New York Giants Official Website

Strahan Excited for Start of Camp
Giants future Hall-of-Fame defensive end ready to begin 2007 campaign.
By Michael Eisen, Giants.com

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July 12, 2007

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. - Like all NFL players, Michael Strahan has a body that sends him signals. Sometimes it feels great and the best defensive end of his generation knows he's primed for a dominant performance. At times it will be good, and Strahan will be ready to give an opponent his best shot. And at rare times, Strahan's durable body will tell him something is wrong and he needs to be examined by the team's athletic trainers and doctors.

Now, two weeks before the Giants open training camp at the University at Albany, Strahan's body has begun to ask questions.

"My body tells me at this time after 15 years, why am I still playing football?" Strahan said this week.

Strahan has a ready answer. Midway through his second decade with the Giants, he is as enthused about playing as he's ever been. So much so that he's even - gasp! - excited about training camp.

"I'm looking forward to the season and getting back onto the field," Strahan said. "Am I jumping for joy? I like training camp, I really do. I love the competition, being in the heat with all the equipment on, the fans watching, waiting to see who is going to pass out, trying to outlast the next guy, I love that part of it. The only part I don't like is that you are gone for a month and that you are two hours away from anything. The fact that I don't like is that we are gone for so long away from home and you don't have an opportunity to see your family when you want."

Strahan made his remarks at his second annual celebrity golf tournament at the Century Country Club in Purchase, N.Y. Hosted by Strahan and the law firm Dreier LLP, the tournament raised $300,000 for the Supportive Children's Advocacy Network (SCAN), which works to improve children's welfare through educational programming in East Harlem and the South Bronx.

Although golf was the sport of the day, football is seldom far from Strahan's thoughts or conversation. He is particularly eager to return to the field this year after missing so much playing time in 2006. Strahan was sidelined for eight of the last nine games, including the NFC Wild Card Game, after suffering a Lisfranc sprain in his foot against Houston on Nov. 5. Unlike backup end Justin Tuck, who suffered a similar injury, Strahan did not need surgery. This offseason he worked himself back into top condition and said he won't worry at all about the foot once he hits camp.

"My foot doesn't bother me - I've been using it on my backswing," Strahan said. "I've been training, I've been running, I went to mini-camp, I've done everything they've asked me to do and it have no effects on my foot. It's fine. I'll be ready for camp."

Strahan is well aware that preseason football magazines already in stores do not consider the Giants serious title contenders. They cite the inconsistency of quarterback Eli Manning, the retirement of Tiki Barber and a defense that was ranked 25th in the NFL last season as reasons the Giants will not reach the playoffs for the third consecutive year. But Strahan is confident the team will play better than those predictions suggest.

"Last year we were 6-2 when we were healthy," Strahan said. "Then when we lost almost half our starters with injuries, we went downhill. It is very hard for any team to win when losing all those starters. Of course, they are going to come in and predict we are not going to be a great team because of what we showed at the end of last year. But that was not necessarily representative or our team. So when everyone is healthy we have as good a chance as anybody to win it all. We all know how this business goes - one year to the next is totally different."

Strahan enters the season with 132.5 sacks, tying him with Hall of Famer Lawrence Taylor for the franchise record and Taylor and Leslie O'Neal for seventh place on the NFL's career list. He is convinced he can collect many more sacks, and perhaps get selected to this eighth Pro Bowl, playing in the defensive scheme introduced by new coordinator Steve Spagnuolo.

"The one thing about this year with the new defense, it kind of reinvigorates you to being in that meeting room, because now you have to pay attention," Strahan said. "Before, here and there your mind wandered because you've heard it before and it was no big deal. Now this year I have to pay attention, it's like being a rookie all over again."

Strahan said the Giants won't collapse without Barber, who played for the Giants from 1997-2006 and is the franchise's career rushing and total yardage leader. Specifically, he was asked what like will be like without Barber.

"I didn't live with him anyway," Strahan joked. "Life will be fine, we have two very capable running backs (in Brandon Jacobs and Reuben Droughns). It is very hard to replace someone like Tiki in the production and inspiration that he gave us. But at the same time it's football, things change, you can't play forever - I won't play forever. When those things happen you have to deal with them. I think our young guys are hungry for success because they see what it has brought him and they want that as well, so they will be fine."

Strahan's golf tournament attracted celebrities like Pro Football Hall of Fame members Harry Carson and Eric Dickerson, basketball Hall of Famer Clyde Drexler, and Star Trek legend William Shatner. It was also a gathering place for an exclusive group that is one of Strahan's favorites: great defensive ends. On hand were Hall of Famer Deacon Jones, all-time sack leader Bruce Smith and four-time Pro Bowler and Super Bowl XX MVP Richard Dent.

All of those former players have tremendous admiration for Strahan, notably his productivity and his longevity. He could not have achieved the latter, they said, without the 20 or so pounds he has dropped in recent years. One a relatively hefty 275 pounds, Strahan expects to be around 255 when he reports to camp.

"What he is doing is right, he is taking a little bit of weight off each year," Jones said. "That will keep you playing a lot longer. Fifteen years is a long time, but Michael still has the same enthusiasm he had for the game when he was younger. That's the one thing that is tough to control, to have the enthusiasm for training camp, to have the enthusiasm for the game itself, it's amazing that he can do that. He is a hell of a football player."

"When I was playing, I lost 40 pounds in a one-and-a-half year period," said Smith, the only player in NFL history with 200 career sacks. "I got up to 310 pounds my second year. But I wasn't going to become the player I wanted to be if I stayed at that weight. I had to have endurance, so I lost weight and I was able to take it to the next level in overtime, etcetera. I can relate to what Michael is going through. Each and every year, the team that you are playing for is challenging him by bringing in a new guy. They're saying, 'Michael is getting a little older, so we have to protect ourselves in case he goes down.' It's a challenge each and every day."

Playing at a lighter weight helps Strahan overcome that challenge.

"Deacon said to me, 'How much you weigh, you think you're too small?'" Strahan said. "But I just feel better, my joints feel better, I can just get around better, move around better, I feel a lot more explosive, a lot quicker and I think it's added to my career. Had I been at 275, I don't think I could still play. It would be a lot harder for me just to get out of bed in the morning."

He might be 35, but Michael Strahan's body is still telling him to get out of bed and play football. And with the Giants gunning for another playoff berth, that's exactly what they need him to do.