Oct 11, 2026; Landover, Maryland, USA; Washington Commanders quarterback Jayden Daniels (5) is sacked by New York Giants cornerback Dru Phillips (22) during the fourth quarter at Northwest Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Geoff Burke-Imagn Images
New York Giants defensive coordinator Dennard Wilson has completely changed his M.O. in recent weeks and has dialled up the blitz.
The former Tennessee Titans’ D-coordinator has had a reputation as more of a passive play-caller. It carried over into his first three games with the Giants this season when he blitzed on just 22.1% of defensive snaps.
The results were as expected: An uninspiring one sack and seven quarterback hits.
But without star edge rusher Brian Bruns, who was lost for the season in Week 3, Wilson has revolutionized his defense. Big Blue blitzed the Arizona Cardinals on 51.3% of passing plays in Week 4, then blitzed Jayden Daniels 62.2% of the time in their tie on Sunday against the Washington Commanders.
The results speak for themselves. In those two games, they’ve accrued seven sacks and 14 quarterback hits.
“Dennard has pretty much every blitz known to man in the system,” head coach John Harbaugh said. “And almost every blitz coverage — we don’t have quite all of them — but we can get to them soon enough if we want. And he does a great job of organizing it. It’s a great, week-to-week game-planning mindset… You saw probably more all-out pressure blitzes from two teams in the fourth quarter and the fifth quarter than you’ll ever see again.
“Every play pretty much was ‘Zero’ blitz by both teams, it seemed like. So, that’s probably going to drive the numbers up a little bit. But we feel like we would consider ourselves probably a blitzing team generally, but we also consider ourselves a cover defense too.”
Still, this more aggressive brand of the Giants’ defense does appear to match up well against the 1-4 New Orleans Saints for their Week 6 matchup on Sunday afternoon at MetLife Stadium. Only eight teams have allowed more sacks than the Saints’ 13 this season, though they have improved in recent weeks with just five yielded in their last three games.
Quarterback Tyler Shough has generally fared well against the blitz. Prior to an uninspiring Week 5 against the Minnesota Vikings, in which he passed for just 96 yards with two interceptions, he had completed 71.9% of his attempts against the blitz, per Nick Underhill of New Orleans Football. But he was also sacked on an alarming 12.2% of his drop-backs, compared with just 2.4% when the opposition doesn’t blitz.
The Vikings sent added pressure on 23 of Shough’s 27 dropbacks, and the New Orleans game plan was not prepared in the slightest. That’s a good omen for the Giants come Sunday.
