 Sterling Shepard joins us here on the Michael K show. How are you? Donald Recker, Peter Rosenberg. How are you? And I guess how's the thumb? I was doing pretty good. I mean, they gave me a cast. The swellings went down a lot. So hopefully here in a week, maybe a week and a half, I'll be able to take that brace off and get back to what I was doing. You're able to run routes. You're able to practice. You're able to condition yourself. But no touching Sterling. But no one gets near Sterling right now. Coach did say that Eli made a mistake and threw it at you the other day. He did it today as well. But you know I caught him and it feels good too. So I had a good time doing it. So what's the overall feeling when you lose Coleman and that stinks and you may end up losing Golden Tate for the first month of the season. But what's your general vibe of what you got here at the wide receiver position? Yeah, I feel like we got a lot of guys that can go and a lot of guys that have a chance to prove themselves. We got Benny Fowler, Cody Latimer, two big bodies that could move really well. So I feel like we got guys that are going to step up and pick up the slack. So what year is this for? You going into four? Yeah, I'm going to four. Is it weird to be sort of a veteran of this giant team? Tom flies man. I feel like I was just walking in here as a rookie. But yeah, I mean I'm the most tenured guy here, which is kind of weird. But you know I'm kind of embracing that role. Yeah, I was gonna say at this point I have to imagine that you're a real comfort for Eli. You know who now loses Odell during the offseason. Just getting to know Golden Tate now. But that relationship between you and Eli must be pretty important in terms of chemistry for this receiving court. Yeah for sure. I mean we've been around each other like you said for going on four years now. So you know we're used to each other. Trying to get everybody else kind of caught up to speed. He and Golden have been looking great, been connecting on some really good shots. So we're getting everybody up to speed and it's been looking good. How is a world without Odell? I mean that's my brother. You know, but you just got to kind of focus on the guys that you have here and getting everybody, like I said, caught up. Now we said it before. It's hard to say, you know, you're better off without maybe the best receiver in the NFL. But does this open other doors, get more guys involved? Is there a different look that you can kind of spin positive in being able to move on? Yeah, I mean when you have a guy like Odell, you have to feed him the ball. I mean he makes things happen in Blicum Van Eyre. So I mean the ball would be spread around for sure. I mean you got to see the last, what, five games of the season and I think that's what it's gonna look like. And we put up some big points, spreading the ball around. It was great. So imagine it look like that. What do you think of Daniel Jones so far? He's been tearing it up, man. I think people were asleep on him. That guy right there, he knows how to throw that ball and he took off running another day, which was pretty cool to see too. It's not something we get to see quite often around here, but he took off and he was blazing. Yeah, the Giants aren't known for the, for the scrambling offense for the quarterback. But it's funny, we were just watching all the quarterback show over here throwing around to Evan Ingram and Eli was standing next to Daniel Jones. And from like a size and stature standpoint, they're the same person. Yeah, yeah. Like they really, and do you guys think, is it just in interviews or does Daniel Jones appear to have some just natural Eli mannerisms as well? Oh, I think it's just an interview. Personality wise, they are different. Yeah, yeah, personality wise. I mean, Eli's a real goofy guy. I was gonna say, Daniel's not the goof that Eli is. Yeah, no, not quite. Daniel's more laid back for sure. So how do you deal with what's happening here? You know, you've got Eli Manning, but then you've got a sixth overall pick that's waiting to play. So do you just go about it one game at a time? Are you starting to think we got to play at a certain level here rather than them bringing in the back of quarterback and changing the whole season? Yeah, I mean, I think you just take it like you said one day at a time. Can't really control what's gonna happen in the future. We just got to get better as a team each day, day in the day out. And that's what that's what we've been doing. So you said Daniel Jones looks good. Give us some examples. Is there a way you've been in this league a while to be able to determine what makes a quarterback? What are some of the things that you're seeing? Yeah, in practice, I think he just made some huge strides from OTAs to this camp. I mean, he was seeing things a little bit late during OTAs. But I mean, he's been catching up to speed. He's hitting guys right out of their breaks. He's making unbelievable throws. Just reading the defense. I mean, he's been spot on from from what I've seen. I haven't really got to work with him because I've been going to the ones. But when I get to watch him, I mean, he's tearing it up. I know that you guys are professionals. And so every year, you know, you guys are going in expecting to perform well. But I think it would be it's sort of hard to argue that it's not a transitional time for this football team. A lot of changes, not just Odell, Landon Collins, snacks is gone. The defense looks a lot different. Eli's in a different stage in his career. What sort of goals do you have? Obviously, you'd love to make somehow go 10 to 6 11 to five make the playoffs would be ideal. But besides that, what sort of tangible football goals do you have for this team that you want to see improvements on? I mean, I'd like to see improvements in some of the things that we lack last year was just red zone. I mean, red zone is huge for us making smart decisions there. And ultimately just getting six on the board. I mean, settling for field goals in this league, they don't get you very far. So just seeing improvement in those areas and then third downs as well. What about you? What do you year for? What does Stirling Shepherd still need to work on to get to be an even higher tier as a wide receiver? For me, I just I'd say making those competitive catches. Those 50 50 balls. I'm going to go get some of those. I was looking at tape just yesterday and I saw something that I could have came down with. So just making those and being more physical. All right, rule changes, you know, with the replay with interference and all that. Has that play into your game at all? It doesn't really. I mean, I don't even I don't even pay attention to the rule changes to be honest. You know, I've heard about them, but it's football to me. Try to come down with everything. It's my mentality. Have you have you thought about when you play Washington this year and you're going across the middle and you see number 21? I haven't thought about it, but I'm sure I'm gonna be looking for him. I know that God loves to hit, but it's gonna it's gonna be fun. That's my boy. So we're gonna be going at it's gonna be a good battle. Personality wise, how different does it feel around here between, you know, over the last two years? You know, you're going all the way back to JPP to snacks, Landon, Odell, just from a personality standpoint, how different does the locker room feel? Yeah, I mean, it's a lot different. You don't have those guys around anymore. So he's just kind of trying to build a different identity, different faces around here. So we're building it. We're in the process of doing that. And I mean, we've got a great group of guys. I can honestly say that. I mean, Big Dexter, you know, he was saying, I can't disrespect the game. And you're like, you don't usually see rookies doing that type of stuff. So we ultimately just have a great group of guys. Alright, second half of the season, you even mentioned it, the team did play better. You could say it was a schedule. You could say that at one and seven, maybe you weren't thinking about the playoffs. But what came together that happened in that second half that can apply to the season? I just feel like everybody was fundamentally sound. Everybody was on top of their assignments. And we were working together as a team. That's that's what it came down to me. That's what I saw. That was that was different. Everybody was doing the job. Was there a moment that made it happen? Or was it just a progression? No, I think it was just a progression. I can't stay here and say that it was just one moment that kind of clicked for us. Just just so happened that way. Is this is not like the other sports we can get off to a slow start and like the Mets are going to slow start another hot. You have to slow start your seasons over. No, yeah, exactly. I mean, that's on one of our pillars that coach hits every single day is we got to start fashion. We at the end, we have to finish strong. So that's the way the season has to go for us. Alright, so you're ready opening day? No concerns with the thumb? You know, I'm not too worried about it. I'm listening to the trainers right now. Got them doing whatever I'm doing whatever they tell me. Hopefully Eli'll stop throwing the ball at you. We'll catch you on the one hand. Sometimes I want to throw two ups. I'm good luck this season. Alright. Thank you. Thanks, Sterling. Chef is a real important part of what the Giants are trying to do offensively.