Giants defense starting to chirp at offense as practice dominance grows

It’s only practice. But the Giants’ defense is beating up their offense to the point of talking trash about it in the locker room. 

“It’s been very competitive,” safety Julian Love said following Monday’s practice. “On the field, off the field, into the locker room. Yeah, we’re gonna be chirping a little bit, just hoping for a response.” 

Competitive in spirit, perhaps. But, at least for the last couple days, not so competitive on the field. 

The Giants’ offense has struggled mightily in practice, with both Daniel Jones and Tyrod Taylor having issues. No one expects much from the Giants this season, but a step forward for Jones — who is in the last year of his rookie deal after the team declined to pick up his fifth-year option — is a bare minimum. 

It is only practice. But repeating that maxim can only get so far, and it does not bode well that a talking point on Monday was whether defensive coordinator Wink Martindale has been asked to dial back his blitzing schemes to give the offense a better shot. 

“That’s why we practice,” Giants coach Brian Daboll said. “We’re all about the process, so if you have a bad day, you regroup, you look at it, you talk about it. Obviously, you want to translate good things in practice to games. 

“We’re evaluating players right now. We’re working through a lot of different schemes. That’s not much different than the last 22 years I’ve been around. But we want to perform well when it counts the most, which is on game day.” 

To answer the question of whether Martindale was dialing things back, Daboll said he thinks it’s good for the offense to have to deal with whatever’s thrown at it. 

“But I do think you want to do that at times where you say, ‘Hey, give me two or three so every play isn’t mental gymnastics of figuring out different things,’ ” he added. “But I think it’s good to apply as much pressure because you’re going to deal with it at some point.” 

At least one team will be playing its backups when the Giants face the Bengals this week, as Cincinnati coach Zac Taylor told reporters he’s not expecting to play any of his starters. 

That aligns with how Taylor approached the Bengals’ first preseason game, whereas Daboll played his starters for the early part of their game against the Patriots. Daboll said Monday that he has yet to decide what he’ll do against Cincinnati. 

Defensive line coach Andre Patterson was back with the team after missing time with an illness, though he did not work on the field during practice. 

The Giants claimed cornerback Olaijah Griffin. Griffin was waived by the Bills on Sunday and was on their practice squad last season.