EAST RUTHERFORD, NJ - JANUARY 09: Joe Judge talks to the media after he was introduced as the new head coach of the New York Giants during a news conference at MetLife Stadium on January 9, 2020 in East Rutherford, New Jersey.
(Photo by Rich Schultz/Getty Images)

The latest criticism towards New York Giants head coach Joe Judge is unnecessary. He’s just providing the intensity this team needs.

It’s been less than a week since the New York Giants began their fully-padded practices, commencing the most significant part of an unusual training camp period. And already, “controversy” has arisen.

No, the latest of such sorts doesn’t have to do with an alleged armed robbery or a hit-and-run incident. Instead, it involves newly hired head coach Joe Judge and his implementation of in-practice urgency.

You read that right.

The critics and pot-stirrers have become so bored that their next complaint has to do with Judge making players and coaches — yes, coaches — run laps when mistakes are made.

People are beginning to say how this won’t work out for the Giants as a whole and how Judge is copying the style of other former Bill Belichick assistants. Some actually believe the players should take a stand against it.

But what these critics fail to realize is that Judge is just attempting to bring a level of intensity to this team, something that’s been missing at the Quest Diagnostics Training Center for quite some time.

And at the end of the day, there’s nothing wrong with that.

Remember how this team fared in each of the last three seasons? Twelve victories were notched from the commencement of the 2017 campaign to the conclusion of the 2019 slate, a time period that encompassed two different head coaches in Ben McAdoo and Pat Shurmur (I’m not counting Steve Spagnuolo’s 2017 interim head coaching stint).

Both McAdoo and Shurmur were extremely similar. Of course, both were supposed to be offensive geniuses and never were, but let’s take a look past that.

The two former head coaches portrayed the same run-of-the-mill, boring, underwhelming mantra, and it reflected on each of their squads. There was McAdoo’s failure to seemingly come up with any sort of concrete plan week-in and week-out during his final season in New York, as well as his infamous “um” answer when asked what he told his team at halftime of the 51-17 defeat at the hands of the Rams that very year.

Shurmur’s approach was normally predictable. After the usual loss (and there were 23 of them during his brief Giants tenure), vague, forgettable press-conference answers followed. No inspiration, no motivation, nothing that truly caught the eye.

The Giants and their fans have learned something significant the past few years — intensity and urgency make a difference, both on and off the field. Those two concepts have been missing for quite some time, and Judge is smart enough to realize this and provide them for the team — he showed you as soon as he stepped onto the podium as the Giants head coach for the first time back in January.

The in-practice laps, the yelling, the screaming, the confident answers in press conferences, and the live hitting drills are all about enhancing the atmosphere in and around this ballclub. It’s not meant for Judge to display any sort of dictator-like attitude or for him to abuse his powers in his inaugural head coaching gig. The intensity we are witnessing is meant to create change, and boy has this organization needed it.

Ryan Honey is a staff writer and host of the Wide Right Podcast.