Ben McAdoo hasn’t decided on who calls the plays

New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning (10) and Offensive Coordinator Ben McAdoo go over plays during the game against the Jacksonville Jaguars at MetLife Stadium on August 22. 2014 in East Rutherford, New Jersey. Credit: Mike Stobe
Ben McAdoo is calling the shots. He just isn’t sure who’ll be calling the plays.
Appearing on SiriusXM NFL Radio on Tuesday to discuss his responsibilities as he transitions from Giants offensive coordinator to head coach, McAdoo said he will be “heavily involved” in the offense but has not decided who will be on the headset telling Eli Manning what to run in the games.
“It is a challenge to be able to call a game and manage a game,” McAdoo said. “Some guys do it better than others. I haven’t done that yet but I’m willing to do that if that’s what it takes . . . You work your whole career to be able to call plays and have a chance to do that. It’s something that I really enjoy and I love to do.”
There are clear challenges to it, though.
“Really the process leading up to it is very time-consuming and it’s tough because it’s not just one guy doing it,” he said of calling the plays. “It’s the quarterback is heavily involved, it’s the run game part of things, it’s the situational part of things and different input from different coaches and really keeping track of how your week is going. The preparation part of things is the time-consuming thing. The game day part is, when things are clicking, it’s fun. And when they’re not, it’s a challenge.”
McAdoo’s mentor in Green Bay, coach Mike McCarthy, traditionally called the plays for the Packers offense. This season he stepped away from that responsibility only to return to it in midseason. Tom Coughlin traditionally handled the big-picture elements of the game while allowing his coordinators to call the plays.
McAdoo said he plans to talk to McCarthy about being a play-calling head coach. At his introductory news conference he said he did not want to say who would call the plays because of a “competitive advantage.” On Tuesday, he said a decision has not been made and may not be until the 2016 season kicks off.
“We’re going to take a look and see how the staff develops, how things develop here through the offseason, into training camp, and into preseason,” he said. “I feel that if you put a good staff together and you build relationships and everything is clicking during the course of the week, it takes care of itself.”
As for that staff, it remains fluid and incomplete even though McAdoo met with the installed members for the first time on Tuesday. He said the staff is about half complete. It’s assumed that Mike Sullivan will be the offensive coordinator and Steve Spagnuolo will return as defensive coordinator, but nothing is official and there are still openings to fill.
McAdoo, who was believed to want Joe Philbin on the staff before he went to the Colts, said he is not looking only at coaches he has worked with (he and Philbin were together in Green Bay).
“In the league a lot of times head coaches hire who they’ve worked with in the past and there’s a comfort level there,” McAdoo said. “We’re not operating that way. We’re comfortable looking at a bunch of different guys we may not have worked with in the past. As long as we feel they fit, we’re looking for some diversity and some different personalities as well. We want a bunch of different guys. We like to identify different ways of doing things and get as much input from coaches you trust and shake things up a little bit.”
More Giants




