Just curious to us older crowd, I guess non-millennial. I was born in 1969 and can remember the sweet innocent days of fun in the sun without the internet. Now, my youth was the 80s of course, watching Lawrence Taylor and shit.
Um, what was the offseason like for you? Did you follow the Giants all year long or did you start to become more of an intense fan because of the internet, Bigblueinteractive.com, apps, etc? I never remember even following who the Giants drafted, maybe I read about it in the paper or my father told me.
Did you listen to WFAN religiously during summer days? Sometimes, I'll admit I didn't know who the Giants were playing until Sunday came around, maybe even didn't know if they had a bye week lol
I do miss the days of no internet (because I didn't know what it was) but I love reading stuff when I'm at work or my wife is bitching at me and I'm pretending to be working "on projects"!
The good old days,
In Florida in the 1970s, the day-old NY Post and NY Daily News were available at the Palm Beach newsstand.
Basically newspapers as a kid. And TV.
It was so much easier to be a fan then, actually. You’d watch the game without dissecting it in the media—every pass, every missed tackle, every freakin’ stat imaginable—the whole next week. And now it’s hard to tune out.
In Florida in the 1970s, the day-old NY Post and NY Daily News were available at the Palm Beach newsstand.
Christ, you were stuck with the Utica Dispatch for sports news?
I grew up in Binghamton, which was very definitely GIANTS territory, but except for an occasional story about the draft picks or camp opening in the Binghamton Press, there was generally nothing available. Once in a great while there might be something of interest in a magazine, but it was always more feature material or in the case of the draft annuals, not very good about any specific team. And this stuff was always pretty dated by the time it got the the newsstand. In those days (50s & 60s) baseball was bigger than football anyway.
By the 1980s, team newspapers were available and you could subscribe to them and get a much better info flow, if always a week or ten days behind what was currently happening due to the time required to print and mail the publications.
Then cable TV became commonplace with NYC sports coverage all over upstate, followed by the internet, and they provided more detailed, up to the minute information.
Not satisfactory but in a different way
I was happy for any scrap of news
Now with the Internet you get scraps all of the time and it is not satisfactory in a different sense in that it is difficult to discern the overall plan - the big picture if you will.
Sometimes it all seems ad hoc - you get the sense that management is just making it all up on the fly
Why were they? Because they were mostly NY/NJ transplants starving for NYG news.
A few months later, a tech guy came by my desk and said, "You've got to take that site down, you are getting more hits than us."
I was born in 1976, and I was lucky enough to meet some of the posters here on BBI in the early 90's on the old Giants "message board" on Prodigy - waaaaayyyy back in the day. I was a junior or senior in HS at that time and remember posting about the 93' Giants and I'm pretty sure that was the first year it was up and running.
People like Eric, Patty Traina, and many others that are still around here posted there. It was a very big thing back then!!
I was born in 1976, and I was lucky enough to meet some of the posters here on BBI in the early 90's on the old Giants "message board" on Prodigy - waaaaayyyy back in the day. I was a junior or senior in HS at that time and remember posting about the 93' Giants and I'm pretty sure that was the first year it was up and running.
People like Eric, Patty Traina, and many others that are still around here posted there. It was a very big thing back then!!
That's how I met Patti...on the old Prodigy boards. I still remember the endless Phil Simms vs. Jeff Hostetler debates.
Hilarious.
Why were they? Because they were mostly NY/NJ transplants starving for NYG news.
A few months later, a tech guy came by my desk and said, "You've got to take that site down, you are getting more hits than us."
Was this bad for his site or something? I know nothing about computers or was he "offended" that the Giants were more popular than his company?
The tribune would have a 20-30 word writeup of US sports. Fortunately, my dad would send me a vcr tape of the Giants game.
Rarely used international land line at $10/minute!
My bad... not Giants Insider, it was Giants Newsweekly. I got Giants Newsweekly, Giants Extra, and Inside Football (this was before Patti was involved in it... used to be an English professor who owned it).
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Giants Extra and Inside football were a great resource as were the sporting news, ourlads, the local papers, etc.
I was born in 1976, and I was lucky enough to meet some of the posters here on BBI in the early 90's on the old Giants "message board" on Prodigy - waaaaayyyy back in the day. I was a junior or senior in HS at that time and remember posting about the 93' Giants and I'm pretty sure that was the first year it was up and running.
People like Eric, Patty Traina, and many others that are still around here posted there. It was a very big thing back then!!
That's how I met Patti...on the old Prodigy boards. I still remember the endless Phil Simms vs. Jeff Hostetler debates.
I was on Prodigy too and remember Eric, Patti, and a guy I think was named Paul Gregory.
Why? Because I was running a sports info website off their server and the traffic was something that couldn't be hidden. It was an ethics issue.
I was just screwing around back then. BBI didn't even have ads until five years later. At the time, it was called "The Big Blue Home Page."
I would fake sick and get my draft magazines out and circle who the Giants drafted.
My Dad, a huge Giant fan knew what I was doing and would come home and ask how we did.
It was the early days of ESPN.
I couldn't wait to get the Giants insider draft recap.
I got lucky my heavy fandom started when we drafted LT.
Still have all the magazines and newspapers from the playoff runs, draft and Superbowl.
And of course all the football card sets.
If I recall, Paul HATED George Young.
I’m pretty sure all of us had a generic code and then a handle - mine I believe was “AFG” or “AG”
Wow those were fun times. Many of us were convinced that 93’ team had one more run in them (Simms and LT) and we suffered together through the Dallas loss and then the game in candlestick.
The first one I remember getting was Inside Football. Then I think Giants Newsweekly came out. Then Giants Extra appeared on the scene.
I forget if it was Newsweekly or Extra, but I swear one of those two would come on Monday AFTER the next game.
Best stuff was the once-a-year interview that the Inside Football professor did with George Young, who was very honest and straight forward with him. They were great interviews.
Same.. News daily... insider & extra monthly? holy fluck
Who was Pete as Pete's Corner?
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Paul was a legend on the Prodigy board.
Who was Pete as Pete's Corner?
a friend of Eric's I think.
And I always got a weekly sports magazine - at first Sports Illustrated then The Sporting News which was a sports junkies dream in those days. There were also the annuals like Street and Smiths and various guides and digests.
One change I see is that in those days you spent more time following the league as a whole. You just couldn't get the level of info about your team that you got starting with 24/7 sports talk and then the internet.
Well, it was the dawn of the internet and almost all websites were comical.
I kept mine for a decade at my folk's house. I eventually said, "I'm never going to look at these again" and tossed them. I kind of wish I kept them but they would just be collecting dust.
We also received some publication a few times per year, maybe Giants Touchdown or something? It was trifold on glossy paper, that’s pretty much all I remember. Other than being really psyched when it arrived as it was dedicated to the Giants.
Married with Children?
Married with Children?
Never realized the Married with Children influence there. Ha
I loved the Sports Machine. Check this baby out on YouTube from 1986.
https://youtu.be/VjHAEGGszkw - ( New Window )
It was either Extra or Newsweekly. It went out of business right after everyone sent in their annual dues and they didn't refund the money. Klein is a bit of sore subject with old timers.
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that Dave Klien put out? Was that the Giants Newsweekly? My Father subscribed to that (maybe one of the 15 people that did) and I remember reading that in the early 80's
It was either Extra or Newsweekly. It went out of business right after everyone sent in their annual dues and they didn't refund the money. Klein is a bit of sore subject with old timers.
Oh, I know! My father HATED him after he ripped him off. I remember numerous letter being written to him. His was not a name allowed to be mentioned in my house. I'm 99% sure it was Giants newsweekly. God, it feels like we're talking about the guttenburg printing press compared to today's connectivity where we get alerts of any news on our phones in seconds.
My life since 95-96. Crazy
I would go to the local store, "Chet's Smoke Shop", to look at the weekend NY newspapers....if there were some good articles on the Giants/Yankees, I would buy it....
Quick story:
One day, years later, I go into the store and this guy bumps me on the way out, and I say, "Hey, watch where you are going!"
The guy said, "Sorry."
After he leaves, there were about 6 guys just hanging around in there, and they bust out laughing.....I asked what was so funny?
They said, "You just ran into Joe Namath!"
He ran a football camp up at nearby Nichol's College for a few years....
I would go to the local store, "Chet's Smoke Shop", to look at the weekend NY newspapers....if there were some good articles on the Giants/Yankees, I would buy it....
Quick story:
One day, years later, I go into the store and this guy bumps me on the way out, and I say, "Hey, watch where you are going!"
The guy said, "Sorry."
After he leaves, there were about 6 guys just hanging around in there, and they bust out laughing.....I asked what was so funny?
They said, "You just ran into Joe Namath!"
He ran a football camp up at nearby Nichol's College for a few years....
In the early 1990s I was dating a girl from Clifton and we went to a party. I didn't know anyone there and ended up hanging out with this guy, mostly talking football. Of course, I was waxing on like some sort of expert. My girlfriend comes back into the room, she hears us talking football, and she says, "Aren't you the guy who plays for the Steelers?" I was like, "What? Trying to figure out who this guy could be? The kicker? Punter? I said, "Who are you?" He responded, "Neil O'Donnell." (And here I was trying to come off as some sort of expert).
Long story short...he was a really cool guy. He was pissed at Parcells because Parcell told him the Giants would draft him.
yeah, but it was a lifesaver for me. i was living in England for a couple of years where an abridged version of USA Today came out twice a week - it was literally about a dozen pages, maybe 3 pages of sports. Somestimes I'd go into London and buy a U.S. paper (like NY Times). But that was always published a day later in the UK. So you can imagine how amazing BBI and Pete's Corner was for me.
Training camp and practices during the week were covered by local sports casts at night (like Warner Wolf), and by the newspapers the next day. For details of all the other games we'd pour over the sports page Monday morning, and watch the highlights on Monday night football.
Living in NY we'd get all the Giants games, and see the score tickers come up for other games, but there was no Direct TV or ESPN to track things on.
In a lot of ways it was better.
"Stuff that happened before I was born doesn't matter"
Heh. Just kidding!
New York Times
Herald-Tribune
Journal-American
World-Telegram & Sun
Daily News
Daily Mirror
New York Post
Plus your local papers in my case
Greenwich Times
Stamford Advocate
And then I moved to Wisconsin in 1971 and sometimes we had access to the New York Times at Milwaukee newstands. And then some MBA type at the New York Times decided we would no longer get a New York version of the New York Times. Instead it was printed in Chicago minus any New York local news or local sports coverage. That must have went on for several years. Fortunately, today I get the New York Times delivered to my driveway each morning in Wisconsin with all the local New York and sports news.
I remember all the different Giant weekly newspapers (Klein was the best) and even one on mimeograph paper in the 1980s.
Motels on LI, in NJ and Conn made out very well renting rooms for a few hours to rowdy Giant fans. Living in Brooklyn, we made the LI trip
I basically left the East coast when I was drafted during Vietnam and trying to get Giant football news was a major difficulty but a major part of my life until Eric began this and the BBWC was on the net.
Inside Football was begun and was written for years by the “Professor”, a professor of literature at by then I think Pace University had been hired as a stringer for training camp by NYTimes and went on to develop the newsletter that continues to this day edited by Pat T. Inside football published monthly in the off-season, and weekly during the season was my lifeline for years. It was really the only source of Giant news and it was also terrific..
I was the kind of Giant fan who during preseason would get into the car at night if the Giants were playing anywhere I might get reception and tried to get to a high spot and roam the AM dial looking for a broadcast almost always to no avail.
The NYTimes was a poor source of information, my father said they were Jets oriented after Giants moved to NJ. I used to have my mother try and cut out info from the Post or News and send it to me. Not a very good idea as she, never a sports fan, had trouble telling football from baseball.
Eric changed it all. I had all the information at my fingertips several times a day. Pete's was OK and there was almost no animosity, but the “corner” is the “grail”. I am a happy camper. I never thought I would live to see my Giants in a Super bowl, I have seen Five with Four wins. Life is good and I am on the site more than I should be.
Thank you Eric, thank you Mara family for giving me great emotion, ups and downs, basically great diversion from the drudge and grime of what everyday life is frequently about.
I can’t recall the players name, I think he was a defensive lineman for the Vikings, but I called WFAN to ask if the Vikings matched our offer sheet. When they said no, I was really excited that we seemingly won the battle to acquire a player. Stupidly, I thought GY had finally figured the free agency market out...
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box full of my old Giants Insiders and Giants Newsweekly's from the 1980s and 1990s. I would love reading their draft previous and wrap ups. Getting pictures of the draft picks was amazing since we didn't have any quick way of looking up players. The camp reports were invaluable.
I kept mine for a decade at my folk's house. I eventually said, "I'm never going to look at these again" and tossed them. I kind of wish I kept them but they would just be collecting dust.
I did the same. I tossed them when I moved to Florida.
I only joined during the 2004 legendary offseason.
I had to participate in that predraft frenzy.
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My first Giants memories were 1956. The championship game was not on local tv; I remember listening to the game on the transistor radio not believing Johny Unitas would drive the team down the field to beat the Giants. In those days, only away games were on tv. It took years until home games were available also.
Motels on LI, in NJ and Conn made out very well renting rooms for a few hours to rowdy Giant fans. Living in Brooklyn, we made the LI trip
That's great. My father would tell me about when he, my uncle and a cousin would go to a motel in Connecticut on Sunday afternoons. I can only imagine the reaction of the person working the front desk when they checked in.
Cigs. Slightly hung over. Reading who got drafted.