"No," he said.
Next question.
His comments summed up a disappointing afternoon for a team expected to compete for the NFC East title this year. Eli Manning went 4-of-9 for 44 yards and outside of Bobby Rainey's 67-yard run, the ground game was stuck in neutral. Andre Williams carried the ball six times for 15 yards. Shane Vereen carried the ball once for -1 yards. The offense has now turned the ball over eight times in two preseason games.
The temptation to vastly overreact to the preseason is there, but the most interesting aspect of Saturday afternoon's loss was watching the way McAdoo dealt with the team and the press. This was by far his most difficult week on the job, after having to answer myriad questions about kicker Josh Brown's one-game suspension and his own previous statements on the issue. Saturday, when it came to Brown, he repeated the phrase I've said everything I have to say on the Josh Brown situation several times.
When it came to the rest of his team, he had this to say:
"I just finished talking to the team. I told them we worked too hard to put a performance like that on film. They were more physical than we were, that was obvious. We need to take a long look in the mirror and bounce back."
His reaction was an odd combination of relax it's just the preseason and these players should be ashamed of themselves. At one point during his post-game interview, after saying there were no positives and after saying the team needs to take a long look in the mirror, he added "I don't think I need to say much to the players. They have a lot of pride and I think they'll bounce back."
Sometimes it takes a while for a coach to mold into a personality that can truly lead a team. McAdoo served under two great examples -- Mike McCarthy and Tom Coughlin -- and now he has a crucial week to show how much he's learned. While it's just a preseason, these kinds of mistakes and errors can easily bleed into the regular season.
