Winston it is!

[MightyGiants]

https://x.com/geneclemons/status/1903438843518316917

https://x.com/geneclemons/status/1903439204173894129

https://x.com/geneclemons/status/1903439488333820398

[Gmo11]

It's clear to me Winston was signed to be our backup QB. Seems they could be all in on Rodgers.

Couldn't possibly see how they also sign Rodgers now. I have that as dead. They will draft a QB and now have the ability to let that guy sit and learn. If anything it allows them the luxury of taking a guy like Milroe in round 2 if they think a year with Daboll could help his throwing issues the way he did with Allen.

[MightyGiants]

https://x.com/JustinPenik/status/1903445308635226292

[uconnjack8]

Couldn't possibly see how they also sign Rodgers now. I have that as dead. They will draft a QB and now have the ability to let that guy sit and learn. If anything it allows them the luxury of taking a guy like Milroe in round 2 if they think a year with Daboll could help his throwing issues the way he did with Allen.

From the beginning of this I haven't seen it happening and it has more to do with Rodgers than the Giants.  He is looking to add to his legacy in his last couple of years of playing.  Unless he thinks he can lead this team to a deep playoff run, I don't see why he would be interested.

[DJN]

I am shocked Mara signed off on this. I thought Mara was pretty rigid around character stuff. Winston's past is dark, to say the absolute least.

Yes, we passed on Parsons to draft Toney instead because of Parsons character issues...How did that one pan out ???

[londonblue]

After two of the dreariest, least enterprising seasons in Giants history his trademark mix of maddening unpredictability, occasional brilliance and baffling stupidity will at least not be boring.

If he has to start 17 (which I do not believe is the hope) the floor is likely 5-6 wins.

Best case Daboll and Kafka coach and scheme him to a 1.5:1 TD:Int (rather than 1:1) and a ceiling of 8-9 wins.

He is known as a positive presence, bringing passion, energy and confidence. That should help lift the locker room mood. It might make it easier for others to perform.

Off the field he is an equally complex mix of past predatory sexual behaviour and amazing charitable work with many strong friendships.

Nothing about him is vanilla and the bad is very bad. It is entirely understandable why some are not keen. It is also clear why others see reasons for hope.

The biggest 'positive' I can see is that he is a very long way outside Mara's historic comfort zone. This suggests Schoen and Daboll will not have one hand tied behind their backs by Mara's 'expectations' when we draft.

Whatever we think individually, here we are. Welcome aboard the 2025 New York Giants. We might still be very bad. We might actually be watchable.

[Bob In PA]

I am shocked Mara signed off on this. I thought Mara was pretty rigid around character stuff. Winston's past is dark, to say the absolute least.

DB: Desperation?

[katkavage]

DB: Desperation?

The best player in Giant's history had character issues.

[Bob In PA]

Let's see, who looks most like Winston in the draft:
BIG ARM, throws off platform, gunslinger mentality.

Everyone:

The full text of this post by @andrew_nyGiants appears on page two of this thread. In it, among other things, he opines that the QB most like Winston in this draft is Ward. I believe Dart is more like Winston (considering only issues directly related to his arm and issues directly involving throwing the ball, which EXCLUDES overall athletic talent, escape ability, and running/scrambling ability). @Ed Vette or anyone else who has studied this year's group of QBs - do you agree?

Lost in the shuffle of this long thread and the numerous other issues raised by Andrew's post is the IMO very interesting thought which underlies the short portion of his post quoted above.

Who believes that the choice of Winston might shed some light on which QB the Giants most prefer in the upcoming draft?  If so, which QB do you believe might be the Giants' top choice, considering that they signed Winston?


Bob

[DaveBrown74]

DB: Desperation?

Bob,

In one word, that is probably the best explanation possible.

I also suspect Mara wants avoid inserting himself in this offseason in any way. I think he wants a clear path to be able to fire Schoen and Daboll with a clean conscience if 2025 is another disaster. It's hard to feel that way if you are vetoing players your guys want. So maybe that is also why he is willing to compromise a bit on his normally stringent conduct standards.

[Stringer Bell]

Bob,

In one word, that is probably the best explanation possible.

I also suspect Mara wants avoid inserting himself in this offseason in any way. I think he wants a clear path to be able to fire Schoen and Daboll with a clean conscience if 2025 is another disaster. It's hard to feel that way if you are vetoing players your guys want. So maybe that is also why he is willing to compromise a bit on his normally stringent conduct standards.

We usually agree on many things, Dave, but I feel differently on the above (respectfully, of course).

1) I don't think desperation has anything to do with this signing. They're paying less-than-standard backup QB money for a guy who will very likely start for half the season. That is smart.

And in an era where unanimous feelings run short, there is universal praise for the type of teammate and locker room presence that Winston is. For a young team, that is worth its weight in gold coming from a veteran QB.

2) I don't believe for a second that Mara is the type of person who needs secondary validation for anything he does. If he wants to clean house, he will clean house. Regardless of how active / inactive he is in personnel decisions. Men in his position don't need the justification of a clean conscience.

The reality is, this year was always a lost cause. So my primary objective for the offseason was to not overcommit in any contract with a vet QB, not sign anyone who will set the franchise back anymore, and hopefully not win too many games only to not make playoff and have a worse draft pick. Mission accomplished across the board with this signing.

[killarich]

https://youtu.be/ysUYo6FfDgY?feature=shared

The good and the ugly

[LennG]

Dude...

Believeland Clowns cut Winston.

Nuf said.

 I believe you are new here, but we usually don't address our fellow posters as 'Dude'. We may not agree on thbut wsure try to be as friendly and courteous as we can to each other.

Forget that 'Dude' stuff.

[Ed Vette]

Everyone:

The full text of this post by @andrew_nyGiants appears on page two of this thread. In it, among other things, he opines that the QB most like Winston in this draft is Ward. I believe Dart is more like Winston (considering only issues directly related to his arm and issues directly involving throwing the ball, which EXCLUDES overall athletic talent, escape ability, and running/scrambling ability). @Ed Vette or anyone else who has studied this year's group of QBs - do you agree?

Lost in the shuffle of this long thread and the numerous other issues raised by Andrew's post is the IMO very interesting thought which underlies the short portion of his post quoted above.

Who believes that the choice of Winston might shed some light on which QB the Giants most prefer in the upcoming draft?  If so, which QB do you believe might be the Giants' top choice, considering that they signed Winston?


Bob

In terms of putting the ball in harms way at the end of the season and forcing throws in murky waters? Perhaps but its a small sample of Dart's body of work. Winston has more velocity in his throws than Dart and Ward is more inaccurate, while Winston is a gunslinger. I don't know that we need comparisons. Let's hope for them they don't wind up with a legacy of being unable to achieve their potential.

[DaveBrown74]

We usually agree on many things, Dave, but I feel differently on the above (respectfully, of course).

1) I don't think desperation has anything to do with this signing. They're paying less-than-standard backup QB money for a guy who will very likely start for half the season. That is smart.

And in an era where unanimous feelings run short, there is universal praise for the type of teammate and locker room presence that Winston is. For a young team, that is worth its weight in gold coming from a veteran QB.

2) I don't believe for a second that Mara is the type of person who needs secondary validation for anything he does. If he wants to clean house, he will clean house. Regardless of how active / inactive he is in personnel decisions. Men in his position don't need the justification of a clean conscience.

The reality is, this year was always a lost cause. So my primary objective for the offseason was to not overcommit in any contract with a vet QB, not sign anyone who will set the franchise back anymore, and hopefully not win too many games only to not make playoff and have a worse draft pick. Mission accomplished across the board with this signing.

Stringer,

Very good points across the board, as usual.

To clarify (and I realize this was not clear in my post), I don't think the move to sign Winston itself was desperate. I meant more that Mara is in a general state of desperation after however many completely humiliating seasons it has now been in the last dozen or so years. And my comment was more that desperation was probably why he was choosing to deviate from his normally strident stance of not allowing anyone on the team with any sort of question marks in the character department. I do not feel that the signing itself was desperate. I agree with you that it was smart. Earlier in this thread I praised it from a value for money point of view.

On point number two we differ a little bit. I don't disagree that Mara is capable of acting firmly and decisively whenever he feels he needs to. We have all seen him do that. I do however think he has a sense of values, and I suspect (though cannot prove) that he was very involved in the decision to sign Jones. To what precise extent that was the case I don't know, but I am highly confident that, at the bare minimum, he influenced that decision at least somewhat. I believe that may be the reason that pushed him over the fence towards the side of not firing at least one of Daboll and Schoen after last season.

So if the above is mostly true, then it would follow that he would want to lay off this offseason as much as possible given 2025 is clearly an ultimatum year for Daboll and Schoen. If he meddles at all, it just makes it harder to fire people. Even if it's not about his conscience, once someone is fired, there is nothing stopping them from revealing later the sort of work environment they were in at their former place of employment. So it's just not smart business to force decisions to do or not do things on your managers and then fire them when those decisions end up being bad ones. If nothing else, I assume Mara at least understands that.