Pat Shurmur has not had any discussion with New York Giants brass about his status as head coach, he said after Sunday's 34-17 loss to the Philadelphia Eagles.
In Year 2, Shurmur went 4-12 on the 2019 season. He followed his 2018 debut, a 5-11 mark, one game worse and lost nine straight games from Oct. 6 through Dec. 9.
After the latest defeat dropped Shurmur to 9-23 through two year on the job, Shurmur was asked about if there had been any meetings yet with ownership regarding 2020.
"I haven't had those types of conversations," Shurmur said. "If and when I do, I'm not going to talk to you about it. At some point, what is said will be revealed. If I'm back, I'm looking forward to working with this young talent. If I'm not, whoever's coaching this team has got a great group of young players.
"The dead money goes away. There's going to be cap space. We got picks. So there's ways to improve the team. So if I'm not here, that's what the new coach has to look forward to. If I am here, I can't wait to get back to work. So that's about as honest and clear I can make it.
"But I will say this -- I don't have anything planned to talk with ownership at this point. Typically, that's what you do when the season's over and I will never share with you what those conversations reveal."
"I will never share with you what those conversations reveal"
- Giants Videos (@SNYGiants) December 30, 2019
Pat Shurmur is mum on his job status pic.twitter.com/tnBRt9H23a
Shurmur doubled down when delivered a follow-up question about what he would say to ownership in his case to remain head coach of the Giants going forward.
"That's, again, my conversation for ownership for when we have those conversations," Shurmur said. "I think we didn't win enough games. I own that. I don't make any excuses for that. But I do know that there's things that happened this year where this team improved in a lot of ways. And I feel like it's only going to get better. The structure of how we're built -- we'll be able to improve now, quickly, and you saw a lot of young players out there playing hard that will only improve with time. So that's where we're at."
While the Giants are unlikley to retain Shurmur -- as SNY's Ralph Vacchiano reported Sunday afternoon before the game kicked off at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey -- Shurmur's opening statement acknowledged 2019's shortcomings but leaned heavily on young talent returning for 2020 with experience.
"I feel like it's only gonna get better" - Pat Shurmur pic.twitter.com/UaNHoKTW5C
- Giants Videos (@SNYGiants) December 30, 2019
"End of a long year," Shurmur said. "I think you watched our guys fought and battled. We had a couple of mistakes there at the end of the second half, just because we kind of let the score stretch out, but they continued to battle and I've talked about that all year. We're not a good enough team yet to win those close games, but some day we will be and I'm proud of those guys.
"I told the young players that, by the way that the roster was structured this year, it was a gift -- it was a gift to them to be able to, because they were our best players, to be able to play as much football as they did. And at some point here in the middle of February, they'll be sitting on their couch and they're going to look back and shake their head and say, 'Holy cow, what happened?' And then they need to use it as motivation to have a great offseason and come back stronger than ever so that, in these close games, we can find a way to make enough plays to win 'em.
"Got no problem with the way they trained. All year long, you didn't get a chance to watch these guys practice. They practiced hard. They practiced intentionally. Got no problem with how hard they play. We just got to find a way to make more plays and win more in the critical situations in games that are critical to winning. And I think this group, as we come together and add more pieces, we'll be able to do that."