Sullivan teaching Eli and learning from him, too

When the Giants' quarterbacks are going through their drills or evaluating tape, sometimes it's hard to tell who's coaching whom. For the last few years, Eli Manning was the clear pupil, learning under the mentoring of Kevin Gilbride and then Chris Palmer. But this season, Manning is helping to shape the new quarterbacks coach.

It's Mike Sullivan, who was the team's receivers coach for the previous six seasons but was elevated to quarterbacks coach when Palmer left after the 2009 season. "I've seen things through the lens of the receivers for the past six years," he said yesterday. "To sit down and look at every play with Eli and make sure we're seeing things the same way and getting feedback and making sure we're on the same page, it's going well so far."

At this point, Manning probably knows more about running the team's offense from the quarterback position than Sullivan does. The new coach said there have been a few times when he's noticed that Manning did not use a term or technique that is specifically called for in the playbook. Manning will tell him that they haven't done it that way in four or five years.

"There are a lot more details that I was aware of and I understood, but you don't really appreciate them until you are actually right in that seat and having to make those calls and those adjustments," Sullivan said.

"He's used to receivers and what routes they have to do, and quarterback is a little different," Manning said. "It's how you see things, how you read things and little subtle movements and working your eyes, mechanics, footwork."

That's something that makes Sullivan's job unlike the ones his predecessors faced. Palmer was brought to the Giants to take Manning from a raw talent to a successful NFL quarterback. Sullivan inherits a player who has won a Super Bowl MVP and is coming off his best statistical season as a pro. Sullivan's challenge is to keep Manning at a consistently high level and help him avoid the valleys he's been prone to in his career.

Sullivan comes with his own game plan on how to get there. He's taken some drills from Palmer and others he's worked with in the past and is incorporating them into his own regimen. It's a work in progress, and he relies on Manning for feedback in terms of what is working and what is not.

That wasn't always the case last year, when Sullivan was working with a young, inexperienced receiver group that turned out to be one of the Giants' bright spots. "When you're dealing with a young group, a less proven group, they were more inclined to take everything as gospel and they really didn't know," Sullivan said. "A guy like Eli has been there and is such a proven veteran."

Which makes him just as good a teacher as he is a student.

Notes & quotes: DE Osi Umenyiora was not on the field for the voluntary practice. The Giants said he was at the team's complex receiving treatment for a sore hip . . . DT Barry Cofield was not at the OTA but with his wife for the birth of their child . . . RB Ahmad Bradshaw sat out the practice, saying he did not feel 100 percent. Coming off three surgeries, Bradshaw said he tries to practice only once or twice a week to get ready for the minicamp next month.