Giants’ Logan Ryan: “0-2 is horrible,” but the season isn’t over

The ‘Fightin Joe Judges’ are 0-2 and have lost their star player for the season. Don’t tell them, though, that their season is over or they are already playing for 2021.

“We’re not going to raise the white flag on anything. Our guys are going to fight straight on through,” coach Joe Judge said Wednesday of his New York Giants team. “We have a job to do regardless of the circumstance or outcome of the previous game. Our job is to get ready to go out there and put the best product on the field we can on a weekly basis. There’s no white flag here, we’re going out there to fight every week.”

Veteran defensive back Logan Ryan is not used to losing, and doesn’t sound like he wants to get used to it.

“I don’t know if I’ve been 0-2 before, but I was 2-4 last year [with the Tennessee Titans] and was in the AFC Championship. So, I do know something. If you have a strong locker room, if you have strong leaders, if you have guys that love to play ball and love to practice hard, you can dig yourself out of some holes here,” Ryan said. “0-2 is horrible, but I think we’re a game out of the division here. It’s not like our division is world beaters at the moment. We’re a game out from being a division leader. It’s football. You have to keep playing the games. You have to get over the tough losses.

“The beautiful thing about Tuesday and Wednesday in football is you turn your page to the next week. We’re focused on the 49ers, who are coming off of some bad news on their side of things. They’re coming through some adversity as well. I’m excited to go out there and get a win. Period. This game is one that I want to win really bad, and I’m doing everything in my power to lead the team in that way.”

The Giants have eight rookies and 20 players total with three years or less of NFL experience. They have a lot of guys who have never experienced winning, so players like Ryan — who have — are critical in providing veteran leadership.

Ryan likes what he sees from the Giants.

“It’s a work ethic. It’s the practices. It’s how hard this team works, it’s how close we are,” Ryan said. “But we need to finish. We need to start better. It’s putting four quarters together. This team is working hard. They’re not outworking us, I promise you that. It’s just executing better in the game.”

What the Giants need to do Sunday is start better than they did last week against the Chicago Bears, when they dug themselves a 17-0 hole.

“We had two turnovers in the second half and we didn’t let up a point. We want to play like that this game. The last two quarters, I want to continue to play like that. I want to continue to punch the ball out. I want (James) Bradberry to continue to pick it off,” Ryan said. “I want to find ways to get sacks and find ways to play better on third down and in the red area like we did in the second half. The great Dick LeBeau once told me, ‘we didn’t lose the game, we ran out of time.’ Last game, we ran out of time. It’s a loss, but hopefully, with four quarters of football, we can play like we did and we can win this game.”