0-4, obviously they have looked awful, I thought they played hard yesterday and the loss can be placed on ST's, but the offense is still putrid.
Reasons for hope-
1. The division is historically bad.
2. The 2009 Giants were 5-0 and then finished the year 3-8 (point is, things can change fast).
3. The 2011 Super Bowl Champion Giants lost 4 games in a row including getting smoked on MNF in New Orleans with Ron Jaworski laughing at the prospect of them making the playoffs.
4. Teams regularly go through bad slumps in today's NFL, see the Ravens last year.
Most importantly though, the division is THAT bad. What if the Giants play well next week and win, and Denver takes care of Dallas? Are we supposed to ignore the fact that this team would only be one game out in the loss column for the division lead?
Does anyone else think the Giants play better and can at lease 'be in the conversation' of a very poor division? Somebody has to win it.
If somehow, someway, they find some semblance of decent blocking (or run more hurry-up as others suggested) and one of the DEs happens to wake the f up, you might have a chance. That being said, 0-4 is when Losing Disease is in full and there's a lot of give up. I say get Cordle out of there and throw Mosely in there and give Moore a shot at DE.
They are doing plenty of things very poorly overall, but those two components are essentially why they are 0-4. Turnovers have killed them but if they line could block you'd have a shot. Highly unlikely but stranger things have happened. We all thought Washington was done last year and they reeled off wins to win a shitty division. No reason why we can't if we can catch some breaks.
We play a lot of quality opponents outside our division.
Our problems are not because we were missing injured players who are now ready to play. They are because several units, OL and LB, need to be completely overhauled.
I don't think we can recover, even though the NFC East is epically bad.
Scott dropping that screen against KC, tipping the Int. to Carr against the Cowboys, Cruz missing a first down by 2 feet..etc.. etc..
It's really kind of a cluster of poor plays, questionable calls, and bad luck.
That's why I think this stretch has had some outliers, and there may be a slight turn around over the next 4 games.
but in every parallel you can bring up, this team has looked worse. on the field, performance has looked awful.
After week 2, I could have said, I'm not surprised. Losing at DAL and at home to DEN isn't that surprising.
After CAR and the manner of loss yesterday, can is definitely still possible, but it's highly unlikely.
I think the OL is probably too shitty to really be salvaged this year.. but who knows. If the division wasn't so bad I'd say there was no chance in hell. But none of these teams look like they're going to pull away any time soon so maybe we can get back into it somehow.
Very optimistically, if some of the younger OL step up (which is possible, players do improve with playing time, AND JPP gets his game back, and we stay relatively healthy, AND Eli plays really well -- then the team might end up being pretty good. But that's a lot of stuff and we've already got 4 losses on the board. Even if you believe the team is way better than they've shown so far, those 4 losses still count.
Can that happen?
it probably still won't get us to 7-9, but it's the right thing to do.
I think that's basically our only hope.
That being said, if we win 4/5 of the remaining division games, i like our chances.
The biggest games will be this week against the eagles and the cowboys at home. That tie breaker might be crucial
But that was the same faith people had coming into week 3, when we were completely dismantled by an average team. And it was the fame faith people had coming into week 4, when we were completely dismantled by a team of TBD quality (they're on pace to win the NFC East, but we'll see how they fare elsewhere).
So far we're 0 for 2 with a pair of disasters in faith-based games. Maybe we'll turn it around and rattle off a bunch of wins, but the faith well is starting to run dry.
The defense giving up two touchdowns in the fourth quarter yesterday was "beating themselves"? Being unable to stop anyone at all on third down is "beating themselves"?
This isn't 07 0-2 Giants. The talent isn't there to make a run in the playoffs, and that's fine. But I'm not going to be thrilled if we make the playoffs as a 7-9/8-8 team. Fuck that. Take advantage of a shit year and don't continue mediocrity. This is a blessing in disguise.
They have not "beaten themselves" though. They suck so far. But the division and it's components are just so bad... I'm optimistic. Always.
They've been in all 4 games well into the 3rd quarter despite playing utterly like crap mostly on O & STs. By the 4th quarter the D peters out as well, except in Dallas. I doubt any team was ever in striking distance of winning w/ -5 TOs.
As said, the OL & pass rush needs to drastically improve. JPP returning to beast mode a few more weeks after surgery isn't out of the realm of possibility. Moore contributing isn't either. Maybe if they practice the short passing game non-stop that would improve as well.
I don't see nearly as much quit in the Giants as I do in a majority of their so-called fans, who seem to be happier when they have numerous things to bitch about than when they win. Compare the Giants current team to those in the 70s & the difference is rather stark. The 1972 Giants went 8-6 w/ Norm Snead as QB & Rich Houston & Don Hermann were their leading WRs w/ 27 & 28 catches. Ron Johnson had 45 & Tucker 55. Chew on that for awhile for comparison sake.
I don't see how a tank season and getting back to contenders instantly next year would be the worst thing in the world.
540NYFAN : 7:05 pm : link
Of salvaged? 7-9 or 8-8? Or 9+ wins? Or getting to playoffs? 0-4 start never made it to post season.
The '92 Chargers made it to and even won a playoff game after starting 0-4.
Scoring output like that is certain to lose games in this league unless you have the 2000 Ravens defense.. and clearly, we don't.
Enjoy tossing your pom poms around though.
Right now I expect a 6/7 win season but I'm still confident that the offense will wake up at some point.
2013: 15.2 PPG
2012: 26.8 PPG
2011: 24.6 PPG
2010: 24.6 PPG
2009: 25.1 PPG
Every year it's a different roster but I don't really feel like this 2013 roster is significantly worse than the roster of the past couple of years. The OL is better than they're showing, especially Beatty. Hopefully this team can hang in there until the offense snaps out of it.
It's funny how you and Dylan equate being a realist to a fair weather fan. I'm not upset, I realize that you can't win them all every year. Sometimes you have to think about the future. I'm a Knicks fan, with how bad the Knicks have been the past decade, I'm content with just a playoff team. The Giants can do much more in the future.
This isn't a playoff team this year. Because I realize that and you don't just makes you a cheerleader, not me being a fair weather fan.