August 16, 2007 New York Giants Training Camp Report (Evening Practice)

August 16, 2007 New York Giants Training Camp Report (Evening Practice)

by BigBlueInteractive.com Contributor Marty in Albany

The Giants were in helmets, shorts, and shoulder pads. There was a stiff wind was blowing from an approaching storm front. Perhaps that is why Coach Coughlin already had the team on the field and practicing when I arrived about 20 minutes before the scheduled 6:10 PM starting time. The wind did not help the kickers, both of whom were in action. It looked as if both Lawrence Tynes and Josh Huston missed on at least one of their three shortish field goal attempts. In addition, DT Jay Alford made a bad snap that Jeff Feagles could not place down for a kick.

QB Anthony Wright did not get to play while QB Tim Hasselbeck got the most snaps during the practice. Tim will be playing in Sunday’s game against the Ravens and Wright will not. Sometimes Tim was running the third-team offense against the first-team defense and at other times he had the first-team offense against the second- or third-team defense. He made some decent throws.

Playing with the second-team offense against the first-team defense, Hasselbeck’s best throw was a long TD pass to WR Kevin McMahon. Kevin got wide open, although covered by S James Butler and CB R.W. McQuarters. It was an excellent throw and an excellent catch. There was also an excellent deep pass to WR Brandon London from Hasselbeck.

There was also a sprint-out pass where nobody was open and Tim just ran out of bounds. Let’s hope we see more of the former plays than the latter in the Baltimore game on Sunday.

CB Gerrick McPhearson, CB Cory Webster, CB Michael Stone, and WR Marco Thomas were not dressed. WR Plaxico Burress was not dressed and had an ice bag on his ankle.

WR Amani Toomer played and looked fine, although I’m guessing that most defenders were keeping their distance. That included CB Aaron Ross on whom Amani made an easy completion from QB Eli Manning. Ross was also victimized by WR Anthony Mix who ripped a pass away from him that they were both fighting for. Ross had good coverage on Mix nevertheless. Mix had a couple of good catches as did WR Michael Jenning. Jenning had an excellent night that included a deep catch from Eli Manning where he beat CB E.J. Underwood for a TD. It was well thrown and smoothly caught. TE Kevin Boss was back on the field and he made a catch or two. More importantly, he showed no ill effects from his injury.

The best defensive play of the practice was an impressive interception by, I believe, S Michael Johnson of an Eli Manning pass in the 7-on-7 drill. Other than that interception, Eli looked quite sharp and accurate on his passes.

New Players: There are two new and very large offensive linemen numbers 68 and 78 with no names on their shirts. 68 is a RT and 78 is a LG, I think. I really can’t say much about either of them.

Number 62 is NT Tui Alailefaleula. He is verging on Norman Hand massive. He is very wide but did not appear to have a huge gut. He has shoulder-length dredlocks a la Michael Stone. Most impressively he was very quick off the snap. On the first snap that I saw, he pushed C Shaun O’Hara backwards onto his butt. On the following snap, Shaun, LG Rich Seubert and a third Giant lineman were there to block him. After a few more snaps, I think that they made sufficient adjustments as to how hard Tui was going to charge. I did not see the other DT, number 77, Wright, get to play.

TE Jeremy Shockey showed good speed in making a deep catch over the middle. The fans cheered and he acknowledged it with a smile.