Block out the noise? Nearly impossible for Giants as lost season nears end
Giants defensive coordinator Patrick Graham stands on the field before the team's NFL game against the Chargers on Dec. 12, 2021, in Inglewood, Calif. Credit: AP/Kyusung Gong
Patrick Graham admitted something very few coaches ever do.
That he hears it.
The praise, the criticism, the chatter, all of those things that football coaches generally attempt to keep out with a thick, tall wall constructed of stoic bricks mortared with willful ignorance. Turns out those outside influences get through. Maybe not specific headlines or radio callers who craft their clever takes while waiting on hold, but the broad tones and wide swaths at least.
"One-minute Pat Graham is the worst defensive coordinator ever in the history of football, one minute I’m going to be the head coach of whatever team, and now I’m the worst coordinator again," Graham said of the wild trajectory of public opinion that has surrounded him during his tenure with the Giants (or maybe just this past month).
At first he attempted to hide behind that wall so many others use for cover.
"I don’t listen to it," he said adamantly.
But he quickly realized the conflict in his answers.
"Obviously I might have heard it, I just regurgitated it back to you," he laughed, even adding that his wife sometimes tries to point out such perceptions to him. "But I don’t pay any attention to it."
That’s been the biggest challenge for the Giants as their season has petered out over the past few weeks and comes to an end with Sunday’s home game against Washington, one of just two Week 18 games in the NFL that includes neither a playoff team nor postseason stakes (Chicago at Minnesota is the other). They’re trying to focus on the matchups, the game plans, the personnel packages, the in-game situations … things no one else really cares about at this point. All the while the rest of the world around them is talking about front office and coaching changes, draft picks, the salary cap implications of unloading unproductive and unpopular players, and how disappointing, discouraging and embarrassing this season and this decade have been for the franchise.
At the center of that cacophony is Joe Judge, the head coach who has repeatedly said he bears responsibility for everything that happens on the field and last week delivered a rambling and probably an ill-advised 11-minute defense of the intangible improvements that have been made under his two-season watch.
Judge poked a hole in the wall to get his message out. In doing so he created a path for the outside to come rushing in. There isn’t even enough time in this season for a proper patch, so the Giants have had to spend a good deal of energy this week acting like Phil Swift trying to Flex-Seal it.
"My focus is on playing Washington, that’s it," Judge insisted on Friday. "We talk all the time about ignoring the noise. Whatever is going on outside this building, a lot of times I have no idea about it."
Sure. Tell that to Graham.
As a hurricane draws its strength over open waters, this latest storm to impact the Giants has upgraded to a Category 5 mostly by syphoning off last week’s diatribe. Judge didn’t create the tempest. It’s been churning and building for years, since before he was even a candidate for the job as head coach. What he did was fuel it to its current monstrous dimensions. Now he must weather it or be destroyed by it.
"I trust in Joe’s vision," Graham said, one of many who have defended Judge from inside the building this week. "Leadership has to have vision and with vision, you can’t be worried about the stuff that tries to sidetrack you … I just know this: I know Joe’s strong, he’s a good leader, a smart dude and he’ll handle things how he needs to handle them. But to me, just ignore the noise. That’s what you have to do."
And hope the wall holds for one more day.
Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.
