Giants Rookie Minicamp Notebook, Day 1
Making the jump from college to the pros can be daunting for any rookie, regardless of where--or if--he was drafted.
That's why Giants head coach Brian Daboll, in planning for his first rookie minicamp, has been putting more of a focus on the mental aspect of things than the physical part.
"Good to be out here with these guys. They got in last night. Had some meetings today with them. Really going to be kind of a short practice, if you will, a little bit over an hour," Daboll said.
"Have some more meetings. Very similar in terms of scheduling tomorrow. It's good to get with these guys and start working with them and see what some of the stuff they can do in the classroom, and just ease them into things outside on the field."
It's a different yet more traditional approach than what some of Daboll's contemporaries, such as Robert Saleh of the Jets, took during their minicamp last weekend in which the rookies didn't partake in certain drills.
Daboll's approach seems to be to ramp up the rookies to the daily grind expected of them both in the meeting rooms and on the field.
"I think that's right on. That's what I told them yesterday--'It’s for you to get to know us, us to get to know you,'" Daboll said. "There's only a couple of days we'll do stuff on the field. There's a long way to go, as they can see.
"We're not going to overdo it in terms of the installation and give them a ton of things to learn. I think it's really important, particularly the trial guys, to minimize the package, not motion and shift, do all these crazy things, and just see who can perform there."
Daboll was later asked what the biggest transition for rookies coming from college to the NFL is, and his answer might lend some insight into his thought process behind how he set up the minicamp.
"There's a lot. Just having that one year in college. You don't have as much time in the meeting room. I need to install a lot less," he said.
"We went through a couple of cadences today just on the offensive side. They’re used to claps, not many cadences. We put in two -- we put in three. Cut it back down to two because it took a little while to get these two cadences. That's just the start of it. Formations, how you signal into the sideline. There are so many different things."
To make sure he's not setting anyone's hair on fire just yet, Daboll has structured the practices to run just over an hour each day.
"Almost half of it will be some type of walk-through. We'll do some individual drills. We'll get about 15, 20 minutes of individual stuff. We have seven-on-seven periods, and we'll do 14 plays."
The grind will eventually come but for now, giving the rookies--many of whom haven't played football since December--a chance to reacclimate to the game seems to be the smart approach in getting them ready for the transition."
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