The Giants on Saturday did not have a seventh-round pick in the NFL Draft, meaning they had extra time to organize another sort of talent board — the one used to prioritize players not drafted for the free-agent signing frenzy.
Immediately after the completion of the seventh round, teams worked the phones to contact and get commitments from players not selected in the draft. As the seventh round progressed, the Giants waited.
“It is actually kind of a gift and a curse because now we have this time where we put guys on our free agent board who we like, but they keep getting picked off,’’ said Marc Ross, the vice president of player evaluation. “We are just focusing on targeting free agents we want to sign so that when the draft is over, we can pounce on those guys.’’
The Giants will sign enough players to get to the 90-man limit, and their roster stood at 84 after they picked seven players in the draft. They will sign more than six undrafted free agents though, and will create space by jettisoning a few players already on the roster.
With the draft pushed back into mid-May, the Giants will not hold their usual three-day rookie mini-camp. The veteran off-season workout program began back on April 21 and is already onto the phase where players are on the field for drills, a phase that cannot be interrupted for a rookie camp. In the past, the veteran workout program had barely started before the draft in late April. The rookies picked in the draft and those signed after the draft have to get to New Jersey as quickly as possible and will immediately get thrust into the workout program alongside the veterans.
“I just talked to [offensive line] coach [Pat] Flaherty and he said it would be kind of more difficult than normal, but I think they have an understanding of what we’re going through,’’ said center Weston Richburg, the second-round pick from Colorado State, who will be on the field with the Giants on Monday. “We’re going to work through it.’’
Although no signings are official just yet, players through Twitter and their agents have linked themselves to the Giants: defensive ends Kerry Wynn of Richmond and Emmanuel Dieke of Georgia Tech; tight end Xavier Grimble of USC; linebackers Justin Anderson of Louisiana-Lafayette and Dan Fox of Notre Dame; defensive tackles Eathyn Manumaleuna of BYU and Kelcy Quarles of South Carolina; and safeties Thomas Gordon of Michigan and C.J. Barnett of Ohio State.
Each year, a few players stick on the roster as undrafted free agents. That’s the way linebackers Mark Herzlich and Spencer Paysinger and fullback Henry Hynoski made it to the Giants. Their most famous undrafted free agent, of course, is Victor Cruz.