Will Mark Herzlich make Giants' roster?

Mark Herzlich, like so many players around the NFL, will spend the weekend constantly checking his cellphone for a call he hopes he does not get. It's the one from the Giants telling him to come into the facility one last time, fill out some paperwork, shake hands with the coach and go off to find another job.

Cutdown day. The Giants must get to 53 players from 80 by 6 p.m. Saturday. They made several moves Friday, including placing linebacker Clint Sintim on injured reserve with a ruptured patella tendon and torn ACL in his right knee. But the big wave of pink slips will come Saturday.

Herzlich said he'll try to stay busy. "I've been watching 'Breaking Bad' lately, so maybe I'll go do that to try to keep my mind off of it," he said.

But the chances are pretty good that the Giants won't be dialing Herzlich's number Saturday and that the only calls and texts he gets will be the congratulatory ones from friends and family.

Herzlich, who has overcome Ewing's sarcoma, a rare bone cancer, and plays with a steel rod in his leg, is one of the most recognizable undrafted free agents in the NFL. He's played well for the Giants this preseason, registering a sack and an interception and making a few special-teams plays. But what he has that other undrafted linebackers do not is first-round talent before his diagnosis. If the Giants keep him, it will be with an eye on waiting for the cancer and the treatments that battled the disease to leave his body and for him to regain the form that made him the ACC Defensive Player of the Year two seasons ago.

"It's starting to feel natural," he said of his abilities coming back. "For a while last season, it was like my brain thinks I can get there but my body doesn't feel like it. Now it's all coming together. I want to come around the edge and I am coming around the edge. So it's progress."

Whittling down the linebackers won't be the only tough job for Tom Coughlin. He'll have to decide who wins the battle for punter between Matt Dodge and Steve Weatherford. And they'll have to pick a backup quarterback between David Carr, who has played unevenly in three preseason games, and Sage Rosenfels, who has played well but appeared in only one game.

Then there are the wide receivers, linemen and defensive backs who must be shaved from the roster.

Herzlich has been here before, on the doorstep of the NFL. There were many who thought he would be drafted, but he wound up slipping through all seven rounds in April and had to wait for the lockout to end to sign with the Giants in late July.

"At least I got to prove myself out here for the last five weeks," he said of the difference between the two experiences of waiting. "I didn't say, 'Oh, I'm going to get drafted' and I'm not going to get my hopes up now, either. You just have to hope for the best and pray that things work out.

"[Thursday night] was my last opportunity to prove something. If I did, great. If I didn't, then that means I have to work harder to try to make another team."Notes & quotes: Lawrence Tynes (thigh) booted 25 field goals and eight kickoffs Friday and expects to be ready for the Sept. 11 opener against the Redskins, but Coughlin said he'll wait until Saturday to see how Tynes feels the day after his workout . . . Coughlin said there still is a possibility that Osi Umenyiora (knee) could be available for the opener. "Every day, he looks better and better," Coughlin said . . . The Giants waived CB Darnell Burks, WR Todd Watkins, G Brant Clouser and DT Ibrahim Abdulai.