Brian Daboll Frowns on NY Giants Pre-Snap Penalties

The Giants have been a little sloppy of late with pre-snap penalties, which was also a problem last year.

New York Giants head coach Brian Daboll looks on during training camp at Quest Diagnostics Training Center. | Vincent Carchietta-Imagn Images

New York Giants head coach Brian Daboll recognizes that throughout the game, minor mistakes will occur, some of which may not be apparent until a review of the tape.

But the one thing that has continued to pop up this summer that is starting to eat at Daboll has been the pre-snap penalties, particularly the false starts by the offense, which on Thursday had about a half dozen such penalties on critical downs.

“It always gets to me when we have pre-snap penalties,” Daboll said before the start of Friday’s practice. “Towards the end of practice, we had a few too many and some longer drives.”

He’s certainly right to be concerned about the pre-snap penalties. According to NFLPenalties.com, last season, the Giants were flagged 26 times for false starts, those resulting in 126 yards and ranking eighth in the league, exceeding the league-wide average of 22.09. 

The Giants also had 10 delay-of-game infractions for 50 yards, tied for second in the NFL, and almost double the 5.38 league-wide average for that penalty. 

Defensively, they had six encroachment penalties for 25 yards lost, ranking 11th in the league, but also topping the 5.16 average league-wide. 

Pre-snap penalties are often considered discipline-related infractions, particularly those on the offensive side of the ball, where there should be no excuse for not knowing the snap count or where to line up so that the quarterback has enough time to set the protection and get the snap off.

Daboll, who denied that having the players run mini wind sprints after Thursday’s practice was a result of the influx of penalties, has begun pulling guys out of the lineup when they commit these mental mistakes. 

“We’ve got to eliminate those and defensive offsides on critical downs, so we have to do better there,” Daboll said.

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