Alexander Wilson
Special teams usually gets treated like the part of football everyone remembers only after it costs them a game.
John Harbaugh does not coach like that, and the Giants are already giving off signs that the third phase is going to be more than background noise under this staff. I actually love that, because a rebuilding team trying to become more physical cannot afford to act like field position, coverage discipline, and kicking stability are small details.
The first hint came right away. Harbaugh jumped into a special-teams drill with the gunners at his first practice, which tells you plenty about what he values without needing a long speech.
Horton gives the operation real weight
Chris Horton is not some throwaway coordinator hire either. Harbaugh made him assistant head coach and special teams coordinator, giving the phase real weight instead of treating it like a staff-chart footnote.
That matters because special teams is culture work. It is roster depth, weekly preparation, coverage lanes, hidden yardage, backup linebackers fighting for jobs, receivers proving they can cover kicks, and coaches deciding whether the bottom of the roster actually helps on Sundays.
The Giants have added enough veteran receivers and defensive depth pieces that the back end of the roster is going to be crowded. Special teams will help decide who survives.
The kicker reset makes it louder
The kicker situation only turns the volume up. Jason Sanders was released, leaving Dominic Zvada and Ben Sauls in the competition. Sanders was supposed to bring veteran stability, but after missing 2025 with a hip injury and then getting cut before camp, the job is now wide open.
Kicker uncertainty cannot sit in the background for a team that has played so many tight, ugly games over the years. Harbaugh knows that better than most coaches, because his best Baltimore teams squeezed value from every phase.
Zvada has the rookie upside. Sauls has already been in the building and made kicks for the Giants. Neither can afford a sloppy summer.
Harbaugh is trying to build a tougher team, and special teams is part of that foundation, not a decoration. If the Giants clean up the kicking battle and turn coverage units into a weekly advantage, the roster gets better in a way that will never show up in a fantasy box score.
That may be the point. Harbaugh is forcing the Giants to care about the part of the game that usually gets ignored until it is too late.
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