Giants' Dexter Lawrence throws weight around in locker room after dismal Week 1

Coming off the field and heading into the locker room after that humiliating 28-6 loss to the Vikings on Sunday in which they were booed by the fans, taunted by their opponent and ridiculed by a national audience, the Giants probably were wondering who would say what.

This was a spot in which in recent years, leaders such as Saquon Barkley or Xavier McKinney or even Julian Love or Leonard Williams might have stood up and spoken their minds. Jabril Peppers or Logan Ryan might have challenged everyone else. They would have addressed the team and tried with all of their words and all of their heart to pull the Giants back from the abyss.

But those guys are all gone now. They’re off playing for — and in many cases succeeding with — other teams. And while the departure of their talents certainly has left a void, the bigger vacancy that these Giants need to figure out how to fill is from losing them as the internal voices.

The Giants elected captains this season, but many of them, including quarterback Daniel Jones, left tackle Andrew Thomas and even linebacker Bobby Okereke to a degree, are less oration-oriented than dire times such as these call for. They are fine citizens, hard workers and set good examples, but, as Michael Corleone might have said, they are not wartime captains.

There is one player, though, who has both the longevity and the clout — and the C on his chest — to step in and fill that important role.

On Sunday, Dexter Lawrence did just that.

The most decorated player on the team, the one tied for the longest active tenure and, frankly, the only one who can be in the conversation for best at his position in the league these days had a few things to get off his huge size 60-plus chest. In the privacy of those moments when the loss was still sinking in, it was Lawrence who told the Giants that what had just transpired was unacceptable.

As newcomer Brian Burns told Newsday: “Dex said his piece.”

Lawrence may come across as a fun-loving, super-sized teddy bear with his big grin and Sexy Dexy sack dances, but he undoubtedly is the most respected man on the team.

So while Lawrence stood in front of the cameras on Sunday afternoon and spoke about not panicking and even laughed off the idea that this was anything more than a single loss (“They just beat us today,” he said, practically shrugging), he already had told his teammates how he really felt.

“We have to have want-to,” Lawrence told Newsday when asked to summarize his message to his fellow players. “We have to want to do our job, we have to want to come out on Sunday and play to the best of our abilities. We have to be focused. I think that’s the biggest thing. Don’t let one big play that they get turn into multiple big plays. That’s a mindset thing we have to work on.”

None of that was evident Sunday. The Giants looked lost and listless. They looked as if they hadn’t been practicing in training camp for the past six weeks. It was as if everything they had tried to become this summer, from a team that throws the ball down the field to one that can pressure opposing quarterbacks with a four-man rush, suddenly vanished.

“It’s obviously disappointing to lose, especially to a team that was talking some [expletive],” Lawrence added, a nod to the disrespectful sound bites that came from the Vikings’ locker room even before they came to New Jersey and won by a lopsided 22 points. “It’s tough to lose. I hate losing with a passion. We just have to play better as a group.”

Burns, still finding his way with his new team, said he was impressed by Lawrence’s command of the locker room. Beyond the massive defensive tackle, though, it’s hard to imagine anyone else making that kind of challenging statement. Jones certainly can’t, not when he is playing at the level at which he played on Sunday. Kayvon Thibodeaux clearly wants to, but he couldn’t even make a tackle against the Vikings and so has nothing to stand on. Burns seems as if he might one day evolve into that kind of fiery leader, but right now, his role is sitting back and watching how this all unfolds.

“It’s going to be one of the captains to speak on it, but at the same time, you don’t want to cause a panic or anything like that,” Burns said. “You want to stay with the same motto that we have, that we are going to get better, watch the film, learn from our mistakes. The leaders are doing a great job of leading .  .  . I feel like the rest of the guys are going to stand up and speak when necessary. If it’s now, it’s now, if it’s not, it’s not. I’m not much of a rah-rah guy, but if something is in my heart, I’ll say it.”

Back in front of those cameras, Lawrence was asked why he isn’t panicking over this ominous result that has so many in a tizzy.

“Because I know who we have in the locker room,” he said. “I trust everybody in the locker room.”

The more pressing question at this point may be whom everybody in the locker room trusts.

The Giants used to have a lot of those types of guys. Maybe in the coming weeks, months and years, they will develop new ones. But at this point, Lawrence seems to be the only one left, the only one capable of salvaging this season by commandeering the will of the team.

It’s clearly his team now. We’ll see if it follows his lead.

By Tom Rock

tom.rock@newsday.com@TomRock_Newsday

Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.