Giants' Rolle stands behind 'no leadership' rant

The Giants apparently had little problem with Antrel Rolle's voicing his concerns about a lack of leadership on the team. In fact, they probably encourage him to speak up more. They just don't want him using a 50,000-watt soapbox to do it.

The Giants safety, who on his weekly WFAN interview Tuesday skewered the team for its reaction during and after the lopsided loss to the Colts, said he spoke with Tom Coughlin about it Tuesday evening. But other than to whom he said it, Rolle was not backing away from what he said.

"I don't feel like I was talking out of turn at all," he said Wednesday. "I said what needed to be said. No matter who heard it, it needed to be said. I should have definitely come to Tom Coughlin before anyone else, which was bad on my behalf. But what I said needed to be said."

What Rolle said was that he didn't like what he saw, noting that "something should have been done to a higher extent" and that there wasn't "enough done at all in that game."

He continued down that path Wednesday.

"I don't think there was enough attitude, enough anger toward getting your butt whupped the way we were getting whupped," he said. "That was my problem, that was the issue I had . . . I just felt like there wasn't enough leadership. I felt like there wasn't enough passion about a loss, there wasn't enough passion going into the game [or] during the game when we were down by such a large margin. But it's going to be fixed. I didn't speak out of anger or because we lost. I spoke because it's a concern. I want to nip it in the bud now as a unit before things prolong."

The Giants' leadership has been a worry since late last season, when Coughlin pointed to the vacuum as a source of the team's infamous flameout. This offseason he prodded Justin Tuck to take on a more vocal leadership role, and he was elected the defensive captain.

Coughlin has put so much faith in his captains that he disbanded the leadership council he instituted during the 2007 Super Bowl season. "What this year's captains have done is really an outstanding job of trying to be good leaders," he said.

Coughlin also had another reason for not forming the council this season. "I did not feel that the leadership council a year ago was as effective as it had been in the past," he said.

Eli Manning, a captain and council member, said the group's effectiveness was overblown anyway and did not seem to mind its demise. "I think sometimes when you have success they just look at what you did and that's the reason," he said. "It's not like the leadership council had a whole lot of responsibilities."

That doesn't mean the Giants who aren't captains can't be leaders. "We have veterans on offense and defense, and we have great leadership," Manning said. "When issues come up, those guys have to take charge."

The way Rolle did. Well, almost the way Rolle did.

"I think sometimes you just have to remember where you are," Manning said. "Anything you say outside of this locker room is going to get blown up. Antrel is new to New York. He's got to get accustomed to that."