Throughout the course of any football game, there are several "high leverage" plays or drives. These are pretty easy to sense/determine. They're the plays that can either flip momentum, get the team back in it, hold serve in a key spot, etc.
Nearly every time a play or a situation like this surfaces, the Giants come out on the losing end of it. They either fail to execute, commit a penalty, can't come up with a defensive stop, or turn the ball over.
2nd Quarter - 7-0, ATL - the Giants are on the 9 yard line with a 2nd and 6. A touchdown ties the football game. Eli and Odell fail to hook up.
3rd and 6 from the 9. Eli gets sacked.
Giants settle for 3 instead of tying the game.
Then, with 50 seconds left and just 1 timeout, Atlanta manages to negate that 3 point cut we put in their lead largely due to a 38 yard pass interference penalty on Michael Thomas
Down 10-3, the Giants get the ball after half and go all the way down the field after hooking up on a big 53 yard pass play to Shepard.
3rd and goal from the ATL 1 - another chance to tie the game.
Barkley is stuffed for no gain.
4th and goal from the ATL 1
Eli rolls out to the right and throws an incomplete pass to our 3rd string TE.
Instead of tying the game, the Giants come away with nothing.
On the following drive, Matt Ryan is sacked for a 7 yard loss on 3rd and 10 from the ATL 20 - but instead of getting the ball right back with what would have been great FP, Eli Apple pulls and grabs at Julio Jones, gets called for defensive holding and ATL gets an automatic 1st down.
The Giants manage to force a turnover, get the ball back, and hit on ANOTHER big play...
This time, it's a 51 yarder to Beckham.
With a 1st and 10 from the ATL 18, the Giants are still trailing 10-3. They again have a chance to tie the game with a touchdown.
The next 3 plays...
1 10 ATL 18 Eli Manning pass incomplete short left intended for Evan Engram 3 10 4.370 3.800
3 4:04 2 10 ATL 18 Eli Manning pass incomplete short left intended for Sterling Shepard 3 10 3.800 3.050
3 4:00 3 10 ATL 18 Eli Manning pass incomplete deep right intended for Sterling Shepard
Once again, the Giants fail to make a play and settle for 3 points instead of tying the football game.
Finally, the Giants score a touchdown - but they fail on the 2pt. So, now it's an 8 point game - meaning, the defense cannot give up any points in order to keep it a 1 score game.
Sure enough, ATL goes right from their own 25 yard line to our 38 where Tavecchio kicks another FG to make it a 2 score game. Again, the Giants have a chance to make a stop / make a play and come up empty.
Now, with under 2 minutes to go, it is a 2 score game - rendering our TD with 5 seconds remaining in the game meaningless.
I know all I am doing here is re-hashing things that everyone else saw - but it is almost astounding how the Giants routinely fail to make plays in high leverage situations or win drives at key points in games.
And it wasn't just this game - you can go back to week one - muffing a punt when the offense could have had a chance to go down the field and win the game. Not being able to keep Carolina from kicking a FG to beat us at the gun. Our games are littered with stuff like this until they're out of reach.
The coaching is bad, the execution is bad, a lot of the personnel is bad.
You can bet money that any time the Giants need to make a play - they won't.
So if they had kicked the extra point the defense could have given up points and kept a 1 score game?
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Mara has a huge hand in this mess - a lot of it is his fault. I have very, very little faith in him being the one to hand pick the right people to fix this.
That doesn't mean Gettleman should be kept. The unknown is better than Gettleman, who we know isn't up for the job.
This assumes the alternative cannot possibly be worse. I'm not sure that's true. What do we have to fall back on when it comes to Mara's track record?
Another year of Gettleman doesn't just mean another draft, it means another FA class. And Gettleman's 2018 FA class has been an utter failure.
"It's too soon" seems like a bad reason not to fire an incompetent person.
But you can't build a sustainable plan if you only give each GM/HC one year to fulfill it.
The Giants are a huge mess. No one is fixing this that quickly.
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In comment 14143144 Sean said:
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The path they took has failed. They are 1-6, they chose not to rebuild. The plan has failed immensely.
What plan did you think it was, turn around the franchise in one year after parting ways with like 60% of last year's roster? Did it seem like that was the plan when DG warned that it would take more than a year to fix this OL?
Then the correct play would have been QB at #2. I expected to absolutely win this year based on the decisions made this past offseason.
I did not expect to win this year, but n this parity leagye I did say take the over 6.5 wins.
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Finally, the Giants score a touchdown - but they fail on the 2pt. So, now it's an 8 point game - meaning, the defense cannot give up any points in order to keep it a 1 score game.
So if they had kicked the extra point the defense could have given up points and kept a 1 score game?
Where did I say that?
If he doesn't trust his football people, he needs to go outside of his comfort zone and find credible people to give him input/guidance. He didn't do that apparently when he hired Gettleman (not saying we should let DG go, at least for now).
In comment 14143209 SFGFNCGiantsFan said:
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is a huge waste of time if that’s the message. We need a sustainable plan.
But you can't build a sustainable plan if you only give each GM/HC one year to fulfill it.
The Giants are a huge mess. No one is fixing this that quickly.
Gettleman only made the mess worse. I'm gonna say this with feeling:
There was no plan entering this season beyond "Make one more run with Eli."
The Giants aren't making any right now when presented.
Just some bad karma right now.
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is a huge waste of time if that’s the message. We need a sustainable plan.
But you can't build a sustainable plan if you only give each GM/HC one year to fulfill it.
The Giants are a huge mess. No one is fixing this that quickly.
Arc- it’s about the direction they chose. They made moves to win THIS YEAR. They said Eli had “years left”. They locked up Beckham.
If this was such a long process, why not draft Darnold & tear it down like the Raiders are?
If they are retained - if there aren't major changes made to the personnel responsible for picking talent, and the way they evaluate talent - we're going nowhere.
Think about it - first, we started with coordinators. Changes schemes, see if we improve - we didn't.
Then, we changed coaches. Maybe a fresh voice would fix things, a different approach catered to a younger audience. It didn't.
Then, we changed FO management. There had been enough misfires, maybe it wasn't anything but the talent that needed to be improved all along. Maybe a new GM and assistant would fix things. It didn't.
Two constants through all that - the scouting department/ head of pro personnel, and Eli Manning. If we don't change one (or both) of those two, then we can't expect different results.
There have certainly been more constants, including having a terrible OL. I get that everyone has their pitchforks out, but you'd swear that just replacing Eli is the path to success - especially since he's the "only" constant...
Solder looks like a complete flop. Sigh.
And not just that - the decision to draft a RB #2 overall and to pay a WR $90M. Our two biggest assets have had their effectiveness mitigated by poor play around them.
This past offseason was a comedy of errors.
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Two constants through all that - the scouting department/ head of pro personnel, and Eli Manning. If we don't change one (or both) of those two, then we can't expect different results.
There have certainly been more constants, including having a terrible OL. I get that everyone has their pitchforks out, but you'd swear that just replacing Eli is the path to success - especially since he's the "only" constant...
The terrible OL being a constant is a concern - and you'll note that I specifically said one of those two needs to be changed next. I'm advocating dumping the FO/scouts. I do think Eli is cooked, but I think he's taken more heat than he deserves.
Most of the moves Gettleman made in FA look crappy. The draft doesn't look as bad, though.
I just don't know what gives you guys the confidence that Mara is suddenly going to wisen up and get the right people in here. There's nothing to suggest that. He doesn't know shit about football. He doesn't know what to look for. He just wants people he trusts and is comfortable with.
Like I said - they can try this all again next year with a 3rd HC/GM set - but I wouldn't expect things to change much in one year there, either. We're probably looking at another losing season next year no matter who we hire. Are we going to fire them too if that's how it pans out?
We had this discussion last week. Everyone wants a plan and stability, but wants to keep firing GM's and coaches after 1 year (well, not even half of one year) if they don't like what they see right off the bat.
I wasn't thrilled with Gettleman being the pick, but I think we're just pissing into the wind if the plan turns into "hire & fire" until it looks like someone knows what they're doing.
Mara could easily turn around and hire someone like Louis Riddick who turns out to be an even bigger disaster. Then we fire him, too and move onto a 4th GM in 4 years?
Who operates that way?
A team who acknowledges it's made mistakes and is trying to correct them.
Gettleman doesn't deserve more time because we just fired Reese.
Bottom line - John Mara has done nothing to deserve any sort of faith that he'll be "shocked" into competence.
The unknown is better until it's worse.
I think Mara was thinking tactically - short term, found someone who thought with some patches the team could compete with Eli at the helm. It backfired.
That's when you cut your losses. Go out, get a new GM, commit to him for 4 years. They may be the wrong guy, but you should give them the time to prove that out. Gettleman has already done so, as the thinking was stabilizing the team around Eli would at least make them respectable, and it didn't.
I can see thinking the team didn't believe there was a quick fix, and maybe they knew the playoffs were a pipe dream. But there's no way they anticipated anything this bad - and they should have seen it coming.
I think Mara was thinking tactically - short term, found someone who thought with some patches the team could compete with Eli at the helm. It backfired.
That's when you cut your losses. Go out, get a new GM, commit to him for 4 years. They may be the wrong guy, but you should give them the time to prove that out. Gettleman has already done so, as the thinking was stabilizing the team around Eli would at least make them respectable, and it didn't.
I can see thinking the team didn't believe there was a quick fix, and maybe they knew the playoffs were a pipe dream. But there's no way they anticipated anything this bad - and they should have seen it coming.
Sticky this post.
I LOVE Barkley. However, it was the perfect storm of circumstances to make it time to move on from Eli. There were other good backs and a number of QBs worthy of the pick. Michel and Chubb look like the real deals too. The Solder signing looks crippling and it appears it was made on the plan to give us one more run with Eli. It looks bad right now and the future is being kicked down the road. I am not a pitchfork, hate Eli guy. I hate to be grouped with them. Eli may have the same exact arm but he is not anywhere near the same QB he was. Anyone who thinks so, does not appreciate how truly great he WAS.
I mostly believe that's what is leading the charge to portray Gettleman and Shurmur as buffoons.
I mostly believe that's what is leading the charge to portray Gettleman and Shurmur as buffoons.
I mostly believe that's what is leading the charge to portray Gettleman and Shurmur as buffoons.
Well they certainly didn’t come up with an alternative plan. The Saints can trade for Bridgewater with Brees in place, but the Giants cleared the deck for Eli. I’m fine with keeping Eli, but no backup plan is inexcusable.
I mostly believe that's what is leading the charge to portray Gettleman and Shurmur as buffoons.
Some people have ummm rich imaginations. Eh that's most people.
We will now likely go into next season with a top 3 pick, the ability to cut Eli and clear 17M in space, and another draft that you'd want to yield more OL help.
The worst thing for the Giants actually would have been a 7-9 season where they said "well, we were close! Let's keep going with Eli... status quo seems good enough"
If we weren't going to be capable of competing this year, the second best thing is being awful.
I mostly believe that's what is leading the charge to portray Gettleman and Shurmur as buffoons.
Why? With a directive, you could at least excuse the results by saying they were forced to do it.
Gettleman and Shurmur look like buffoons because of the results, and because the Giants continue to trend downwards. You're not seeing any improvement, despite a significant amount of change driven by Gettleman. Even if you expected a losing season, did you expect this?
We will now likely go into next season with a top 3 pick, the ability to cut Eli and clear 17M in space, and another draft that you'd want to yield more OL help.
The worst thing for the Giants actually would have been a 7-9 season where they said "well, we were close! Let's keep going with Eli... status quo seems good enough"
If we weren't going to be capable of competing this year, the second best thing is being awful.
They "cleared the deck"?? By doing what, cutting Davis Webb? Basically people are saying that we made moves to win now and build around eli because we drafted Barkley. But that makes it sound like Barkley is just some schmo and the team passed up other, better prospects to draft him.
We have no idea if there is a plan or not. If they end up drafting a QB who becomes a long-term starter and they end up actually fixing the OL - this team immediately becomes competitive. Everyone is so fixated on drafting a QB because of the hyped prospects that they ignore that the team can still go RB and then QB with great future results - look at the Rams.
The idea that this was one last shot to get Eli a ring is somewhat laughable given some of the moves that were made. Outside of the Stewart signing which was pretty bad (but done before the draft), we went after guys who would be expected to be here a few years. We cut JPP. We still had Flowers as a guy on the OL. We cut Hart and let Pugh and Richburg go elsewhere. DRC too. That doesn't say to me they are all-in - yet it gets posted here frequently that they were.
Basically because they picked Barkley, much to the dislike of most of the board, there's been a shitload of rationalization and conspiratorial theories with Eli being a member of the Illuminati or something with rampant speculation that this year's goal was to win it all and send Eli off to the sunset.
The giants need to just make the right move(a) and forget about perception or conventional wisdom.
I give up. All I know is when no one has the answer or when everyone has a different solution it’s bad. Very bad. Remember having the same stupid tired convos in the mid 90s. It’s Dave browns fault no it’s not he’s got no talent. Rinse repeat.
It’s everyone’s fault but it always always always starts at the top. Leadership, qb. In that order.
And if there's any rationalizing going on, it's been from the people justifying the Barkley pick. It's been a wave of rationalizations and refuting of previously accepted truths since the draft.
One thing I'm completely certain of: had we picked Darnold there wouldn't be a single BBIer saying we should have drafted Barkley.
If we had Darnold and he's out there with more turnovers than TD's and we see Barkley getting 100+ yards every game with another team - you can bet your ass people would be complaining.
Especially if we are 1-6.
I don't think Mara is a fool like the Dolans and Wilpons, so I actually have some hope he can lead this team back to where we all want it to go. But he needs to wake up, look around him, and realize the extent the whole system has been allowed to go stale.
God bless you - I enjoy reading your posts and your general way of thinking. But if you really think Mara is going to make the right decisions at this point - after the evidence keeps pouring in that he's incapable of being trusted to do so - than you have lost your way as much as Mara.
This team is the Titanic. And Captain Mara has just crashed into an iceberg.
For every positive "if", there are several negative "ifs". What if Herbert shreds his knee or stays in school? What if someone picks him ahead of us? What if it takes three years to fix the OL and we're already looking at paying Barkley by that point?
When a plan is built on the word "if", it's not a plan at all. An engineer wouldn't construct a flimsy bridge in San Francisco and say, "Hey if there's no earthquake we're fine."
If Mayfield, Darnold, Rosen or Allen prove not to be long-term starters, their respective teams will be in the crapper for awhile.
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One thing I'm completely certain of: had we picked Darnold there wouldn't be a single BBIer saying we should have drafted Barkley.
If we had Darnold and he's out there with more turnovers than TD's and we see Barkley getting 100+ yards every game with another team - you can bet your ass people would be complaining.
Especially if we are 1-6.
I don't think so. I think people would (rightly) see it as growing pains for a rookie QB; part of a growing process for the whole team. You know why? Because we know that running backs are easily found and easily replaced, and you don't need the best RB talent in the league to have a great offense.
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When a plan is built on the word "if", it's not a plan at all
If Mayfield, Darnold, Rosen or Allen prove not to be long-term starters, their respective teams will be in the crapper for awhile.
Then we shouldn't feel so bad because the Giants aren't the only team being run by incompetent people.
In-fuckin-deed.
There is not a position that is more fungible than RB.
But, hey, Barkley is fun to watch. And he moves merchandise for Jints Central. And he makes ESPN top ten plays...So enjoy the trade-off...
Heck, the worst thing for a lot of teams in the NFC was the Panthers changing ownership as Richardson was borderline insane and Tepper has his shit together.
Most of the teams that drafted high last year have ownership warts, as well as 3/4th of our division.