Giants GM Reese confident in team, plan

At least Jerry Reese is aware of what Giants fans are thinking.

"It seems like people are in a little bit of a panic," the general manager said Thursday, addressing the media for the first time since the start of training camp. "The perception is we aren't doing a lot."

Reese said the team made "responsible offers" to free agents Steve Smith and Kevin Boss, both of whom bolted. He also pointed out that the Giants accomplished a few of their objectives in the truncated offseason, which included the acquisition of David Baas at center and the re-signing of running back Ahmad Bradshaw.

"We had a game plan and we're sticking to our game plan," he said. "We made responsible offers to everybody. Sometimes it doesn't work out the way you want it to work out, but we'll play the hand we're dealt and we'll win with it."

Reese seemed so confident about that, he practically guaranteed the Giants will make the playoffs this season after a two-year absence.

"We won 10 games last year," he said. "It wasn't like we were 6-10; we were 10-6. We expect to build off of that. If we made a couple of plays last year, we would have been in the playoffs and who knows what would have happened. So we'll make the plays this time and we'll get into the playoffs and we'll make a run."

The question, of course, is who will make those plays? Not Boss or Smith, two of Eli Manning's favorite targets in recent seasons. But that doesn't seem to have the players concerned, at least not outwardly.

"He has a plan to make this team competitive in this league and I trust that he knows what he's doing," defensive captain Justin Tuck said.

"My job is to go out there and play," Manning said. "The media and the fans can worry and ask the whys. My job is to go out there and perform and get our players ready to play."

Naturally, as Manning suggested, many outside the organization are worried. There seems to be more name players heading out the door than coming in, and those who are supposed to fill their void are mostly unproven.

Reese said he is not bothered by that public panic.

"It's mostly fans who say that kind of stuff and they don't really understand the process," Reese said. "We have good players on the team. We're not looking into going to make every sexy splash that can be made. We make solid football decisions and that's been happening for a long time."