Wednesday was one of those rare days when Giants beat reporters got to talk on the record with assistant coaches. Usually, only GM Jerry Reese or Coach Tom Coughlin speak with reporters.
There were quite a few interesting tidbits. To me, the most interesting was found in Ernie Palladino's Giants Journal. It's a report on the work new quarterbacks coach Chris Palmer has been doing with Eli Manning. Here's part of Ernie's report.
"For 13 hours, you sit and you go over 328 plays," Palmer said. "That's a pretty tedious assignment. It was a long, drawn out deal, and we went very, very slow and dissected each play.
"We looked at his footwork coming back, whether his shoulders were open, what his read was. We spent a lot of time on it, and I felt at times it was difficult on him. You've got three quarterbacks in there, and he's the one getting singled out on every play."
Still, Palmer said he's confident Manning can make the next step that is so important to the Giants' success.
"I've been very encouraged," Palmer said. "He's very athletic. Stronger than I'd anticipated. And he's doing a nice job on the footwork and the things we're working on right now."
From Ralph Vacchiano of the Daily News comes a good quote from new defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo about how much he plans to change this season.
Mike Garafolo of the Star-Ledger has some info on the Giants fullback situation.
Newsday's Arthur Staple has lots of quick thoughts from the variety of assistant coaches he spoke with.
It's all interesting stuff, from people we don't get to hear from nearly often enough.