New York Giants Notebook | Judge Remembers Ray Perkins, McCoy Remembers Kliff Kingsbury and More
Giants head coach Joe Judge opened his Wednesday video conference by sending his condolences to the family of Ray Perkins, the long-tine NFL head coach who spent the 1979-81 seasons with the Giants.
In speaking glowingly about Perkins, who, like Judge, has strong ties to the SEC from their respective college days as coaches, Judge remembered meeting Perkins during his time down south.
"The first time I met Coach Perkins, I was working at Southern Mississippi for a spring, and he was at a junior college down the road," Judge said. "He came up and watched us practice one day, and we just spent some time talking. I had just come from Alabama--he had been at Alabama obviously through his time.
"We shared some stories about Tuscaloosa. But he spent a lot of time with me that day actually talking about being a young coach and really working with players and developing the players. That was the biggest thing that he really shared with me, and that’s a message that’s been echoed to me by a lot of people I’ve been around that have been very successful."
Judge took away lots of tidbits from Perkins, but there was one thing that stood out to him from their conversations.
"The development of the players is what he really hammered me with, and that really came after a spring practice and watching a lot of young guys out there trying to plug guys around and find the right spot for them," Judge said.
"He was just sharing some wisdom along ‘hey listen, give everybody an opportunity to improve and don’t make your mind up too early from what you think someone can do."
Colt McCoy is Staying Ready
Giants backup quarterback Colt McCoy truly doesn't know if he'll be called upon again to start for the injured Daniel Jones this weekend against the Cardinals. But if his number does come up, McCoy is doing all he can to stay ready.
"We have another tough opponent with the Cardinals coming into town," McCoy said. "On Monday and Tuesday, we started on our preparation the exact same way, and had our practice today."
Last week, McCoy completed 13 of 22 passes for 105 yards, one touchdown, and one interception in the win against the Seahawks.
While the Giants leaned more on the run game and McCoy filled in more as a game manager, his poise and football IQ will still be a valued asset if Jones isn't able to go and is preparing the same as he did last week, even though he doesn't know what his rep workload might look like during the practice week.
"I think it’s all based on how (Daniel Jones) feels, right? I think he’s feeling better. We’ll see how it goes throughout the week," McCoy said.
The Legend of Kliff Kingsbury
Long before Cardinals head coach Kliff Kingsbury ascended to his current post, he was doing his thing on the gridiron as both a high school and college football quarterback in Texas.
As a starting quarterback at Braunfels High School, Kingsbury threw for 3,009 yards and 34 touchdowns while leading the team to the Class 5A Division II semifinals and a 13–2 record.
Kingsbury then broke 39 program records at Texas Tech and earned the Sammy Baugh Trophy for his nation-leading passing performance in 2002. Kingsbury then became a coach for some well-known Texas college programs, specifically the University of Houston and Texas A&M.
"Obviously, every quarterback that grew up in Texas knows Kliff Kingsbury," said Giants quarterback Colt McCoy, who also grew up in Texas.
"He was the first guy to be throwing for thousands of yards every season and lots of touchdowns. They spread it out there at Tech.
"I grew up a couple of hours outside of Lubbock, so I knew all the Texas Tech quarterbacks, and Kliff was one of the very first to do it. He's a really bright offensive mind, he's a good friend, and they've done really nice things out there in Arizona."
Copycat Cardinals
It's no secret that the NFL is a copycat league. So in the latest form of copying someone's idea, last week, the Cardinals rotated some of their interior offensive linemen much like the Giants have done throughout this season, a tactic Arizona could even use against the Giants this weekend.
"I don't know if that's their reason for it," Judge said. "It's working for them; they're doing a good job, they're developing a lot of players, and they've been effective. These guys protect the quarterback as well as anybody in the league."
Still, Judge admits that ideally, one goes with continuity among the offensive line.
"I think the old-school school of thought is you want to have five guys operating as one unit on the offensive line, whereas the defensive line you're trying to keep guys fresh," Judge said.
"We're rotating a lot of our offensive linemen right now. We've taken that approach in terms of number one, developing as many players as we can."
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