los Angeles Lakers to capture their first of 2 NBA Championships. They'd win one more in 1973. With better health for Willis, they would have won 4. At Reed's retirement, Walt Frazier pointed out that "we just haven't been the same without you." 45 years later, this is still abundantly true.

Giants Claim QB Cooper Rush from Dallas

The Giants have claimed 26 year old QB Cooper Rush off waivers from the Cowboys.  They cut Reggie White Jr. (Not that Reggie White) and Alex Tanney must be packing light. Rush spent the last 3 years in Garrett's Cowboy offense after leading a surprising and fun Central Michigan team. He knows the O and can presumably help install it. Now what's Tanney's job? Exactly.

Daniel Jones in Year 2

The Draft is done, the virtual Rookie Mini-Camp is done and Daniel Jones and the rest of the team are now involved in a virtual offseason program with lots of Zoom coaching. This might seem like a disadvantage for DJ going into his second season, but there are even more advantages to this being his second season. Let's take a look.

First, Daniel Jones will get all of the first team snaps in camp and preseasons whenever they occur. That's huge. Last year they stood on ceremony with Eli getting all the reps, when it was pretty clear that Jones was beating him out. That's no longer an issue and it's DJ's time to lead.

Second, the OL will be much improved. Even though we don't know who the Center will be, adding Andrew Thomas and a good OL coach, should create greater consistency. Hunter was a train wreck, and one of the huge differences between the Shurmur and Judge staffs will be the attention to detail and preparedness. Last year, they never made adjustments.

Third, this year, they will make adjustments, because that's how Judge defines football and game planning. What's more, Garrett will move Jones around in the pocket to create multiple launch platforms for his passes. No matter what was happening last year with the protection, Shurmur wouldn't move him, and generally when he rolled out, it was to run,

Fourth, he will have much better chemistry with Saquon Barkley. Saquon had some uncharacteristic drops last year, and that might have been a result of not playing together in camp of the preseason. What's more, Garrett will max Saquon in the run game and probably look to get him 100 catches.  So there's that.

Fifth, he wants to be great. Over the years we've seen the ones who want to be great surpass those who were content.  That was the difference between Cano and Melky. Coach Judge last week said that Jones had fire. He also said that Jones has been a great student of the new playbook. So Jones will be better because he burns and prepares to,

Next offseason, they can get him more weapons and if nothing works out, a new Center.

The Judge Rules

Even with all of this distance training, the differences between Joe Judge's staff and other Giant coaching staffs we've observed is that they seemed far more involved in the draft, "we wanted to coach him,"  and really believe is NFL level player development.  While it certainly seemed like Coughlin and Shurmur were involved in the drafts while they were head coaches, and Mouse McNally was involved in OL selections when Fassel was the head coach, but the assistants have never seemed this involved before. After the draft, Chris Pettit commented on the unusually great mesh between the coaches and scouts this year. Parcells used to complain that he didn't get to shop for the groceries. Judge helps push the cart.

So Judge and company helped pick the groceries.  After the draft, Judge was asked about the pass rush. The scribes have been giving Dave Gettleman grief about his "there's more than one way to skin a cat" description of the pass rush. Now it seems that Judge might have given him that impression.  Just pointed out the Tiki and Tierney that 2 of the better pass rushers in the league had started out as Long Snappers. In other words: he expects players to develop at the pro-level.  Since the CBA that rolled back practice time, that has seemed hard to do. But, Judge has only been in the league post that deal, and seems to believe there is still time to grow the players. That's a great attitude and let's hope he and his teacherly coaches can get some of that done.

The Giants are not without pass rush potential - they are just low on sacks, relative to the league and Giants history. Also, Graham likes to blitz more than anyone we've had since John Fox. We'll see how that works out.

This Week on the Blog

This was another surrealistic week,  The Yanks didn't seem to do anything. The Giants signed up their undrafted class. The Rangers didn't do anything, and the Knicks announced that they'll be keeping Scott Perry for another year.  Let's take a look at what could be coming.

Yankees: Baseball seems like it could have a plan soon. So far no deal has been made on the MLB Draft, but all of the proposals seem idiotic. 5 rounds?  10 rounds when only allowing teams to sign 3 undrafted player? Ridiculous. Let's hope they wise up.

Giants: The Giants are currently running a virtual rookie mini-camp. More overkill. Coach Judge did confirm to Tiki and Tierney that he loves working with Daniel Jones, because he has fire and toughness. He also met with DJ a few times before the lockdown. So Judge is now in "full bloom love" like Gettleman was mocked for being, Great to have a young coach and young coach who are willing to do whatever it takes.

Rangers: The NHL is also working on plans to continue their interrupted season. Let's hope they don't screw with their draft. The Rangers have 2 firsts and 2 thirds, their 2 was trade for Adam Fox, so nothing to cry about.

Knicks: the NBA has postponed their draft and draft lottery, Weak sauce. NFL wins,

So there we are.  Yanks waiting for a plan, Giants making adjustments to keep on keeping on, Rangers waiting for a plan, Knicks are in a weak league,

Stay safe, but have fun.

Giants: Virtual Rookie Mini-Camp

Usually, the rookies show up and get their helmets and gear and do some easy scrimmaging. This year, during the draconian lockdown of the healthy, the rookies and coaches will be at home and meeting through Zoom. Presumably, Coach Judge will lay down the law, and then the Coordinators will introduce their visions and then the positions coaches will start working with their groups.  In Shupinsky's case, there will be just one player in his group: QB Case Cookus.

Let's hope the position coaches, in general, have video cut-ups of their all time favorites at their positions, to demonstrate to the rookies what a rep should look like at their various positions,  Mike Wauffle, the old Giants DL Coach used to show kids cut -ups of Strahan, years before he would ever coach Strahan.  That was nearly 20 years ago, so let's assume, all positions coaches can use video to supplement what they can only describe at this point. They should be sending videos to the regular team as well, as technique was crap under Shurmur.

Judge was quoted as saying the Giants would practice tackling in pads this year. This is huge as not only could last year's Giants not tackle, but literally every kid they drafted last week needs his tackling tightened. Fortunately, the kids are all over aggressive, which is better than if they were timid tacklers. It's easier to dial it back than it is to dial it up.

Dialing it up, is something Coach Columbo will have to do with Andrew Thomas and, even moreso to Matt Peart - who needs to add muscle, technique and nasty to his very natural ability to pass block.  Lemieux just needs some technique stuff.

Should be an interesting experience. Let's hope it useful.