Coming from the cloak and dagger culture of the New England Patriots, you can expect first year New York Giants head coach Joe Judge to be cagey when it comes to speaking about injuries.
The NFL policy on injury reporting is clear, but we all know that Bill Belichick has made a habit of not elaborating on players’ injury statuses any further than the rules allow. Judge has brought that practice here to East Rutherford. He already has the players muzzled when talking about their health, now he’s instilling that into the very inquisitive Giants’ beat pool reporters.
On Tuesday, when he was asked about certain players (Golden Tate, Blake Martinez, RJ McIntosh, Montre Hartage) who were held out of or were limited at practice, Judge simply gave a very Belichickian response.
“We’re expecting all of them except for Golden to practice today. Golden’s going to go ahead and stay behind with the trainers, kind of get a look at a little something. We’ll see where he is. He’s really kind of day to day right now. But the other guys, they should be out there and ready to roll today.”
There it is. He told us what was happening but he did not cite the specific injury or issue with each player. That is something the Giant beat pool and the fans are going to have to get used to. Information won’t be flowing so freely under this regime.
When Martinez was quizzed about his condition after practice, he towed the new company line, just as tight end Evan Engram and others have done this summer. No one speaks to the media about injuries on this team other than Judge himself.
“It’s good, I’m good,†Martinez said. “We don’t discuss injuries and things here. I have to push that to coach Judge. But for the most part, I’m doing well. Just doing what I can do and getting ready every day.â€
Judge is within the rules at the moment, since it’s still training camp, but once the season starts he’s going to be pressed to give more detail. The league’s policy is strict when it comes to reporting injuries.
Once the regular season starts, each team is required to publish a practice report on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, unless, of course, their game that week is on a day other than Sunday, then the reports are shifted to match those timeframes. Â The policy:
“The practice report provides clubs and fans with an accurate description of a player’s injury status and how much he participated in practice during the week. If any player has a significant or noteworthy injury, it must be listed on the practice report, even if he fully participates in practice and the team expects that he will play in the team’s next game. This is especially important for key players whose injuries may be covered extensively by the media.”
Then there is the game status report which “provides clubs and fans with an accurate description of a player’s availability for the club’s next game. Teams must notify the league, their opponent, local and national media, and the league’s broadcast partners of the status of their injured players by 4 p.m. ET the day before their next scheduled game.”
Injuries incurred during the game must also be reported. It “requires club personnel to report in-game injury information factually and accurately as soon as it is available. In-game injury updates must be disseminated to the broadcast partner, the media and the fans in the stadium at the same time. Clubs must post injury updates on the stadium video boards, scoreboards or ribbon boards so fans at NFL games are also informed.”
The policy is followed by a reminder that “teams provide credible, accurate and specific information about injured players to the league office, their opponents, local and national media, and the league’s broadcast partners each week during the regular season and postseason.The reporting process is of paramount importance in maintaining the integrity of the game.”
It will be interesting to see how Judge manages all this here in New York where media is omnipresent and the organization has always been forthcoming with information. The Patriots pride themselves in stretching the rules and pushing the envelope on others that many teams and their fans see as non-consequential.