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DANIEL FELLS HAS STAPH INFECTION, SEASON OVER…
The New York Giants announced on Monday that tight end Daniel Fells has developed a staph infection, which was discovered during treatment of what the team is calling a “chronic ankle condition.” According to NJ.com, Fells reportedly underwent multiple surgeries to treat the infection. He will be placed on season-ending Injured Reserve.
“It was very unfortunate with Daniel,” said Head Coach Tom Coughlin. “It went from early in the week being a junkie ankle to a serious situation. I just talked to him a little while ago, he feels upbeat about it. He’s just looking forward to getting things under control so he can get out of the hospital.”
HEAD COACH TOM COUGHLIN…
Tom Coughlin addressed the media by conference call on Monday:
Good afternoon everyone. We were certainly pleased to look at this tape because I thought our demeanor, the effort, the enthusiasm with which we played, the excitement—I thought the stadium there in Buffalo was electric. I liked the way that we responded to it. We worked well, particularly late in the week. Because of the nature of the Buffalo team, a very good team, their sophisticated defensive scheme, outstanding special teamers, outstanding returners with a very good offensive team that had scored 32 points on New England, that was the number one rush team in the league etc…
We had a lot of very sophisticated adjustments within the nature of the game plan on offense and I liked the way the approach was. I liked the way they focused, I liked the way the players prepared themselves. I think defensively we definitely set the tone with a number of three and outs in the first half. Offensively, the first half was pretty much the way we would want it to go, as well. I thought the interesting thought there was the objective on special teams was to do an outstanding job at coverage, punt coverage and kickoff coverage. And we did. And on defense, to first of all stop the run and, of course, all that falls in line there. Try to win the physical battle and the turnover battle. So our defensive team held Buffalo to a very low percentage on third down. We did not do much better on the offensive side. But as I said, we were plus-one and we won just by a little bit the time of possession. So we were pleased to be able to go on the road and to play against a very good team and to come away with a win.
Q: How impressed were you with the offensive line given the early injury to Ereck Flowers and how formidable the Bills pass rush is? Can you talk a little about their performance on Sunday?
A: Well, I will. I will say this—they did perform well. They’ve done a nice job with that. We pass protected well, we did end up with one sack. Quite frankly, that should have been picked up as well. We did have some occasions to run the ball. We rushed for 92 yards, they rushed for 55 yards. So we had more yards there. Again, we prepared well, there was an awful lot that went into it from a cerebral standpoint in the game. The guys did a good job with it. You would like to have the third quarter, maybe come back and do a better job there. Obviously the penalty on the screen really knocked us out of some opportunities there because the ball was down way deep into their territory. But we did do a good job, and we did protect the passer. The ball did come out quickly and that was the nature of the game.
Q: How has Marshall Newhouse done in particular in your estimation?
A: He’s done a good job, he’s done a good job. He’s come in and he’s worked hard and he’s been very good up front in terms of communication. He’s a smart guy. So he’s worked himself in very well.
Q: A lot of your players last night and a couple guys today talked about, it seemed like after the 0-2 start your energy level rose a little bit higher. Is that a conscious thing that you did, stay upbeat and stay the course?
A: Yeah, the obvious. Whether the energy level came up from whatever level it currently is, I don’t know about that. But I do know that it puts a fire in our belly without a doubt to be 0-2 and I didn’t think we were an 0-2 team. We needed to do something about it. So we tried to inspire our guys to believe in themselves and come together as a team, to play the four quarters. Forget about the score and play each play as hard as you possibly can and don’t let any of the circumstances get into your head. And the coaches all did a great job of, again, continuing to express the feelings that I had and keeping the energy level very high and coaching the heck out of them and being excited about it. Trying to surround ourselves with guys that are excited to compete and believe that we can win. All of those things went into it, without a doubt.
Q: Tom, you used this word to your team last night after the game and the word keeps coming out. “Relevant.” Why that choice of word?
A: Well, it’s always good to be, at this point in time in a season, looking at our start and to know that you’re in the mix, you’re in the hunt. I chose that word to make them understand it’s a word that puts you in position, but you’re not there. You’ve got a long way to go and that’s the significance of that term.
Q: You put Fells on I.R. Do you have a corresponding roster move? When did that happen?
A: Well, we’ll see about that, the move. It was very unfortunate with Daniel. It went from early in the week being a junkie ankle to a serious situation. I just talked to him a little while ago, he feels upbeat about it. He’s just looking forward to getting things under control so he can get out of the hospital. With that being the case, we would have a roster move, but we’ll make sure we take our time, do our due diligence on that.
Q: Eli threw his first interception on Sunday. What did you see from that play? Was it more a product of maybe trying to force the pass or could Rueben Randle maybe have fought a little bit harder for the ball?
A: Well, you can look at it any way you want to. The error goes to me, because I wanted to score. I wanted to be in a position at that point to score a touchdown. And then on fourth down, if we didn’t score, we would kick the field goal. But there’s different ways to play that. I asked Rueben about it, he said when the contact came from the corner, he was kind of knocked back a little bit and wasn’t able to completely finish. And I’m sure if you really bore down on him, he could have maybe run the route just a little bit better. I think Eli had thrown a similar type of pass to him for a touchdown earlier in the game. The ball had been thrown low and in a spot where Rueben was going to get it and nobody else was going to get it. I’m sure Eli would probably say something to that effect as well. Give some credit to the corner. The corner played that pretty well.
Q: Getting a chance to look back on it, do you regret throwing the ball there in that spot?
A: No, I don’t regret the call, I regret the result. I do understand completely the consequences of the decision that you could make or couldn’t make there. However, as I explained, I was looking for an opportunity on third down to score a touchdown. If we didn’t, we would kick the field goal on fourth down. That was the entire concept.
Q: Right now, you two rookie tight ends and Larry Donnell, who doesn’t have a tremendous amount of experience himself. Is this somewhere you feel you need a veteran in that spot in some way, shape or form?
A: Well, it would be nice, but that type of a player may or may not be available. We’ll have to see where that exactly stands. Larry has played a significant number of snaps here in the early part of the season and he seems to have grown into that role. We’d like to be supportive in other ways. If we can do with what we have here, fine. If there is something that we can look into that will improve us in other areas, then so be that, too.
Q: I know he dropped the pass, but what did you see from Will Tye?
A: Well, I thought it wasn’t too big for him. I thought that he did a decent job of blocking. There was a couple of decent, good plays and probably one poor play. He did have the drop on a second and one, which would have converted to a first down, no doubt. But for the first time out of the box, he went out there and handled it well in terms of emotion and that type of thing.
Q: Owa Odighizuwa played 40-something defensive snaps in his first NFL game. How do you think he did?
A: You know what, he obviously hasn’t played in quite some time and that was a factor there. But he got in there, he mixed it up. He made a really nice play on the quarterback where he kept the ball on the option. He got himself in position a couple of times where he could have been able to apply some pressure perhaps with a little bit better movement to the quarterback and the passing game. He got in there, he got his feet wet.
Q: Do you have an update on any of these injured guys—Devon Kennard or Jayron Hosley and maybe how Ereck Flowers came out?
A: Well, Flowers seemed to come out okay. This morning, he looked very good when he was here in the building. The trainers and the doctors felt that he was actually a little bit better about the position that he’s in right now than he was a week ago. So that was good. The other guys, I do not have anything on.
Q: How about Victor Cruz? Victor said that Monday was going to be a big day for him to come in and see how that injection went?
A: I don’t think we have anything to update on Victor.
Q: Is there anything with Jason Pierre-Paul? Is he scheduled to come in any time soon?
A: I have no knowledge of any such information.
THE PLAYERS SPEAK…
Transcripts or audio of Monday’s media sessions with the following players:
NOTES…
The Giants are 8-1 in regular-season games vs. AFC East opponents under Tom Coughlin and 2-0 in the post-season.
QB Eli Manning increased his career total passing yards to 40,731. That moved him past Hall of Famer Joe Montana (40,551) and into 13th place on the NFL’s career list. Former Giant Kerry Collins is 12th with 40,922.
WR Odell Beckham has now played in 16 NFL games or a full season. He owns the records for catches (115) and receiving yards (1,612) in the first 16 games of a career.
ARTICLES…
WHAT’S UP NEXT…
The players are off Tuesday and return to practice on Wednesday to start preparing for Sunday’s game against the San Francisco 49ers.
