3x-Super Bowl Champ Sings Joe Judge’s Praises, Giants Signing Imminent

Getty Head coach Joe Judge of the New York Giants looks on from the sidelines against the Washington Football Team at MetLife Stadium.

Free-agent Nate Ebner currently has his sights set on representing the USA at a second Olympic Games this summer. Ebner’s first stint on the United States men’s national rugby team came back in 2016, where the support of New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick played a pivotal role in his journey.

“I think when you have got a Bill Belichick, who is who he is and supports you the way he does, it not only gives me the support in what I am doing, it gives me the strength that I have the confidence to go hard, knowing he has my back,” Ebner told Talking Rugby Union.

Due to Ebner’s participation in the 2016 Summer Olympic Games in Rio, he didn’t rejoin the Patriots until less than a month prior to the start of the regular season. Still, he went on to have arguably the most prolific campaign of his nine-year playing career, earning second-team All-Pro honors under the tutelage of then-special teams coordinator Joe Judge.

Now at the helm of the New York Giants, Judge is following in Belichick’s footsteps, giving his unwavering support to his special teams ace — a gesture Ebner couldn’t be more thankful for.

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Ebner Praises Joe Judge’s Support

“Joe Judge was there the whole time, he saw me do what I did in ’16 and thankfully I have him around this time and he knew what it did for me as a football player. He knew what it meant to me,” Ebner said. “When you have that support, it just allows you to confidently go towards what you want to do, and I don’t have to second guess their support or where I stand with them when it is done.”

“I think the biggest thing when I went in ’16 is that I was ready to have that conversation if I didn’t get that support, that I was going to say, ‘I’ll have to see you on the other side of this and we will figure out what we want to do and if you still want to have me on your team’. I was ready to have that conversation because I was convicted… But when you have that support off the bat, it is great. You don’t have to have that conversation and I can go confidently.”

Joe Judge Expects Ebner to be a Giant in 2021

After playing a career-high 81% of the Giants’ special teams snaps in 2020 (332), Ebner remains an NFL free agent at the moment. With that said, when the 32 -year-old’s hunt for a Gold medal concludes, you can expect Ebner to make a return to East Rutherford.

“Technically Nate is a free agent right now, but we fully intend for him to be a member of the Giants,” Judge told reporters in mid-May. “He has to go through Olympic rugby training and we’re supporting him with that.”

“Ultimately, I think they like me for who I am and the character that I have and the effort I put towards my job every day and the consistency I bring,” Ebner stated. “Bill [Belichick] respects that, Joe respects that. I think it is the character, it is the work ethic, it is the consistency of who I am.”

It’s clear Ebner has a good handle of his sitting within the Giants’ organization, as Judge echoed those exact sentiments regarding Ebner’s high-end character traits.