Gilbride Jr. Is Here

As expected, the Giants hired offensive coordinator Kevin Gilbride's son, Kevin Gilbride, Jr., as their offensive quality assistants coach.

Gilbride replaces Sean Ryan, who moved from that position to wide receivers coach after that coach, Mike Sullivan, moved on to coach quarterbacks.

Tom Coughlin said he's had his eye on Gilbride for a while.

"Kevin is very aggressive and a very energetic young coach," Coughlin said. "Quite frankly, I investigated him three or four years ago. He’s busted his tail to get where he is. He was a graduate assistant at Syracuse (Coughlin’s alma mater), so I knew about him there and the coaches were very favorably impressed by what he was able to accomplish there."

Coughlin indicated the job, though considered an entry-level position among NFL coaches, is rather involved.

"In this day and age, your coaches are relying on the quality control coaches’ ability to take off segments and situations (from game tapes) before they can start to game plan," Coughlin said. "It’s a grinder’s job. It’s very much a behind-the-scenes job. They are responsible for self-scout. They are responsible for the next opponent and he has already started, because very shortly we will be on our divisional opponents.

"During the season, he has to provide us with self-scout information on a Monday night, get the next opponent off and he runs the scout squad. And when you talk about professional football, and you talk about the quality of your practices, those scout squads have to be run to perfection."

Gilbride coached wide receivers at Temple last year, the 9-4 Owls' first winning season since 1990.

Gilbride, Sr., said he advised his now 30-year-old son to stay away from coaching. Oh, but you know kids. They never listen.

"In terms of getting into coaching,” said Gilbride, Sr., "my wife and I did everything we could to discourage, not encourage, because we know it’s a challenging life and there are a lot of potential pitfalls. He was adamant that he wanted to get into it and he’s been very fortunate. He made a decision he wanted to try pro football. And again our efforts to discourage were met with non-compliance.

"He was fortunate enough to get the interview with Tom, and Tom was impressed enough with his knowledge of the computer and the things that he’ll have to do in the quality control position to bring him on board."

Bet he'll be more obedient with Coughlin than the old man.

EP