New York Giants defensive coordinator Don “Wink” Martindale is in his 20th season as an NFL coach. But he said he’d never had to address a situation like the one he did with safety Xavier McKinney this week.

After the Giants lost to the Las Vegas Raiders 30-6 on Sunday to fall to 2-7, the former Alabama defensive back had something to say about the team’s coaching style.

“I don’t think they’ve done a great job of letting the leaders lead and listening to the leaders and the captains,” said McKinney, who is a team captain. “… It was one of those things where you have some of your leaders, captains from a defensive standpoint, trying to switch things up and just not really being heard.

“I don’t know. There are other things, too, that we could’ve done. Like I said, the execution stuff could’ve been better. But when you got guys out there that are playing and seeing different things and are being vocal and communicating that with the coaches and whoever and are not being heard, it’s hard to go out there and be able to make plays and do things of that nature.”

Martindale said McKinney’s comments stung “because I’ve always been open, I’ve always been honest with players, and I think if you have a problem, it’s just how we handle things in that room. …

“I end every meeting with, ‘Does anybody have anything? Any questions? Any concerns? Are we OK? Your families OK?’ Because it’s a safe space, if you have something, say something. We like the plan. I check all the boxes, and I mean it when I say it. And we’ve had discussions and we’ve had some different personalities that have been in those rooms, that you’ve had discussions. And I think that’s a good thing, before the fact, before the game, those type of discussions. I said, ‘I mean it when I say it, so if you have something, say something.’”

Martindale said he checked with defensive veterans such as defensive linemen A’Shawn Robinson from Alabama and Rakeem “Nacho” Nunez-Roches from Central-Phenix City to see if they thought McKinney’s complaint had merit.

“I had to go back and talk to the leaders,” Martindale said, “and when I say leaders, you don’t have to have a ‘C’ on your chest to be a leader. I talked to the vets — A’Shawn and Nacho, I can go down the list, (linebacker) Bobby (Okereke) — I talked to everybody in every room, and I said, ‘Hey, is there something that we’re not discussing? Is there a problem here?’ And to a man, they said no. Like I said, we’re moving on.”

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Martindale said he had met with McKinney and attributed the comment to the safety being “frustrated from losing.”

“I just told him that’s something that it’s hurt the locker room,” Martindale told reporters on Thursday. “It hurts the defensive room when you say something like that. I’ll tell you all the exact thing I used is it –and I understand clicks and all the things that you do and I respect your profession — but the example I used in front of him and the entire defense was when you make a statement like that, it puts money in your pockets and takes it out of ours — talking about the media, you know what I mean? I said you just have to understand that it was an emotional thing right after the game, and you’ve just got to learn from it, so we’re moving on.”

McKinney acknowledged meeting with Martindale.

“We met, and we’re going to keep pushing,” McKinney told nj.com. “We got on the same page, and we’re keeping everything in house. We’re on good terms, so everything is good. We’re just going to keep working, keep trying to figure out how we can be able to string these wins together. That’s really all that matters at the end of the day. But everything is good.”

The Giants play the Dallas Cowboys in an NFC East game at 3:25 p.m. CST Sunday at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas.

“At the end of the day, the guys that are actually between those lines, we’re still the ones that have to go out there and compete and play hard,” McKinney said. “We have to stick together. There is not going to be any breakage to the guys in this locker room. We’re not going to fold. We’re going to keep playing and be vocal about the things that we see, and, hopefully, we can make changes.”

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Mark Inabinett is a sports reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter at @AMarkG1.