At least in Tom Coughlin’s narrow worldview, you can add “wreaking havoc with the Giants’ preparation” to the list of Hurricane Irene’s sins.
Coughlin said he is considering sitting all 22 starters in tomorrow night’s preseason finale at New England because of the incredibly short turnaround from Monday’s loss to the Jets, which was delayed two days by Irene over the weekend.
Asked yesterday if resting all his starters against the Patriots was on Coughlin’s radar, the Big Blue coach said: “Under these circumstances? Yeah.”
Coughlin admitted he is worried the disruptions in the Giants’ practice schedule caused by the storm could affect readiness for the regular season, which opens Sept. 11 at Washington.
“Am I concerned about it? Of course,” Coughlin said. “You’re supposed to be in training camp to prepare, and that usually means practice. [But] just look at the practices we won’t have this week.
“We were all caught short. We got a practice in Saturday, but this week, quite honestly, you’re talking about jog-throughs. You’re into that mode [already]. So there’s a lot of forced learning, and you’ve got a lot of sore people. Are they complaining? Nobody is. Whatever we’re assigned to do, we’ll do it. But it’s just not an optimal situation.”
A mass benching of the first team would snuff Coughlin’s plan to get his starters 60 plays in the final two preseason games combined. They appeared to get just 45 snaps in the 17-3 loss to the Jets.
But the exceedingly brief timespan between games, which prompted a five-man league exemption for the Giants and Jets from yesterday’s roster cutdown to 80 players, might not leave Coughlin much choice.
And that would appear to be fine with Coughlin’s players, considering Eli Manning’s thinly veiled call yesterday for the starters to don baseball caps instead of helmets against the Patriots.
“It’s important to go into a [regular] season healthy, and the offense is healthy right now,” Manning said last night.
The Giants’ offense might be healthy, but it has been anything but productive. With a retooled offensive line and prime targets Kevin Boss and Steve Smith now elsewhere, Manning and the starters have produced just one touchdown in three preseason games combined.
Manning has looked particularly out of sync, completing a mere 49.1 percent of his passes with zero TDs, two interceptions and a dreadful 51.6 passer rating.
Not that Manning cares.
“No one’s ever going to remember what your preseason numbers are,” he said last night.
The crosstown Jets are in the same situation, but the Giants are at a bit of a disadvantage there because they have to travel for the finale, while Rex Ryan’s club stays home to face the Eagles.
At least the Giants are accustomed to adapting on the fly after last December’s travails in playing the Vikings after snow collapsed the roof at the Metrodome. The game was pushed back a day and moved to Detroit, but Coughlin’s team persevered with a 21-3 win.
Cornerback Corey Webster recalled that victory last night when asked if the off-kilter week would cause problems going into the regular season.
“We have been doing a great job in New York of doing midstream adjusting,” Webster said. “We had a couple of times last year where we had some traveling arrangements and we got out there and did a great job adjusting to them, so if we have to do it, I don’t think it will be a problem.”
Which is why Manning, in his typically unruffled approach, thinks any concerns about Irene affecting the Giants are, well, overblown.
“We’re ready,” he said.
bhubbuch@nypost.com