Due to weather, the Giants were back inside the fieldhouse for Wednesday's practice at training camp. Here are the standouts from the day:
S Antoine Bethea: Coach Pat Shurmur ended practice today with a spirited series of two-minute drills for the first, second and third teams. Antoine Bethea won it for the defense on his turn, elevating to intercept an Eli Manning pass intended for running back Saquon Barkley up the left sideline. Jabrill Peppers, who is his partner at safety and 12 years younger, let everyone know the "O.G." can still play.
"One of the things, when I was a young guy, the coach used to always tell us was follow the older guys," the 14-year veteran said. "So, being an older guy, I got to do all the right things so the young guys can see me do it, and they can follow in the same footsteps."
WR Alonzo Russell: It wasn't always pretty, but rookie quarterback Daniel Jones got it done during the two-minute drill with the second unit. He jumpstarted the drive with a long completion to Russell, and the two later hooked up for the winning touchdown as the offense needed to find the end zone under scenario that was drawn up today.
"He's one of the guys I am talking about champing at the bit getting these opportunities," wide receivers coach Tyke Tolbert said of the 6-foot-4 Russell. "What does he bring? He brings his size and ball skills. He can always run, he can always make plays on the ball, and at the end of last year, he became active. But what I was telling him throughout the course of the year, 'It's not your ability to make plays on the ball and do things on offense, which I know you can do. It's your ability to go out there and perform on special teams.' That's a role that younger guys have to play in order to be active on the roster and active on game day, it's be a special teams guy. He improved that greatly and he was worried about that. Being active the last game with the Cowboys, he has continued to improve, as you have seen throughout this training camp, making plays on the ball. I like where he's going."
Defensive Backs: It was a collective effort from the group today, particularly the young guys and players fighting for roster spots. Jake Carlock broke up back-to-back passes near the goal line during the two-minute drill. Ronald Zamort was fiery throughout practice. Rookie Julian Love, Sam Beal and Antonio Hamilton also had pass deflections.
"There are some challenges because you have so much youth, but I also believe it's a clean slate, too," defensive backs coach Everett Withers said. "So what they learn, they learn together as a new group. They're not bringing a whole bunch of things in from other places, so they learn together as a new group and I think that has some benefit to it."
