NEW YORK _ The New York Giants made a stunning head coaching hire on Wednesday in the wake of preferred candidate Matt Rhule's stiff-arm of their franchise, landing on Patriots' special teams coordinator Joe Judge.
They also reportedly requested to interview fired Dallas Cowboys coach Jason Garrett to be Judge's offensive coordinator, which would put an experienced coach the Giants have long coveted very close to the big chair.
Not one person saw Judge's hiring coming following his Monday interview with the team, though, perhaps outside of Judge and his representatives themselves.
"Shocked," "wow," and "Joe Judge?" were three texts from sources immediately after ESPN broke the news.
Sources say Baltimore Ravens defensive coordinator Don Martindale had reason to believe he was the leader in the clubhouse as late as Monday evening, when the New York native Rhule chose the Carolina Panthers before even interviewing with his hometown team.
But when Rhule officially agreed to a seven-year contract with the Panthers on Tuesday morning, something changed.
Judge, 38, who had an offer to coach his alma mater, Mississippi State, suddenly was reported as the Giants' next head coach to succeed the fired Pat Shurmur.
The Giants selected Judge before even interviewing Patriots offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels on Wednesday. McDaniels wasn't interested in the position anyway, however, as long as Dave Gettleman remained in power as GM, according to sources.
When Rhule chose Carolina without even flying to New Jersey to hear the Giants out, one source said: "What does that tell you?" The answer: candidates such as Rhule were wary of just how much say they would have running the Giants as long as Gettleman remained.
Judge won three Super Bowls with the Patriots in 2014, 2016 and 2018. And he won two national championships on Nick Saban's Alabama staff in 2009 and 2011.
At 38, Judge is one of the youngest NFL coaches. Sean McVay of the Los Angeles Rams currently is the youngest at 33.
He's been with the Patriots since 2012, first as special teams assistant (2012-14) and then as special teams coordinator (2015-19). New England ranked in the top 10 among the league's special teams units in all five of his seasons as coordinator.
This season, though, he handled both special teams and wide receivers, and New England's outside wideouts were a huge weakness of their team.
Judge was born in Philadelphia. He is married with four kids and working on a PhD in education.
He played quarterback and strong safety in the suburbs at Lansdale Catholic. Then he earned three letters at Mississippi State (2000-04), arriving as a backup quarterback but seeing most of his time on special teams.
His father, Joseph, played football at Temple and professionally in the CFL. His uncle, Jerry, reportedly is a former boxer who fought both Larry Holmes and George Foreman.
John Mara and the Giants long have wanted to land a branch off the Bill Belichick coaching tree, if not the man himself. And they now get their wish.
Plenty of Belichick's disciples have fizzled or failed as head coaches when they've gone out on their own: Eric Mangini, Charlie Weis, Romeo Crennel, McDaniels, Matt Patricia and Saban in the NFL.
But Bill O'Brien (Texans) and Mike Vrabel (Titans) have teams in these playoffs, and Brian Flores (Dolphins) looks like the real deal. So Judge will get his shot to prove which group he belongs in.
With Judge as special teams coordinator since 2015, New England consistently ranked as one of the NFL's top units. He added receivers to his responsibilities in 2019. He coached kicker Stephen Gostkowski to the All-Pro team in 2015 and special teams captain Matt Slater to the same honors in 2016 and this season.
Belichick called Judge "an excellent coach" and said he excelled in his added duties this season.
"Joe’s done a great job. He’s done a great job with the kicking game," Belichick said. “He’s expanded the role a little bit and that’s kind of had a little bit of a ripple effect in the way we’ve organized the kicking game, but that’s all worked out pretty efficiently. Joe’s done a good job of organizing that, as well as taking care on some other things with the offense and particularly receivers.”