NFL releases statement on Giants’ alleged headset issues

Joe Judge said that there were issues with his headset during the Giants’ loss to the Chiefs

Poor clock management was a common theme in the New York Giants’ 20-17 loss to the Kansas City Chiefs on Monday Night Football.

At the end of both halves, the Giants found themselves without any timeouts. In the first half, Judge used timeouts at the 10:35 and 3:09 marks in the second quarter. At the end of the first half, the Giants had the ball with 1:36 left and no timeouts. Appearing to be in no hurry at all, running back Devontae Booker rushed the ball up the middle on third-and-1 at the Giants’ own 35-yard line, killing crucial seconds on the clock and ultimately not resulting in any scoring opportunity.

When asked about the lack of timeouts after the game, Judge said the following:

“The headsets were going out. We are having headset issues. This has happened in every game so far. We deal with the league and they keep telling us there are different software updates or whatever it is, but we had to call two timeouts today because we were trying to send the deals in personnel wise and you got half of the headsets not getting reception. That is the issue right there. We are trying to make the right call. There were other times it was not the right look. I wanted to make sure we settled down, but the other one with the substitution right there, that is a breakdown. We have to make sure the hardware is working. So whatever the issue with that is, the people involved better get it fixed fast.”

Judge added that “We will do hand signals or whatever we have to do. If we can’t rely on the equipment, we will figure something else out. At one point, we tried to go back to the old equipment, and they told us we were not allowed to do it for whatever reason. We didn’t have issues with it last year for the most part. Hopefully, we will figure that out.”

Today, the NFL released a statement on the headsets via the New York Daily News.

The NFL has not found any issues with the Giants’ headsets during last night’s game.

NFL coaches use a Bose SoundComm B30 headset for wireless sideline communication. The company advertises the headsets on its website for $849.95.

This statement, of course, does not align with what Judge said after the game, particularly when he stressed that he personally has experienced headset issues during all eight games this season.

“I would say this: Whoever is in charge of it, I don’t know the exact answer, I don’t know if it comes from the league or us exactly, but they better fix it fast,” Judge said. “That is it.”