New York Giants head coach Joe Judge has had to deal with a slew of hardships in this young NFL season, mainly with injuries to some key figures in his locker room.

In the Giants’ Week 4 win down in New Orleans, Judge was without two of his top wide receivers in Sterling Shepard and Darius Slayton, both of whom were ruled out of the game with hamstring strains.

That meant the ‘next men up’ were called onto produce. Free agents Kenny Golladay (six receptions, 116 yards) and John Ross (three catches, 77 yards, one touchdown) and rookie Kadarius Toney (six receptions, 78 yards) all were up tot the task in the Giants’ 27-21 overtime win.

Judge was pleased with the way the receiving unit responded on Sunday and spoke about the status of his injured players.

“I’d say that Slayton and Shep are both working hard. We were encouraged last week with the progress they made. I think we’ll know a little bit in a couple of days in terms of what they look like going into this weekend,” Judge told reporters on Monday. “I know they’re pushing hard to go ahead and get back out there, and we’ll see the rest of the week what that looks like.

“In terms of having all those guys available at the game when they’re all up and healthy, to me it’s you want to have as many good players at the game as possible. I think all those guys are very capable of making plays. Whoever the open player is, we want to get the ball to and have them make a play. Very pleased with the way those guys are coming along as a unit and the improvements they’re making and the production they’re having.”

When Shepard and Slayton do return, the Giants may just have an embarrassment of riches in the passing game. Let’s not forget that Saquon Barkley is a great receiver, too (five receptions, 74 yards, one touchdown) and two experienced tight ends in Kyle Rudolph and Evan Engram.

The new deep threats on offense has led to more shots downfield, which is perfect for the Giants as quarterback Daniel Jones is one of the NFL’s top deep passers.

Judge said they aren’t necessarily looking to go three deep unless the game plan calls for it.

“That all ties more into the opponent, who you’re playing them, how you match up against them with different matchups, some of the things they’re doing defensively and how you’re playing up front with some other elements,” Judge said. “This isn’t anything that we go and calculate saying, ‘We have to hit this many of this kind of pass.’ There were things we saw within the game plan that were going to give us opportunities. We weren’t going to go down there and not try to be aggressive and make any play that we thought was there.

“There have been other games where we’ve had very controlled passing games, which have been productive moving the ball up and down the field. There have been times we’ve taken calculated shots, pushing down the field, but it’s really based on the opponent and what they’re giving you at the time.”