Less than two weeks after taking full responsibility for fixing the Giants, New York coach Joe Judge partially blamed his team’s latest loss on broken headsets.
“The headsets were going out,” Judge said after losing 20-17 to the Kansas City Chiefs on Monday Night Football. “We are having headset issues. This has happened in every game so far. We deal with the league and they keep telling us there are different software updates or whatever it is, but we had to call two timeouts today because we were trying to send the deals in personnel-wise and you got half of the headsets not getting reception. That is the issue right there. We are trying to make the right call. We have to make sure the hardware is working. So whatever the issue with that is, the people involved better get it fixed fast.”
It’s tough to blame malfunctioning headsets — which Judge claimed have been a problem at every single stadium the Giants have played in this season both home and away — for New York jumping offsides to negate an interception off Patrick Mahomes on what would become Kansas City’s eventual game-winning drive.
Errors like that were compounded by the poor clock management Judge blamed on the headsets, but there’s no way they were caused by the hardware issues that were allegedly taking place. Penalties have been an issue for the Giants all season and with Judge now 8-16 as a head coach in the NFL, it seems fairly clear he is not the right guy to get Big Blue back into the black in the win column as last night also wasn’t the first time an offsides penalty has directly contributed to a loss.
“The fish stinks from the head down,” Judge said last month. “I’m the head coach. It’s my responsibility. Point blank. Every player on this field, every position group, the execution, it all comes down to me… There’s no excuses, no exceptions. It starts and ends with me. To me, the only time you really feel any pressure or nerves is when you’re unprepared.”
If the headsets truly have been an issue for Judge for the entire season as he says, perhaps the Giants should prepare to be able to play without them. And really, they should have been preparing to do that anyway.
“Again, look, I don’t want to make this about stupid headsets,” Judge said. “That wasn’t the factor in the game. We got to do other things on our own for us to be successful.’’
Like stop complaining and start preparing your players not to jump offsides and yourself to function without a headset.
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