Best of the Giants on WFAN: Jaxson Dart, John Harbaugh join the show

**Craig Carton** (0:00)
John Harbaugh is on the line right now, the Giants head football coach. John, good morning, how are you?

**John Harbaugh** (0:04)
Ah, doing great, great to be with you guys.

**Boomer Esiason** (0:06)
Yeah, great to have you, John, and welcome to New York, of course. And I gotta start with the quarterback, Jaxson Dart, you've had Joe Flacco, you've had Lamar Jackson, you've had some really exciting times with those two players, an MVP Super Bowl year for Joe Flacco, and of course, three MVPs for Lamar Jackson. Your initial assessment now, after getting to know Jaxson Dart this summer.

**John Harbaugh** (0:29)
Yeah, that's a great question, Boomer.
I guess you're the same question. I mean, you know quarterbacks and I'm kind of excited about him. I just feel like he's, you watch guys on tape, you watch him in college, you kind of watch him as opponents or whatever, and you get a feel for him. But it's different when you get around him every single day.
He's a really talented guy. He really can throw the football. I'm really, it starts with talent, it starts with the ability to make plays. You know, we had that with Lamar, obviously, and Joe in his way was a great thrower. I think Jaxson in his way is gonna be really a talented quarterback. So all the other intangibles are really there too, but I'm impressed with his talent so far watching him in camp.

**Boomer Esiason** (1:08)
Any chance that he plays on Friday or are we gonna keep him in bubble wrap?

**John Harbaugh** (1:13)
You know what, we are waffling right now between playing him and putting him in bubble wrap.

**Boomer Esiason** (1:19)
I feel like all these players are in bubble wrap now, John. I came from an era where these games actually mattered for all of us and all of us quarterbacks wanted to play. I was interested in that Tom Brady came out about two weeks ago and said, you know, I'm a football player. I want to play football and I wanted to play in the preseason. And he showed a game in which he was in the third quarter and he ran a play to Randy Moss. What is going on in the NFL that these players no longer play as much in the preseason?

**John Harbaugh** (1:45)
That's a great question. You know, this third preseason game would have been a three quarter game. You know, when you were playing and when I started out coaching in this league that's pretty much completely changed and really what it is is if a guy gets hurt it's like the end of the world, you know. And again, I look back right when I first started with Andy his first year we lost our starting center in the fourth preseason game on the first drive at the end of a ten play drive at the ten yard line, you know. And so guys are getting hurt back in those days too, but it's just the idea of getting guys to the regular season and keeping them healthy and then even the practices they aren't what they used to be. So it's a different era for sure.

**Craig Carton** (2:23)
Talk to John Harbaugh on the fan and CBS Sports Network. If you don't play Jackson on Friday, does that mean that you are comfortable with his grasp of the offense and what Matt Nagy wants to do with him?

**John Harbaugh** (2:36)
Yeah, Gio, yes. I would already say we are comfortable with that. He's made, you know, he's really done a great job in camp. I feel like in the last couple weeks, he's really, really kind of skyrocketed. I understand in the offense. It's operating the offense and practice. We do practice at a pretty, at a very high level, I think, especially for today's era. There's a lot of pressure on the guys. We try to make it as game-like as we can. We can't make it exactly like the game, but as much as we can, we try to put pressure on them in the pocket, all those kind of things.
And he's got a good handle now, what we're trying to do with the offense. And we're trying to figure it out, too, and just figure out what we do well, what he does well. It's not going to stop with the first game. They'll keep developing past the first game. But I would be confident right now that he could go out and play a Red Bull season game.

**Boomer Esiason** (3:21)
Head Coach John Harbaugh joins us for a few more minutes. You know, one of the things, how was the spa in West Virginia when you guys spent 13 days there? How was that?