NY Giants coaches leading accountability charge by example

Rookie NY Giants head coach Joe Judge has made major waves this preseason by making his players – and even coaches – run laps at practice.

Since taking over as the young, rookie, 38-year-old head coach of the NY Giants, Bill Belichick, and Nick Saban disciple Joe Judge has ruffled some feathers around the league, to say the least, regarding how he’s chosen to run his program out of the gates.

The major practice Judge has enlisted that has attracted negative attention is the fact that he’s making his NY Giants players run laps when they make mental mistakes on the practice field. It all goes back to his clear message that every single person in this organization – from top to bottom – will have accountability and pay for any mental errors they make.

According to the NY Daily News, that sometimes has even included assistant coaches. Count new tight ends coach Freddie Kitchens as those that don’t mind running laps with his players at all as it only reinforces the team-first mentality and that every single person will be made an example of should they need to be.

Via the NY Daily News:

"“As you can tell I am probably not excited about that opportunity [to run],” Bielema said Sunday with a laugh. “It’s probably good for me in the long run. But what it does do is it builds accountability. Without question everybody has a responsibility on the field, and if you don’t do your job, everyone in this program knows the value there is placed on that walking in the door to the time you walk out."

Any other assistant coach questioned about having to run laps with their players have had a similar response, as it seems the players and coaches are both buying into Joe Judge’s approach. Maybe, if he was older it wouldn’t resonate with the younger NY Giants as it has been, but being one of the handful of youngest head coaches in the league has only seemed to be a positive so far for Judge in New York.

In fact, even veteran NFL head coach and new offensive coordinator, Jason Garrett, spent a practice running and stretching with his players just to continue to show this mantra goes all the way to the top of the food chain.

There has been no word on Joe Judge running any laps yet, but if i had to bet, I’m sure he’ll get a few in by the end of training camp.

Will Judge’s old-school approach wear thin on NY Giants?

This is the million dollar question, as it’s all well and good to be a disciplinarine, but the NY Giants are going to want to see wins on the field before they truly respect coach Judge and his methodologies.

I’m totally on board with everything I’ve seen out of coach Judge so far this offseason, as after losing more games than any other team in the NFL over the last three seasons (36), the NY Giants need to take a major step forward in the accountability department which will lead to fewer mental mistakes that have killed Big Blue in recent years.

When Tom Coughlin took over with a similar approach, he found himself on the ropes quickly before that miracle Super Bowl run in 2007 etched his name into NY Giants history and commanded that his message be respected.

In addition to Jason Garrett, Joe Judge has also already shown that no player is above his ire as Saquon Barkley has been at the forefront of his harsh criticisms in front of the whole team several times.

While Barkley may not be too keen on that, you better believe it’s going to make the guys at the back-end of the roster play that much harder and pay that much more attention to detail if the franchise icon is getting reemed out.

To make a long story short, Judge will likely get 1-2 full seasons regardless of how bad the NY Giants potentially play.

However, with how hard he’s come on early he may not last much longer than that without significant improvements as his coaching style is one that can disrupt a team’s functionality if there aren’t serious upgrades in the win column.