Giants use bye week lull to make silent staff shake-up fans didn’t see coming

The New York Giants finally hit their bye week after suffering through 13 weeks of straight misery. There isn’t much this team can do at 2-11 other than try not to make things worse. But even that seems impossible. With the season dragging toward the finish line, you’d almost think the week off would do them some good.

Related: 3 moves Giants should make during their bye week but definitely won’t

But quiet isn’t really how this franchise operates. Not this year, at least. Not with the amount of coaching changes they’ve already had. It feels like every week someone else is packing up their office. And the coaching carousel kept spinning while no one was looking.

Pat Leonard of the New York Daily News reported that assistant defensive line coach Bryan Cox has been fired, which the team semi-confirmed in its own subtle way by very quietly scrubbing his bio from their website. Talk about a brutal way to go out -- not even a formal announcement. Another name removed from a staff that has been shrinking by the week.

Giants’ Bryan Cox firing signals sweeping changes are coming

Cox’s firing isn’t surprising at all. Nothing about this defense has gone well. In fact, it's been objectively terrible. The run defense sits dead last in the league, and the staff already watched defensive coordinator Shane Bowen lose his job not two weeks ago.

Someone else was bound to go next. Cox just happened to be in the crosshairs this time. And there's more to come for sure.

The timing is interesting. Bye week firings usually have a purpose behind them. In this case, Big Blue has already removed their head coach, their defensive coordinator, and now a lower-level position coach who has been in place since the Brian Daboll regime began. It’s hard not to see the fire everyone-involved-with-Dabs pattern going on here.

Defensive line coach Andre Patterson hasn't been fired yet, which is a brainbuster in its own right. He’s been a part of the same problems Cox was, but the G-Men clearly wanted someone familiar around to get them through the final four weeks before the reckoning. After that, nobody should assume anything. No one is safe.

At this point, the firings tell fans more about where this franchise is headed than anything happening on the field. NY is bracing for a full teardown once this season is over. Cox is simply the latest reminder of the inevitable. Regardless of how the public found out about it.

And if this season is any indication, he definitely won’t be the last coaching move. Maybe next time it'll be a lot less secretive.