Giants linebacker Kayvon Thibodeaux (5) walks off the field after...

Giants linebacker Kayvon Thibodeaux (5) walks off the field after OTA practice at the Quest Diagnostics Training Center, Wednesday, May 31, 2023, in East Rutherford. Credit: Corey Sipkin

There was a time not very long ago when Kayvon Thibodeaux seemed to figure he’d easily etch his name into the team record book. He saw the Giants’ rookie record for sacks in a season was 8.5, set the year prior to his arrival by Azeez Ojulari, and acted as if he could sneeze out that many during his first lap through the NFL.

Even more audacious marks — the “unofficial” team rookie mark of 9.5 set by Lawrence Taylor before sacks became an actual stat, and the league record for a rookie of 14.5 set by Jevon Kearse in 1999 — seemed attainable to the fifth overall pick in the 2022 draft as he embarked on his career last summer.

Then the season began with him nursing a preseason knee injury. He had to wait until Week 6 to record his first career sack. Then until Week 12 for his second. By the time his rookie campaign wrapped up with just four total sacks — less than half the number he was publicly aiming for, probably a quarter of any goals he was wise enough to keep private — the ballyhoo over his arrival had faded to "bleh."

Thibodeaux took two lessons from that statistically disappointing season.

The first was that he had to learn to finish plays on the NFL level. There were times, as he went back and watched film of himself, he had offensive linemen beat early on a snap but was unable to complete the victory by getting to the quarterback.

The second was to stop counting.

“Forget the number,” he said on Wednesday, at first using a more colorful word than “forget” before cleaning up his own language. “I had a number on it last year, and I figured out that the season is so long that you have to do it by game.”

Even framed that way, though, he said he’s more comfortable tallying impactful plays, not just sacks. Production now tops predictions.

“As long as we win, as long as I continue to play well, play for my teammates, I think I'll be good,” he said. “What can I do to just make a play? Come the Baltimore game [last year] it was like, OK, I’ve got to make a play. I don't really have time to think about the goals I had. I've got to go for something now.”

That Baltimore game, ironically, was the one when he recorded his first sack, a game-sealing tackle and strip of Lamar Jackson.

There are many other plays from his rookie season that Thibodeaux thinks about more than that one. Mostly they are the ones where he came up short. He rattled a few off from memory on Wednesday.

There was the first game against Washington that ended in a tie. “It was a second-guess kind of a step that threw me off even though I was unblocked,” he said.

The loss at home to the Eagles the following week.

“I could have had an impact if I finished the top of my rush.”

Against the Texans in midseason.

“I was going against Laremy Tunsil,” Thibodeaux recalled. “He's a guy who's really long, but at the end of my rush I let him get his hands on me where I should have been able to get around him.”

Thibodeaux may have stopped counting, but the Giants are still counting on him. After an offseason in which the team upgraded at a number of key positions, one unit that went almost glaringly untouched was edge rusher. Despite disappointing production from that group, some of it due to key injuries to Ojulari throughout 2022, the Giants' front office is basically running it back with the same group as last year. Besides Thibodeaux and Ojulari that includes the re-signing of Jihad Ward and Oshane Ximines.

Thibodeaux, who fancies himself if not a future general manager at least a student of front office strategies and philosophies, joked there are financial reasons why the Giants didn’t add a proven veteran in the offseason. “I don't know how much more money they were going to spend on edge rushers,” he said with a laugh. But the reality is the Giants believe in the players they have.

And they still believe in Thibodeaux just as much as when they selected him just over a year ago, making him the first player drafted by the new regime.

“You’d like to see a jump from everyone in Year One, your rookie class, to Year Two,” coach Brian Daboll said. “They’ve had a year under their belt. They still have a lot to learn, still young players, but they can draw from some of the experiences that they’ve had the previous year.”

Thibodeaux is trying to do just that.

His chance to set the team record for sacks in a rookie season has come and gone with an unfulfilled sigh. But it is not too late for him to live up to the potential he has, to add his name to the list of edge rushers who have defined this franchise’s legacy over the years.

It wasn’t until his third year that Justin Tuck recorded his first double-digit sack season. Ditto for Osi Umenyiora. Future Hall of Famer Michael Strahan had to wait until his fifth season for his.

How long must we wait for Thibodeaux to reach those levels?

He’s not saying. Not anymore.

And he’s definitely not counting any longer.

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