New York Giants HC Joe Judge making players, coaches run laps when mistakes are made

It’s a new era for the New York Giants, and the man at the top of the coaching staff, Joe Judge, is inserting toughness into his team.

Amid an unusual period prior to what should be an unusual regular season with the COVID-19 pandemic lingering upon us, the New York Giants took the field in full pads for the first time on Monday. It felt like the new era was finally beginning, headed by a new coaching staff leader in Joe Judge.

And with a new era comes new in-practice vibes, and in the confines of a Judge-run training camp session, toughness is certainly encouraged and inserted.

During Big Blue’s first full-padded practice of the year, the 38-year-old head coach had members of his team run laps if mistakes were made. And yes, coaches were included within that rule.

Just asked Joe Judge on Zoom why he had players (AND coaches) running laps at parts of practice during drills. Judge says "there are consequences for making mistakes," so the #Giants practice and reinforce that, too. https://t.co/Y8gISsI0qH

— Pat Leonard (@PLeonardNYDN) August 17, 2020

Of course, this seems like a move that the great Bill Belichick — Judge’s former boss in New England — would pull.

After the session, veteran wide receiver Sterling Shepard, who’s now the longest-tenured Giant currently on the roster, spoke on the concept of penalty laps.

How to avoid those penalty laps? “Just don’t make mistakes,” Shepard said. https://t.co/r5NVwhwqvc

— Paul Schwartz (@NYPost_Schwartz) August 17, 2020

It’s this specific insertion of toughness that could alter things for this Giants team. For much of the last few years, a sense of urgency and intensity had been clearly absent, likely due to the underwhelming and, at times, boring mantras that Ben McAdoo and Pat Shurmur provided.

Maybe this type of mentality at practice could be the start of something new for an organization that definitely needs a change.