Pugh hosting Friendsgiving
JUSTIN Pugh is hosting “Friendsgiving” for the Giants offensive line on Friday and it’s going to be big.
“I’ve got my chef cooking for everybody,” Pugh said Tuesday. “We’ve got 65 pounds of turkey, we got a couple hams. (D.J.) Fluker wanted a fried turkey, so we got a fried turkey. John Jerry was requesting a turducken. So I don’t know what he’s gonna have prepared, but it should be good.
“We’ve got cornbread, stuffing, appetizers, all sorts of appetizers,” Pugh added. “The thing I wanted to do is everybody doesn’t have a place to go, doesn’t have family or they live far away, they got some place to go. We’re all gonna be playing on Thanksgiving, so I figure do a little dinner on Friday night.”
Pugh said he got plywood to lay on top of his pool table to display the buffet and is bringing in six tables to fit 35-to-40 people, including friends for his neighborhood and his best friends from growing up outside Philadelphia.
Yes, his friends are Eagles fans, but it’s probably not wise for them to talk trash at this meal.
“We’re not mixin’ state church,” Pugh said with a laugh.
The offensive line meal is nothing new. After Week 2, with the Giants 0-2 and reeling, Pugh said the Giants’ O-line got together and discussed how to change its routine to improve chemistry and performance.
Doing a weekly Wednesday offensive line meal was one tradition they came up with. Each week, a different lineman buys a meal for the group and brings it to the facility to share. They’ve already done Italian, wings, steak, you name it.
“After the second week of the season we knew something had to be changed, and we kind of went in and as a group we hashed out what we think we need to do to get better and it was a collective effort to do some things,” Pugh said. and
Pugh laughed when he explained why he was the first lineman to spring for a Wednesday meal.
“I had to go first cuz … money,” Pugh said, taking heat from his teammates for his lofty $8.8 million salary for 2017 on the fifth-year option as a former first-round pick.
The unfortunate part is Pugh can’t be on the field with his teammates yet. He started the season at left guard, where he’s most comfortable, but quickly had to move to right tackle in place of Bobby Hart. And Pugh’s back hasn’t been right since Week 6 in Denver. So after coming in and out of games trying to play through it, he is now sidelined until it gets right.
“I’m feeling better,” said Pugh, who will be a free agent at season’s end. “The one thing I’m not gonna do is rush back. I don’t want it to be a lingering thing where I’m putting the team in a bad position by every time I come back and I’m not finishing the game. So I want to make sure when I’m back, I’m back.”