Big Blue Huddle

Quote from: MightyGiants on January 08, 2024, 11:35:12 AMI put myself at a 3.

QB-  Jones' health issues combined with a poor 2023 performance makes him unlikely to be the team's long term answer


Overall talent level-  Bottom 5 in the league, potentially bottom 3

Since the trenches are very important-

O-line-  Still a real mess with the need to add at least 2 starters and a swing tackle capable of starting

D-line-  Need at least one more quality edge rusher and a replacement for Williams

Cap Space-  The Giants are middle of the pack with about $17.5 million in effective cap space (the Giants may be able to boost this a bit).

No indication the team is parting ways with Ronnie Barnes, but at least there will be a new S/C coach

Coaching overall, they are replacing their two worst in BJ and their ST Coordinator, so there could be improvement there.  Hitting on their O-line coach could give this team a real lift

Young talent in the pipeline-  There is some in Hyatt, W. Robinson, Banks, and KT, but I would say it's a source of great optimism

So I am not seeing many reasons to be optimistic about this team's prospects.

That said, you never know what knock-it-out-of-the-park draft could drastically change this team's fortunes.

Great post. I agree with every word.

Quote from: files58 on January 08, 2024, 12:03:31 AMMontana in the third, Brady in the sixth, Purdy Mr. Irrelevant. It's sometimes not what the "can't miss" prospect has done, but what Daboll etal thinks a prospect who has shown talent can become in his system. I don't want to give up draft capital, there are too many holes. We need some luck.

Daboll apparently thought Daniel Jones was that guy.

Dave, exactly. They'll have to pay through the nose.

Nabers.

Quote from: TDToomer on January 07, 2024, 05:32:08 PMTeams don't like to give up on drafted talent so easily. Holsey was a decent player as was Ximenes. If someone would have beaten them out in training camp they would have been cut. Now except for Ximenes those players Banks pointed out were Jerry Reese players. We're talking 2 GM regimes ago.

Shepard was kept in case Robinson never broke out and Hyatt was a bust. When both players became starting receivers there was no room for more snaps for Shepard. So we lost Cole Beasley and David Sills. Where are they now? They player who shouldn't have been signed was Parris Campbell.

It's like talking to the wall...

Quote from: TDToomer on January 07, 2024, 05:18:59 PMNone of those players ever got extended from my recollection nor did they even matter much.

Stewart was another bad Gettleman signing and I have already expressed my hatred of him.

There aren't more examples like Shepard because they don't exist! you can keep this going and I will counter with facts.

You're just saying anything. I never said they were extended. I said they were kept on the roster for multiple seasons despite not earning it.

The reason the Shepard example is so egregious is because is isn't supposed to be done, that's why there aren't examples of the Shepard idiocy. Why is this so difficult for you to grasp?

Quote from: TDToomer on January 07, 2024, 03:22:04 PMSo I guess Eli Manning was a scholarship player. The Giants held onto him about 2 years 2 long. I am not defending Gettleman. He was a lying you know what who extended OBJ, said he wasn't signed to trade him and then traded him and replace him with Golden Tate and Kenny Golladay. I am just curious as to who are all these other "scholarship" players that Banks is talking about outside of Shep. You have only given 1 example!

If I recall correctly, the guys Banks used to talk about as scholarship guys were guys like Ximines, Hosley, Jernigan, Brewer, Cooper Taylor. Guys like that. Banks doesn't share info like this anymore so it's hard to know where he really stands on this new generation of young players.

There was also the Jonathan Stewart fiasco where a washed player was paid over 3 million to be a locker room informant.

You aren't going to find a lot of examples of players being paid to not play (who aren't being developed). What they did with Sterling Shepard this year amounts to a parting gift. This, I think, is unusual in the NFL.

Quote from: TDToomer on January 07, 2024, 01:46:05 PMThat's all fine but don't make it out like the current and former GM were just handing out "scholorships" left and right. Shep deserved his first extension. It was reasonable and there is nothing wrong with taking care of a player a year early if you believe in them. Should we have waited till after tomorrow to extend Dex who would have the franchise tag card as a negotiating tool? We took care of Thomas 2 years before we had to since his 5th year option would have easily been picked up.

I got the term "on scholarship" from Carl Banks years back when he was still willing to criticize the organization. Banks used to say there were players on the roster who were only kept because they had a big name or because they were drafted. He called them scholarship players.

Sterling Shepard was clearly a scholarship player this year. 14% of snaps on offense and no contribution on special teams. It doesn't get much more egregious than that.

I disagree about the extension Gettleman gave him. Paying more than 20 million per year at the time for Shepard and Golden Tate to soften the public criticism of losing OBJ was malpractice. Defend Gettleman all you want. I thought it was an idiotic decision at the time and I stand by that.

Quote from: TDToomer on January 07, 2024, 11:32:58 AMOutside of Shep the only drafted players who have been give extensions who are still on this team are Thomas, Dex, Slayton and Jones. You make it seem like every average player is getting some contract extension that they do not deserve. We are actually letting too many good players go like Julian Love who just made the Pro Bowl, which shatters the argument that none of them were worth re-signing.

My point isn't about signing your best players to contract extensions. There were two egregious errors made with Shep in my opinion.

1.They signed Shep to a big extension while he still had another year and change on his contract. This was done immediately after trading OBJ and looked like Gettleman's attempt to manage the public relations aspect (i.e., we can live without OBJ, Shep is our guy). That contract made him one of the highest paid slot receivers at the time. He had the worst year of his career after that which made the contract look even worse.

2. They gave Shep a roster spot this year that he clearly didn't earn or deserve. Shep is so washed up that the team all but announced his retirement this week by telling the fans Shep would be the last player announced at the start of the game with the starters so he can get one final ovation. They could've figured out a way to get Shepard fan appreciation without tying up a roster spot for a full season. He played only 14% of snaps on offense this year and doesn't contribute on special teams. There was no logical reason he should've been given a roster spot.

Remember the last game of last season when they made the big spectacle of getting Kenny Golladay his first TD because everyone knew he wasn't playing in the playoffs and everyone knew his Giants career was effectively over?

This is bush league stuff done solely for public relations purposes. It has nothing to do with winning games or building a team.

Quote from: andrew_nyGiants on January 07, 2024, 10:30:21 AMBecause those teams have a better defense than the Giants.

I'm not saying this defense is supposed to be great or that they are really good except for the offense.

I'm simply saying that the defense isn't THAT far off of being good.

Apologies if I'm not making my point clear.


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Ok, that makes sense. I agree that the defense is not good and needs work, but the offense is in much worse shape.

Quote from: andrew_nyGiants on January 07, 2024, 10:17:28 AMI'm not saying it's that the offense is solely at fault, I'm saying that it's all about complimentary football and that offense' ineptitude contributes to the poor statistics of the defense.

If we were the'86 Giants or '85 Bears the offense ineptitude would not impact the game the way it does today.

Let's face it, the NFL leans its favor heavily into offensive football. Our offense is offensive.


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So how do you explain how the Panthers, Jets and Patriots are as bad as the Giants on offense, but all three are in the top-6 defenses?

Quote from: DaveBrown74 on January 07, 2024, 08:18:26 AMThat precisely defines this year's Eagles team, so to say it's the offense's fault the defense is so bad is not an automatically valid excuse to me.

Right. Another way to look at it, who are the worst offenses this season? Giants, Jets, Patriots, and Panthers.

Defensive rankings:
Panthers 3rd
Jets 5th
Patriots 6th
Giants 28th

So why are the other 3 terrible offenses going to finish in the top 10 for defense but the Giants are going to finish in the bottom 5?

The "fickle and rash"  comments have gotten old after a decade of futility. 

Quote from: Stringer Bell on January 06, 2024, 05:16:33 PMWhen measuring the performance of the team's units for the purposes of determining draft / offseason focus, i care less about how the units rank against the entire league vs. how the units stack up against each other within the context of this team only.

From that perspective, the defense is light years ahead of the offense. Assuming Barkley leaves, the offense needs to upgrade half or more of the starting spots. Whereas the defense only needs to fill 2-3 holes.

This is fair. Offense is definitely the priority.

Quote from: andrew_nyGiants on January 06, 2024, 04:53:27 PMIn a vacuum that appears to be a defensive weakness. But the overall performance of this defense given the obstacles that they're dealing with has been solid.

4.9 avg is similar to a RB who averages 3 YPC in the 1st 3 QTRS and in the 4th rips off a couple of runs for 40 yards and suddenly their overall average is 5 YPC for the game.

You put an offense together that can sustain drives and average 20 points per better per game and I promise you, the same defense presently on the field will be statistically far superior than what the books show now.


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It's not just a weakness, it's a fatal flaw. You can't win with a defense that consistently allows the average RB to perform like an elite RB.

I'm not a fan of the magical thinking around here over the last decade that things will somehow get better if we believe hard enough. They need to address the front seven beyond Dex and Ekereke.