Gettleman then opened it up to local reporters, who asked about building a championship-caliber team. Part of six Super Bowls himself – three winners – Gettleman knows something about that, most recently helping the Giants win two titles.

“I think that, really, in terms of building a team, you need a quarterback, you need touchdown scorers, you need pass rushers,” said Gettleman, who spent time with the Bills and Broncos prior to New York.  “And I’ll give Tom Coughlin credit on this one — he taught me big men allow you to compete.  So that, to me, is a winning structure.”

“I came from a place that when Ernie [Accorsi] retired, Jerry Reese came in for the G.M. job and we kept Tom. Now if you remember, Tom was under incredible heat,” Gettleman said. “We had gone to the playoffs and you folks [Carolina] had come up there in ’05 and just kicked our fanny – but we won’t go there. Then in ’06 we go 8-8 and we struggled to get into the playoffs. Tom was under a tremendous amount of heat and it’s the same situation. Listen, my responsibility is to make everybody better.”

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