Mara on why they didn't trade Barkley

[MightyGiants]

Ryan Dunleavy
@rydunleavy
Every #Giants fan loves to jump on John Mara. Here is Joe Schoen's answer on why he didn't trade Daniel Jones.

It's curious to me that Saquon was considered vital to Daniel's success last year but not moving forward:

'He was one of our better offensive players, and we weren't giving up. We still wanted him to go out there and perform for us. I mean, we strung together some games together with Tommy, and Daniel was coming back.

'Again, I think we all wish things would have went better early in the season when Daniel was healthy. When he was coming back from the neck injury, we wanted to make sure they could go out there and operate. I think Saquon was a big part of that at that time.'

https://x.com/rydunleavy/status/1773348735612850403?s=20

[AZGiantFan]

Does "still trying to win" mean he thought they might make the playoffs?

"Still trying to win" for the sake of winning when you know you have zero chance of actually contending and almost zero chance of the playoffs, instead of investing in your future during a throwaway season, sounds so absurdly foolish.

Also if what he said is true, why did they trade Leo?

Makes no sense.

What REALLY makes no sense is that Mara was this involved with the decision.  This reinforces the meddling narrative and brings into question of how much are Schoen's hands tied by our meddling owner with a ten year track record of futility.  I think Jerry Jones was more fortunate with his son than Wellington was with his.

[DaveBrown74]

No sense playing the game if you're not playing to win. If you are going to give up, at what point should you tell the players that you are giving up? 2-6 after 8 games?

Trading away a player you're almost certainly not going to sign in the middle of a lost season, so that you can acquire draft capital in a talent-loaded draft and improve your franchise for the longer term is not "giving up." It's doing what is best for your franchise. You can't only live in the moment and care about the very short run when you're running an organization with lofty longer term goals. That's what they clearly did here. I don't buy that they were planning on putting in a big effort towards signing him. Maybe Mara was hoping they would, but I don't buy that Schoen felt that way.

[jimc]

Trading away a player you're almost certainly not going to sign in the middle of a lost season, so that you can acquire draft capital in a talent-loaded draft and improve your franchise for the longer term is not "giving up." It's doing what is best for your franchise. You can't only live in the moment and care about the very short run when you're running an organization with lofty longer term goals. That's what they clearly did here. I don't buy that they were planning on putting in a big effort towards signing him. Maybe Mara was hoping they would, but I don't buy that Schoen felt that way.

I think not trying to win because you THINK you will have some better position in the draft that's many months away is sending the wrong message to the team. You are asking these guys to put their health on the line and not try to not win? Silly. There are no guarantees that your better draft position will get you an impact player. I'd still like to know at what point in the season do you decide to tell your players you are going to throw in the towel?

[DaveBrown74]

I think not trying to win because you THINK you will have some better position in the draft that's many months away is sending the wrong message to the team. You are asking these guys to put their health on the line and not try to not win? Silly. There are no guarantees that your better draft position will get you an impact player. I'd still like to know at what point in the season do you decide to tell your players you are going to throw in the towel?

Having a macro vision about where you're trying to go as an organization you call "silly", but I call it responsible stewardship of an NFL franchise. Simply put, if you're not going to sign a player (or make a serious effort to) in the upcoming offseason, it behooves you to try to get what you can for the player prior to the trade deadline, rather than let him walk away for nothing.

The Giants were 2-6 at the deadline. They probably weren't going to sign Barkley. They definitely weren't going to tag him, and they probably weren't going to sign him. Their $40mm a year starting QB was done for the season. The season was clearly over, insofar as them having any chance of contending or even realistically squeaking into the playoffs as a bottom seed and getting destroyed in the first round. That was the situation they were in.

Nobody said anything about "quitting" other than you. You still field a roster and expect the players you put on the field to give their absolute best and try to win. But you don't sit on impending UFAs you don't seriously intend to sign or tag, when you can get a quality asset for them. You can call that "quitting" if you want to, but I call it being responsible. The team was 2-6 and playing with a backup QB. Did you seriously regard them as having a chance of making a run in the NFC playoffs in January?

This is a loaded draft. Are you telling me you wouldn't have rather had an extra second or third round type pick in this draft for Barkley, considering we didn't make any real effort to sign him (and didn't tag him)? Why was that smart? What exactly did that do for the franchise?

[jimc]

Having a macro vision about where you're trying to go as an organization you call "silly", but I call it responsible stewardship of an NFL franchise. Simply put, if you're not going to sign a player (or make a serious effort to) in the upcoming offseason, it behooves you to try to get what you can for the player prior to the trade deadline, rather than let him walk away for nothing.


The Giants were 2-6 at the deadline. They probably weren't going to sign Barkley. They definitely weren't going to tag him, and they probably weren't going to sign him. Their $40mm a year starting QB was done for the season. The season was clearly over, insofar as them having any chance of contending or even realistically squeaking into the playoffs as a bottom seed and getting destroyed in the first round. That was the situation they were in.

Nobody said anything about "quitting" other than you. You still field a roster and expect the players you put on the field to give their absolute best and try to win. But you don't sit on impending UFAs you don't seriously intend to sign or tag, when you can get a quality asset for them. You can call that "quitting" if you want to, but I call it being responsible. The team was 2-6 and playing with a backup QB. Did you seriously regard them as having a chance of making a run in the NFC playoffs in January?

This is a loaded draft. Are you telling me you wouldn't have rather had an extra second or third round type pick in this draft for Barkley, considering we didn't make any real effort to sign him (and didn't tag him)? Why was that smart? What exactly did that do for the franchise?

I believe they wanted to sign Barkley, but at their price. That is responsible stewardship. I think they were surprised that they couldn't.

I don't believe at 2-6 we were done. I don't know what would have gotten us into the playoffs, but you keep playing and trying until you can't. You owe it to your players and to all the other teams.

If you are not trying to win then the only thing you're doing is QUITTING.

Look, you have your opinion and I have mine.  Better to say that we agree to disagree on this point. No harm no foul.

[DaveBrown74]

I believe they wanted to sign Barkley, but at their price. That is responsible stewardship. I think they were surprised that they couldn't.

I don't believe at 2-6 we were done. I don't know what would have gotten us into the playoffs, but you keep playing and trying until you can't. You owe it to your players and to all the other teams.

If you are not trying to win then the only thing you're doing is QUITTING.

Look, you have your opinion and I have mine.  Better to say that we agree to disagree on this point. No harm no foul.

Fair enough. Happy to leave it there. I respect your point of view.

[PSUBeirut]

I believe they wanted to sign Barkley, but at their price. That is responsible stewardship. I think they were surprised that they couldn't.

I don't believe at 2-6 we were done. I don't know what would have gotten us into the playoffs, but you keep playing and trying until you can't. You owe it to your players and to all the other teams.

If you are not trying to win then the only thing you're doing is QUITTING.

Look, you have your opinion and I have mine.  Better to say that we agree to disagree on this point. No harm no foul.

Agree with this 100% and will add a few more points.

-Viewing the team in such a "macro" way feels a lot more like fantasy football/Madden type of thinking than actually running an NFL organization.  At 2-6, following a season in which the team had won a playoff game, is 100% not the time to trade away literally your only offensive weapon and the face of the franchise.  Doing so would have been a disaster- leading to a higher draft pick?  Sure.  Disastrous in every other way?  Yep.
-The fans that pay for tickets and spend all that money to go to games deserve a franchise that is trying to win
-Comparing the Giants throwing in the towel with NINE games left in the season to the Eagles tanking in the final game of the season for draft position is apples and oranges and intellectually dishonest.
-It seems obvious that the Giants were hoping the RB market this year would be similar to what it looked like when the bottom fell out the previous year.  They would have definitely signed Barkley back if that was the case.  But it wasn't....  In fact, DaveBrown and many others on this board thought the same thing and were proven 100% incorrect.  In their eyes we had a broken down RB about to hit a terrible RB market and so it would be smart to let him hit free agency and then try to sign him to a team friendly deal.  That turned out to be wrong.  Ob la di Ob la da.  It's ok to be wrong sometimes. 
-Guess what?  After all this chatter on this board over the last few years it actually looks like Barkley was the smartest one of all of us.  Got a tag for a good amount of $$ and then converted that to a deal that will set him up for the rest of his life- and in the process goes to a hometown team with actual offensive players and an OL around him, and to top it off he gets to stick it to all the fans who have weirdly turned on him. 

It will be interesting to see how he does next year, to say the least.  If he stays healthy, IMO- look out.  Top 3 RB for sure.