Giants aren't a team that should be picking in the top 10

it's WHO on the team gets injured. You lose Tom Brady, you and no one else, you think the Patriots sniff the Super Bowl. Blanket statements and cliches

In comment 12113273 Eric from BBI said:

Quote:

injury issue is a bit overblown. Aside from Cruz, Schwartz, and the CBs, a lot of the guys on IR are not very good. Did it have an impact on the record. Some, but I would argue that the team's record is right around where many BBI'ers predicted 10-6 to 6-10 range was what everyone was saying when we polled in the preseason.

Except the top of that range of records, 10-6, might have gotten us into the playoffs (depending on where the wins came).

As for the injuries, I think Schwartz was a big one. The ton of injuries at CB exposed us terribly also. Beason's injury had a large trickkle down impact on the D.

All that said, I think this team could have still been a lot better than their record.

In comment 12113316 Carthonfan said:

Quote:

, no matter how predictable, had significant impacts on our running game and run D as well.

I was thinking about those two as well but can we expect any better next season. Beason is injury prone and I don't hold out hope for Jennings to stay healthy either.

Ehh...I wonder who had more of a positive impact on the 2013 defense: Will Hill or Jon Beason.

Regardless, Beason is a walking injury time bomb. He may not even be on the team in 2015.

The jags and Dallas losses were brutal though. you're right it's time the giants started beating teams and not being content to just play competitive football against good teams. This team is fucking due. No more excuses in 2015. It sucked but I can kind if forgive this franchise for 2013 and 2014 IF they establish a winning trend in 2015. It's time to win again.

but the team couldn't stop the run, couldn't get consistent stops when they really needed them, and the OL just couldn't move good defenses at all.

It's a rabbit hole, dudes.

they were going to challenge,and maybe the roster at 100% isn't great, but for those with selective memories, the Giants were a lot of people's picks to win the Division and some had them as a Super Bowl darkhorse. It's real easy after the fact and the passage of time to say oh yeah they were crap before the injuries

Defense:

Injuries were not an issue at safety. Waiving Hill hurt and Rolle didn't play well. Brown and Demps subpar. Injuries obviously hurt at CB.

Linebackers...aside from Kennard, is there anyone to build around here?

DL...Until Moore/Ayers play the run better... The DT's outside of Hankins were not very good.

Offense:

Line still isn't very good. It's not a physical group.

RB...I like Jennings and have hopes for Williams, but they weren't dynamic... no outside running threat at all.

WR...Even before injury, Cruz had yet to regain 2011-12 form. After he went down, it was only Beckham.

TE...Donnell has an upside, but this wasn't a very good group.

hindsight is 20/20

9 wins if they stayed healthy and the defense surprised. Picking higher than that did not compute last Summer.

In comment 12113346 Headhunter said:

Quote:

hindsight is 20/20

I picked them to go 6-10.

outlets, not some guy that posts here

than the average fan, quite frankly.

Football issue had them 2nd in the Division and making the Playoffs

1. A DC who couldn't sniff another DC job whose system allowed 230 points in the second half of all games last season. Thats the most in the NFL and shows his absolute inability to make in game adjustments.

2. New system on offense and the learning curve to grasp
it.

3.Injuries. MacAdoo never had two top receivers out there at the same time. Randle was inconsistent as usual.

There are some pretty good pieces here especially if we keep JPP to build around:

-Top 10 Qb, maybe better in second year of a QB friendly offense
-One of the best young receivers in the NFL
-A young line that needs another part or two that could be at least decent in year 2 under MacAdoo.
-An underrated DL that features some pretty high ceiling talent in JPP,Hankins,Moore and a couple role players.
-if healthy, top 3 CB duo in NFL and potential for great depth with health and re-signing a couple guys

With a good FA and draft and some health, this team can be right back in the thick of it next year.

On another thread he posted along the lines of this - there is no position on this team that ought not be considered for the draft in round 1. They can really go BPA regardless of position, because they need help everywhere.

So it's like this: Should the Giants NOT draft an OG in Round 1? Should the Giants NOT draft a CB in Round 1? Should the Giants NOT draft a LB in Round 1? The answer is always "No", for every position.

If you want to exclude QB from that, OK.

Holes? Well, I guess it's terminology. The Giants are weak at every position, that's for sure.

Again, exclude QB if you want.

You're seriously not using preview magazines as the basis of your argument? You may want to go back and see what the 2000 and 2007 preview mags said about the Giants as just one (of probably hundreds) of counter examples.

can make a strong argument for the Giants to draft a DT, DE, LB, S, OL, WR, TE, RB if the talent was there in the first round.

before the shit hit the fan, most around here were excited about the team and you know that. The First exhibition game
people started to show concern, by the 4th people were ready to jump off the ledge because Eli complete like 3 passes for 42 yards the whole preseason BUT going into the preseason not too many around here saw this

and got a top talent at #11.

I guess it all evens out as I believe the 2013 (7-9) was worse than the 2014 (6-10) team despite a better record.

This team still has a lot of holes and a lot of problems but I thought the 2014 team was a little better than the 2013 team.

Definitely, the 2013 team exhibited a rare level of ineptitude and beat 3-4 awful teams with backup QBs at the helm. That was a 3-4 win team.

and others have said the same, but the bottom line was that the Giants misread the 2012 season. Perhaps they thought that their fall from 6-2 (including a beat down of the Niners in SF) was fallout from Sandy. Coughlin candidly put it out there that he wanted to find out what happened in Atlanta and Baltimore at the end of the season when the Giants got killed. They took too much stock in blowing out a Philly team in the last game, who had completely checked out because they knew Reid was gone and would have lost to Don Bosco.

What the Giants did not understand was the Atlanta and Baltimore games were a signal that the 2007 and 2011 core championship team was done and they squeezed an extra Super Bowl out of it. So they decided to hold off on a rebuild to take one more chance at a title with Metlife hosting. The reality was, the 2013 Giants were probably a 4-5 win team that got lucky due to QB injuries (the Giants don't beat Green Bay with Rodgers there, nor do they win in Philly if Foles or even a healthy Vick).

The 2014 Giants were a rebuild. They pushed out a number of the old guard (Snee, Tuck, Jacobs, Webster, etc.) They brought in a new offensive coordinator. They brought in a number of new players on short term contracts that were not cap killers and refocused on the draft and put in more rookies than we have seen in a long time. The Giants absolutely were a team that should be picking in the top 10. The good news for the Giants? The moves seemed to work. Eli finally clicked in the new offense and they were rolling up 500+ yards late in the season. The Rams game was particularly exciting because that defense had put the clamps down on Denver, Seattle, Arizona, and the Niners, but the Giants went up and down the field on them. So you have a team where the arrow is clearly pointed up, and picking where they should be and they should be in position to be a dangerous team in 2015. But were they a legit 6-10 last year. Absolutely. They were not in the class of the playoff teams that they lost to, not yet.

the 2013 team was a dumpster fire. The 2014 team actually flashed potential.

This is the NFL. The Giants aren't far off from being a 9/10 win team again.

In comment 12113408 Matt in SGS said:

Quote:

and others have said the same, but the bottom line was that the Giants misread the 2012 season. Perhaps they thought that their fall from 6-2 (including a beat down of the Niners in SF) was fallout from Sandy. Coughlin candidly put it out there that he wanted to find out what happened in Atlanta and Baltimore at the end of the season when the Giants got killed. They took too much stock in blowing out a Philly team in the last game, who had completely checked out because they knew Reid was gone and would have lost to Don Bosco. What the Giants did not understand was the Atlanta and Baltimore games were a signal that the 2007 and 2011 core championship team was done and they squeezed an extra Super Bowl out of it. So they decided to hold off on a rebuild to take one more chance at a title with Metlife hosting. The reality was, the 2013 Giants were probably a 4-5 win team that got lucky due to QB injuries (the Giants don't beat Green Bay with Rodgers there, nor do they win in Philly if Foles or even a healthy Vick). The 2014 Giants were a rebuild. They pushed out a number of the old guard (Snee, Tuck, Jacobs, Webster, etc.) They brought in a new offensive coordinator. They brought in a number of new players on short term contracts that were not cap killers and refocused on the draft and put in more rookies than we have seen in a long time. The Giants absolutely were a team that should be picking in the top 10. The good news for the Giants? The moves seemed to work. Eli finally clicked in the new offense and they were rolling up 500+ yards late in the season. The Rams game was particularly exciting because that defense had put the clamps down on Denver, Seattle, Arizona, and the Niners, but the Giants went up and down the field on them. So you have a team where the arrow is clearly pointed up, and picking where they should be and they should be in position to be a dangerous team in 2015. But were they a legit 6-10 last year. Absolutely. They were not in the class of the playoff teams that they lost to, not yet.

Agree. Well said

excellent post.

awesome post. Agree with that 100%.

In comment 12113372 Eric from BBI said:

Quote:

can make a strong argument for the Giants to draft a DT, DE, LB, S, OL, WR, TE, RB if the talent was there in the first round.

Well, I wouldn't be thrilled with a WR, TE or RB in Rd. 1, but all those other positions seem reasonable options. Thankfully, the only position of the three I listed that seems a possibility in Rd. 1 is WR, and if that were the case I guess we'd be talking Cooper or Kevin White, two great prospects. But to me we have too many weaknesses to "waste" further resources on a WR position that is relatively deep if Cruz returns.

I think our record is deserved and a fair indicator of what we did as a team. Having said that we were right there in a number of other games and easily could have been 9-7 or so.

Everyone knows. Dallas was predicted to be one of the worst teams in the NFL by everyone including their owner. That didn't happen. So saying you know a team would have still been bad even without the injuries is not that smart.

the Giants should be picking #1 since they have the least talent in the NFL....

would love to see the make your season prediction threads before the first preseason game

In a nut shell..

If you picked the Giants to stink before the season, you think the injuries are an excuse and the players that were injured wouldn't have made much of a difference, were they healthy.

If you picked the Giants to be decent and possibly make the playoffs, before the season, you think the injuries were crippling and had everything to do with the Giants picking in the top 10.

This is a bad team. They have been a bad team for 2+ seasons. They aren't even competitive against the good NFL teams.

They absolutely deserve to be picking where they are and those trying to paint a different picture have their heads in the clouds.

Just face the facts, we had a series of absolutely abysmal drafts. That is why we have a roster largely bereft of talent. Not to recognize that or try to rationalize it is simply burying ones head in the sand.

In comment 12113287 Chip said:

Quote:

The most important thing is to get Elis contract done now or trade him.

Why the hell would the Giants trade Eli ?...

We were clearly mediocre before the injuries. That said, the difference between 6-10 and 10-6 in the current league is the width of a pubic hair... and clearly injury played a role in taking us down a peg, especially timing wise. We lost Jennings and Cruz at really poor timing, and if OBJ started the year... who knows?

I do believe a solid draft and a couple of smart FA moves coupled with the DC change will definitely go a long way.

We were extremely lucky to win the amount of games we did last year.

I mean 2013.

Just a couple of good moves with our top picks and a few solid free agent additions and we'll have a good team.

We have a very rare matchup weapon in Beckham. This is a player no team can matchup against. This alone makes us much closer to top 10 than bottom 10. Beckham has a Randy Moss type impact. Nobody can cover the guy. He changes everything for an offense. In year 2, he will dominate the league again.

They have to make a tough decision with JPP. As much as I like him and his upside, it may be better to let him go and use the cash at 3-4 other positions including a lower priced DE.

After the JPP decision, the top priorities for me are bringing in at least one good starter at S and one quality OL starter. They must start here and get it right. If they do it solves a lot of problems. We don't have to sign the most expensive guys out there. If we can sign a speedy S like Parker from KC at a good price and then add one starting quality OL (I'd like one of these 26 years olds: Carpenter in SEA or Boing from CIN).

We had a bad team in 2013. The front office did a pretty good job of adding talent in FA and draft but fell short in the one area that killed us: OL Depth.

Also, the guy who thought we could rely on Walton should be shot. However, if the team did not lose Schwartz we would have had a decent OL. This injury killed us at 2 positions and we did not have the depth to overcome it.

This problem will be fixed. On offense we only need one good OL addition and the team will score plenty because of Beckham.

I'm really looking forward to this free agency and draft. They can have a big rebound year in 2015 with just a couple of good moves.

.
arcarsenal : 3:37 pm : link : reply
This team still has a lot of holes and a lot of problems but I thought the 2014 team was a little better than the 2013 team.

And it was.....the 2013 record is misleading when you factor in the four quarterbackless teams we faced in a row, 2 games against a woeful Washington team, and a tipped pass returned for a td in Detroit where our offense could not move the ball in the second half...they won 7, but really were a 3-4 club....

3 years ago and even 2 years ago means nothing in the NFL.

2013 we were terrible. Nice infusion of talent in 14 but injuries exposed the depth problem on OL and some other issues.

One good offseason and the team will bounce back big as Beckhham continues to dominate the NFL.

In comment 12113300 Eric from BBI said:

Quote:

I said "aside from those guys". But let's not pretend that having those guys around would have made the Giants viable Super Bowl contenders.

As long as you have Eli, and if they made the playoffs, who knows what could've happened if we had those players.

is closer to the truth then those that posed after him.

due to injury but if the coaches cannot coach up the remaining guys, we have a problem. Our offensive line and defensive backfield were the major culprits in 2014 with lowered performance. For once, I would like to see some waiver pickup shine and develop like Cruz did.

Our defense
TMS : 5:38 pm : link : reply
was the trouble spot last year and kept us out of the playoffs. New DC on board and new emphasis on that unit make me believe we go defense in the first round.

that are very true and yet serve as a lazy way to avoid any in depth analysis are ...

1. You are what your record says you are.

2. Every team has injuries

They are the equivalent of saying "Whatever".

in our season, especially with many of them being to (projected)starters, and in some cases, their backup.
They were also undertalented at JRs draft- unimportant positions: OL and LB.
That said, hopefuls Ayers, Dennard, AWilliams, maybe 1-2 others would not likely have seen much action
without those injuries so there appears upside in building the team through players like that.
If JR can counter his OL building from last year through FAs, and can get at least 2 of the first 3 picks to be starters by no later than mid season, and, players stay healthy for a change, 10-6 or better is reasonable.

Yes injuries cost us some, but not nothing too significant.. They are right where they should be..

I had this a 9-7 7-9 team going in...and they could have easily accomplished that without spectacular meltdowns... Jacksonville and 2nd Dallas game come to mind.

In comment 12113372 Eric from BBI said:

Quote:

can make a strong argument for the Giants to draft a DT, DE, LB, S, OL, WR, TE, RB if the talent was there in the first round.

And you could probably say the same thing about every single NFL team going.

Every team has "holes" so to speak. The great teams just have more star power and one or two less glaring weak spots.

that was a very sharp post !!