Former Eagle Shawn Andrews plans to prove doubters wrong with Giants

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. - He had yet to take a hit or absorb a block, but Shawn Andrews had his reconstructed back up before his first live practice with the Giants, his new team.

Andrews' message:

He's tough, and he wants to play football. He wants to play for, say, 8 more years. Anyone who questions his message is dead wrong.

"I just think back to how I felt after my first surgery," Andrews said yesterday morning, standing in front of his new locker with its shiny "NY" helmet hung on a peg behind him. "And after my second surgery. Getting up, with a reservoir in my back, draining blood."

Andrews, rising from a sickbed, intent on rebirth.

Andrews, yesterday, 8 months later, after endless hours of rehabilitation work, back in the NFL, taking snaps at left guard with the third-team offensive line.

That's a different image from the one painted by pundits and onlookers who cast him as soft and kooky.

That's Bednarik, not Barney.

"I'm here for a reason. I'm a competitor," Andrews said. "People telling me I don't want to play football anymore, that I don't have a love for the game . . . Me being back speaks for itself."

He could have quit. He was the Eagles' first-round pick in 2004. He went to the Pro Bowl at right guard in 2006 and 2007.

That pedigree has little relevance now, since he injured his back in Game 2 of the 2008 season, which led to his first operation, then needed another surgery in December. He signed a 6-year deal that, according to the Star-Ledger, of Newark, N.J., could pay him approximately $40 million, but he was given only $250,000 in bonus money and will make only $1.25 million in base salary this year if he makes the team.

He is damaged goods reborn, ready to convince the NFL and the Giants and himself and, of course, the Eagles. Andrews professes to have no hard feelings, but then, his brother, Stacy, is the Eagles' current right guard (they hadn't spoken since Shawn signed).

Still, the abruptness with which the Eagles cut ties after standing by him so long took away his breath.

"It's like, 'We're going to release you, here. I'm going to let the media know.' It happened like [snap of the fingers], that. It was fast," Andrews recounted.

He wouldn't confirm that it was head coach Andy Reid who called him, but, when pressed, he allowed that it sounded a lot like Reid's delivery.

Perhaps the Eagles were "swayed," he said, by what he perceived to be a fan base eager for his departure, but Andrews insisted that there is "no bad blood."

"I don't want no 'Shawn vs. the Eagles' going on," he said.

He insists that he failed no physical in March; that, in fact, he took no physical in March and was at the beginning of a therapy track that had just begun when the Eagles released him.

The Eagles never have publicly said Andrews failed a physical. It was Andrews himself Friday who asserted that the Eagles released him because of a failed physical.

Andrews' is an interesting universe, no?

It was a universe in flux until Friday, when the Giants signed him.

It was a universe that began to right itself at practice yesterday afternoon.

As intermittent rain soaked the grounds at the Giants' swampy practice site, the team worked indoors at the Timex Performance Center in shorts, helmets and shoulder pads. Andrews took 15 live snaps, three of them in a one-on-one drill. All of his snaps came with the third team - 12 at left guard, three at left tackle.

Andrews played right tackle in college and right guard with the Eagles. Not only is he now learning a new offense, he's learning it from the left side.

With Andrews lined up at left guard, defensive tackle Chris Canty swam past him in a one-on-one matchup; then, with Andrews lined up a left tackle, defensive end Dave Tollefson sped past him.

However, Andrews looked competent, healthy and powerful during the full-team drills, at both positions, both running and passing. Twice, at left guard, he snuffed out stunting defensive linemen, part of the offensive line's ballet.

Giants coach Tom Coughlin was impressed.

"I like what he did," Coughlin said. "He's starting to be spoon-fed the offense, which is foreign to him."

Andrews, 27, is trim and fluid at 6-4 and 330 pounds, with a strengthened core and loose hips - his back needs that, he said.

How well he has recovered will be better measured today, after 2 hours on artificial turf, and in the weeks to come, as his frame acclimates itself to pro football.

"I have to decipher the football soreness vs. if there's an issue with the back," Andrews said. "I feel like I have a pretty high pain tolerance."

Andrews also said he felt as comfortable playing on the left side of the line as the right side because he is lefthanded.

Coughlin did not exactly support that theory.

Coughlin also has denied the Giants signed Andrews because they're banged up on a thin line, a denial that seems unsupportable. Left guard Rich Seubert has a broken hand. Right guard Chris Snee has issues with his left knee. Fifth-round rookie Mitch Petrus is playing on the second team at left guard.

Assuming Andrews remains healthy and can absorb enough of the Giants' scheme, he might play Saturday when the Giants visit the Ravens, Coughlin said.

Also, pointedly, Andrews said he hopes anyone who doubted him - including members of the Philadelphia press corps, which was represented yesterday - will reassess their perspectives, and re-evaluate themselves.

"Even some of the [reporters] I developed a good relationship with in the media in Philly, it's like, 'Shawn's a G-man now, so, let's ride the wave of, he didn't want to play football. He stole money,' " Andrews said "How did I steal money from the Eagles organization? It's not like I held a gun to their head and said, 'Hey, keep me here.' I had a back injury. I went through a depression. That's a thing of the past."

Andrews missed part of training camp in 2008 because of depression. In the brutish, conformist world of the NFL, such subtle luxuries as maintaining mental health can ruin a player.

For a player such as Andrews, with his dyed and Mohawked hair and his extensive use of Twitter, debilitating depression served as a death knell for his image. He's willing to rebuild that image.

"Everybody has trials in life," Andrews said. "I've found that all the people who point fingers - they really have something going on, as well. I just pray for them. That's what I do. That's what I do, guys."

He then folded his hands in prayer, bowed to his questioners, and went to lunch. *