When the Giants selected Justin Pugh in the first round of the 2013 NFL Draft, the standing joke was that his family needed to stay in the house and away from family functions.
There is a high degree of loyalty that comes with being an Eagles fan, and Pugh’s family was no exception while growing up in Holland, a suburb located 30 miles northeast of Philadelphia.
But the magnitude of this moment was too great. This was a chance to play professionally for iconic coach Tom Coughlin and a historic New York franchise that had recently won two Super Bowls. This was an NFL dream being realized.
“It provided for some tricky interactions, but we just stayed the course,” said Frank Gavaghan, Pugh’s stepfather. “Anybody that’s truly family or truly a friend understood and came to the games.”
Here was a kid from Council Rock South, from where no one had ever made it to the NFL. He unexpectedly faced tragedy at 13 years old when his biological father died of a heart attack. He overcame long odds when only one major college courted him for most of his high school career.
Yet Pugh not only made it to the big stage — he has thrived for more than a decade as one of the NFL’s most dependable offensive linemen.
Among the more than 2,000 active players who comprise the NFL’s 32 rosters plus practice squads, only 19 offensive linemen have started more games in their careers than Pugh, who has made 123 starts for the Giants and Arizona Cardinals in 11 seasons.
“Especially at that position seeing a guy that’s playing over 10-plus years, you’ve got to respect him,” Giants rookie center John Michael Schmitz said. “You’ve got to respect the level he’s doing it and competing. He shows up every day with a mindset to get better, and that’s the guy you want to have in your corner, in your facility, on your team.”
And now there is no other place where Pugh would rather be than MetLife Stadium and its adjacent Quest Diagnostics Training Center in East Rutherford. The 33-year-old signed with the Giants in October coming off a torn ACL with the Cardinals last fall and intends to finish his career where it all started.
“The Giants drafted me, they gave me my shot, and they were going through a little bit this year — they had some injuries and things like that. So I felt like I had a chance to repay the favor,” Pugh said. “It feels like home, for sure.”
A TOUGH LOVE FAMILY
Gavaghan vividly remembers Pugh as a young teenager helping him cut down trees and build a house up in the mountains where the family bought property.
“Other than that, he would avoid working at all costs,” Gavaghan joked.
Despite being a big, strong kid, Pugh had no interest in working full-time in his stepfather’s construction business. He has always considered himself the least helpful among his two stepbrothers — Shaun, 12 years older, and Michael, 10 years older — in their “hierarchy of helpfulness.” His biological sister, Jenna, who is 18 months older, has been the most hands-on.
“All of our kids had the opportunity to come out and work in the construction business at one point or another, and they all knew pretty quickly this wasn’t for them,” Gavaghan said. “In my mind, mission accomplished. They all went on to have successful careers and were successful in their own rights.”
Most important was Pugh’s bond with Gavaghan, who showed love and instilled discipline after coming into Pugh’s life when he was six years old. Gavaghan married Pugh’s mother, Carolyn, a few years later. Pugh appreciated that Gavaghan raised him no differently than his biological sons and provided an unwavering support system alongside his mother.
“He’s the one that kind of pushed me,” Pugh said. “I wanted to be a defensive lineman when I went to college, and he pushed me to be an offensive lineman. He was like, ‘You’re a little too slow.’ But he came to every game. He would fly in to like Louisville or Washington or Missouri and drive through the night to make it to all my games. He’s Irish Catholic — tough love. We’re a tough love family. There’s no ‘I love yous’ and hugs and stuff like that, but we show each other our support by action, and my stepdad was that guy for me.”
When it came to sports, Pugh was seemingly fated to be a hockey player at first.
Gavaghan coached ice hockey, Shaun and Michael played ice hockey, and Jenna played field hockey. But genetics had other ideas. Pugh kept growing, to the point that he was too big to fit into his brothers’ equipment. His parents urged him in seventh grade to try football and save them some money.
Pugh had also been a good baseball player — his stepfather describes him as an overachiever — but he found a niche on the gridiron that suddenly changed the course of his life.
“We just realized that there’s something special there,” Gavaghan said. “By the time he was a sophomore, our opinion aside, when colleges started contacting us, we realized that now it’s coming from a professional opinion side — not just ours. His coaches and high school were very supportive, very helpful through the process.”
RECRUITING A 15-FOOTER
Council Rock South did not appear on a GPS.
At least that was what college coaches claimed years ago when they would drive to the high school and instead ended up at Council Rock North, a sister school that became overpopulated and led to the establishment of South in 2002.
Vince Bedesem, the head coach at South from 2002-21, believes that may have been a factor in some kids being lightly recruited. The lack of social media made it more challenging to find players, too. But Pugh was simply too good to go unnoticed by his senior year in 2008.
Bedesem remembers a player who for three varsity seasons was a consistently dominant two-way lineman in practices, workouts and games.
“His demeanor was always, when it got switched on, you’ve got to look out. Anything in front of him, you better look out,” Bedesem said. “You had to actually see it in motion, you had to actually see his expression, you had to actually see what it was. Because you see kids get fired up or get angry … and then they play off-balance, where with him it would be so consistent and he would just, as they say, wreck a game. He’s a game-wrecker. That’s what he would do. Even offensively, he’s a game-wrecker.”
While Pugh probably could have played varsity as a freshman, the program at that time wanted all ninth graders to play together. That molded Pugh into a better leader.
“Those guys kind of really set the tone for us little by little — his senior class — of getting us eventually in a run of like four years, five years in the playoffs, and actually running deep into the playoffs each of those years,” Bedesem said. “We made it all the way to the district final, so I would attribute his senior class for that.”
Pugh didn’t draw Division I interest until he was a junior, when Syracuse found him through a recruiting service. Former head coach Greg Robinson offered a scholarship and told Pugh’s family during a campus visit that Pugh’s future in football was limitless.
“His exact words were, ‘Justin is a 15-footer,’” Gavaghan said. “And I said, ‘I’m sorry, coach, I don’t know what that means.’ He said, ‘In the old days of tape, you only need to see 15 feet to realize this kid will play on Sundays.’ It was a pretty bold statement.”
Pugh figured he was “about to get every offer under the sun” after that. Yet none of the local schools reached out, while smaller DIs like Villanova and New Hampshire made a late push.
He strongly considered Villanova’s top FCS program. He aspired to play at Boston College, which had offensive linemen in the NFL, but the Eagles only showed lukewarm interest at the very end when they needed to fill the spot of a recruit who bailed.
Pugh instead chose to be loyal to the program that desired him the whole time, even after Syracuse fired Robinson that November and hired Doug Marrone, an offensive line guru. Pugh was fortunately one of three recruits, along with Alec Lemon and Andy Phillips, who got to keep their scholarships. He was also a good student who scored well on his SATs.
“It was a little adversity, but they stuck with me and it worked out well,” Pugh said.
INNATE INSTINCTS
Pugh was a two-time First Team All-Big East selection at left tackle in three seasons at Syracuse after redshirting as a freshman, becoming the program’s highest NFL Draft pick as an offensive lineman since Bob Fleck went in the second round in 1954.
The Giants started Pugh at right tackle for his first two seasons and then moved him to left guard, where he has started for most of his career including this past Sunday in Las Vegas. “That’s my home,” Pugh says.
To understand why, you must go back to his high school days. Council Rock South ran a triple-option offense, which required the three best linemen to play on the interior, protect the A-gaps — the spaces between the center and two guards — and perform combo blocks in the run-heavy attack.
“People always say I play offensive line and defensive line with aggression, and that triple-option is probably where that comes from where I’m always just firing off the ball, being aggressive, attacking the defensive line,” Pugh said. “I didn’t even know what a pass set was until I got to college, and they were like, ‘Yeah, you’ve got to go backwards sometimes.’ Even to this day, I’m better when I’m jump setting, getting my hands on folks, and making it a grindy, dirty game.”
Pugh was not known for simply overpowering players. Bedesem describes Pugh as having innate instincts for playing the sport, and Bedesem would know. His late father, Dick, coached at every level of football for 45 years including work with the Pittsburgh Steelers and Cleveland Browns.
“He’s doing certain things that, not that we hadn’t taught it or we weren’t gonna get around to teaching it, but he was already a step ahead,” said Bedesem, who expects to coach again in the next year or two. “Just the way his body position was, where his feet were, where his hand position was. It’s all of the things that you’re trying to go step by step with other kids when you’re teaching them.”
Pugh showed similar traits while also being recruited as a defensive lineman. Gavaghan recalls a game where Pugh swatted down a pass for a pick-six and then tried to run off the field because he was so excited before realizing he had to stay on for the extra point.
Many high schoolers want to play defensive line because they believe they can play more aggressively on that side. Bedesem’s coaches always told their players that the opposite is true because defense is about reading and reacting. But they never had to dispel that myth with Pugh.
“There was nobody that was more aggressive than Justin Pugh, and he loved playing offense,” Bedesem said. “He loved it.”
Pugh always prided himself on his high football IQ. He prefers “being the puncher instead of the punched” on the field, so studying film and knowing what problems defenses will present before they happen allows him to play faster.
“At the end of the day, football is very intuitive,” Pugh said. “It’s like, kick the guy’s ass across from you, make him quit. You have a one-on-one battle within the 11-on-11, and that’s always been my mentality of just like, ‘Guys are gonna beat me. I’m not the biggest, I’m not the strongest, I’m not the fastest. But I just play like a gnat. I’m annoying. I’m just gonna keep coming back. You may get me one play, but I’ll keep coming back to play after that.’”
STRAIGHT OFF THE COUCH
Pugh started all 16 games as a rookie with the Giants and battled through early struggles and injuries over the next four years to become one of the NFL’s top guards, according to Pro Football Focus metrics.
When the Giants overhauled the front office and roster after the 2017 season, Pugh signed a five-year contract with the Cardinals. He pondered the idea of retiring at various times, especially last October as an impending free agent.
A torn ACL meant a year-long recovery process. He began thinking about life after football. He knew he wanted to get into real estate, so he started working for a developer in Phoenix.
“Guys won’t say it, but every guy thinks about when they’re gonna be done playing. Even as a rookie you’re like, ‘Alright, how much longer do I got to play football?’” Pugh said. “Playing offensive line isn’t a fun position. I don’t enjoy playing offensive line. I enjoy winning games, I enjoy working with the guys, I enjoy the competition. If it wasn’t for the competition aspect, I would’ve retired a long time ago.”
But those closest to Pugh believed he would not end his football journey on a medical cart. This was about more than just money, and leaving the sport on his own terms was ultimately what motivated him to come back.
About a handful of teams showed interest earlier this fall. Pugh’s preference was a reunion with the franchise that drafted him. He accepted an offer from the Giants onto their practice squad on Oct. 3, and 12 days later he worked himself into the starting lineup against the Buffalo Bills.
A tradition of Sunday Night Football on NBC is for each player to announce their name and alma mater. Pugh had proudly announced Syracuse for the last decade. But when he arrived at the stadium and had to record his intro before the game, he had a better idea this time.
“Justin Pugh, straight off the couch,” he said with a grin.
The one-liner instantly became a social media hit.
“A lot of us didn’t even find that out until after the game, but we thought it was honestly the funniest thing ever,” said Schmitz, the Giants’ second-round draft pick this year. “It was perfect for him honestly at that time.”
Schmitz remembers the energy and big smile that Pugh carried when he first walked into the locker room. Pugh loved being back in the Giants’ family atmosphere with many of the same faces in the cafeteria, equipment room and training room.
“Whether he cares to admit it, I think he’s always had a spot in his heart for that team,” Gavaghan said. “It was no surprise that he ended up there.”
The Giants awarded Pugh with a one-year contract on the active roster after the Buffalo game, and so now the question becomes, will this be his last season?
“I’ve had family and friends come to my last game for the last two or three years, and I keep saying this is gonna be my last game, I’m done playing,” Pugh said. “But you start going against d-linemen and you start getting the competitiveness going, you start being around the guys, it’s hard to walk away from the game. So my goal this year is to finish the year healthy, prove that I can still do it at a high level, and if they want to bring me back, that’s a discussion we’ll have. But I won’t play anywhere else. This is it for me. It’s either the Giants, or I’m gonna be working in real estate.”
BUCKS COUNTY PRIDE
When the Giants host the New England Patriots the Sunday after Thanksgiving, there will likely be a Bucks County reunion inside MetLife Stadium.
Gavaghan is hoping the entire family can attend. He and his wife, a retired elementary school teacher, have a condo in Florida but still live in Holland for much of the year. Shaun, who runs his own insurance company, lives a mile down the road with his wife and three children. Jenna, who works for Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia in fundraising and development, lives a mile in the other direction with her husband and two children.
And Michael, who recently retired after 20 years in the air force as a mechanic, is flying in from Florida for the holiday.
They all continue to marvel at Pugh’s longevity in the NFL.
“I don’t know that anybody that follows the sport closely thinks anybody is going to make it for 11 years. I think it’s pretty miraculous,” Gavaghan said. “He puts a tremendous amount of time, effort and money out of his own pocket keeping himself healthy, in shape with treatments and proper diet. And when I say proper diet, it’s somebody preparing meals for him that he has to pay for. He’s been diligent about it and he’s kind of put that attention to detail his entire career. I don’t know that that should go without notice because it takes a lot of effort on his part to maintain that.”
Pugh says the other key ingredient is the desire to not let down his teammates, even more so than a commitment to coaches. And that has driven him to become a craftier player over the years.
“I truly believe that I’m playing my best football right now,” Pugh said. “I may not be physically as big and moving people as I once did, but the game has changed. It’s a pass protection league, and I think I pass pro as good as anybody. To see the game better now than I ever have, I’m a better pro, I’m better off the field. I do everything better than when I younger, so I think the Giants are getting a bargain right now.”
Bedesem, who tapes Pugh’s games to study his performances, has watched him go toe to toe with future Hall of Famers like Aaron Donald and Von Miller and feels his former pupil is still an underrated player. The two communicate and visit occasionally, but the mentor knows he doesn’t need to tell Pugh if he screwed up on a play.
“He always knows what he did,” Bedesem said. “He’s his hardest critic, to be honest with you.”
Pugh recalls looking up to Bedesem and the late Bruce Stansbury, Council Rock South’s offensive line coach, for advice in high school. Bedesem remains one of his top role models.
“Out of all the teachers and people at Council Rock, I was the closest with him,” Pugh said. “He took care of me, he looked out for me, taught me things, told me how to be a football player, told me what it was to compete. He built that competitive side up in me, and I keep in touch with him just because of how great of a man he is, a father, all the other sides that go with off the field.”
ONE OF A KIND
Bedesem used to tell one of his assistants that he wouldn’t be surprised to see Pugh take his big personality to a major sports network one day. Pugh says he is more interested in doing segments for fun on his own terms, which is why he launched a podcast in September called “NetWorth with Justin Pugh” to help athletes with their finances and give fans an unfiltered glimpse into the NFL’s logistics.
But his post-playing career will mostly entail conducting real estate in the tri-state area as well as in Arizona. He and his wife, Angela, began dating near the end of Pugh’s first stint with the Giants and got married last year. They have a home in Arizona, but they plan to go back and forth. Their first child, a baby girl, is due in January.
Pugh’s long-term vision, decades down the road, is to own at least part of an NFL team.
“My goal is to be more successful off the field than when I played,” Pugh said. “I’m trying to set the bar really high in football, so I’m gonna have to top it after.”
Until then, the kid from Bucks County will cherish his remaining moments as a professional football player.
Council Rock South has had other Division I football players over the years, including P.J. Gallo (Maryland) and Eric and Nick Gallo (Virginia Tech). Greg Cochrane played professional soccer for eight years. Billy Fleming was a Minor League Baseball player with the Yankees in Trenton and other teams.
But the path that Pugh has taken and the legacy that he has forged in the NFL from his humble beginnings in Holland is unprecedented.
“To play for somebody like Tom Coughlin and to have him involved in selecting you is legendary,” Gavaghan said. “I don’t even know at this point if Justin realizes the long-term implications of being associated with somebody like Tom Coughlin as well as Doug Marrone. I cannot say enough, whether Justin does or not, of Doug Marrone calling us on the phone and telling us that there’s a number of attributes that he has besides being physical. Doug Marrone said, ‘I would let Justin babysit my children.’ That’s quite a compliment coming from a football coach.”
Pugh, with his actions both on and off the field, just wants to keep shining a light on his hometown.
“The fact that I’m still playing is something that I’m definitely proud of,” Pugh said. “I’m happy about that. I take pride in that.”
