Schoen all but said "why am I fucking stressing out over a running back?"
I keep going back to why was he franchised after 2022? It's seems clear to me that if it were up to Schoen, the no brainer would have been to franchise Jones and let Barkley test the market. This is where I think Mara did come into play after the success of 2022 including the playoff win.
My guess is John Mara is a good-hearted man, who naively thinks everything can work out nicely.
I think he believes in a world where the nice, well liked players are also the best players and with a team full of those good guys, the Giants can win Super Bowls. And that will in turn make his siblings and the Tisches lot of money.
And when those good players (include the coaches and staff) get a little older, they'll voluntarily retire and ride off happily.
Some in the front office seem more focused on the individual players than on the overall success/failure of the team.
isn't one kind of related to the other? the literal job descriptions of most everyone in any FO below GM is focusing on individual players.
I am talking about what Mara, Schoen and McDonnell are focused on. Are you suggesting they should be more focused on individual player success than team success?
Sure, a RB coach should be concerned about the success of the RBs. Clearly that is not what my post was about. I think you know that.
i am suggesting that individual player successes are entirely linked to team successes and the job of the FO is to find players who will be individually successful because those individual successes = team success. when any player gains yards or scores touchdowns, their team gains yards and gets points. teams arent trying to build rosters of players who are individually unsuccessful.
the show cuts together months worth of things they are "focused on" into a narrative that will be compelling for TV. Barkley is by far the most recognizable player on the team and one of the bigger storylines of the offseason so that's what TV is focusing on.
if you think 40 minutes is an accurate guide to what they were in reality (not tv) more/less focused on does that mean you think the team wasn't focused on OL since it hardly came up beyond a few throwaway lines?
The Giants aren't John Mara's pet project. It's a job. And yes winning is an important outcome, but creating value for the dozen plus other owners who have entrusted him with authority is also important to him.
I think this might be true of some NFL owners, but not John Mara. Despite my criticisms of him as an owner, the Giants are his family and he is passionate about the success of this team like any rabid fan would be. If you asked Mara behind closed doors if he would accept a 10% decrease in NFL revenue in exchange for a Giants SB win, he would take it in a heartbeat.
I don't disagree. But this where I think many people forget John Mara personally owns less than 5% of the team.
In the discussion around Barkley and McDonnell’s comments around losing their offensive identity. The question in his mind was clearly around replacing a really good player that they could market as opposed to how do we make a terrible offense better.
Some in the front office seem more focused on the individual players than on the overall success/failure of the team.
THIS.
The one thing that didn't leave me with a warm and fuzzy feeling was the lack of a big picture discussion. What are we doing? How are we trying to build this? What is our vision?
Instead, I came away with a totally REACTIVE mindset, rather than PROACTIVE. I've personally seen this before in government organizations.
Now, I'm hoping we simply were not privy to the big picture, strategic discussions. But if those did not occur and everything is done piecemeal, yikes.
The Giants are going to push to minimize any talk of Maye. Jones was going to be the starting QB at the start of the seasonwith a contingency plan regardless of whether we drafted a QB, of course these conversations are going to revolve around him being the starting 40m QB this year.
What I found interesting was that he referred to the fork when discussing Daniel, he's referring to the out next year. I still think it's a long shot that he does enough to earn a restructure but they're going to give him a shot that's more inline with Schoen/Daboll's identity. I'm a little skeptical about our OL issues being sorted but we'll see.
You are making an awful lot of strange arguments to support your point. In absolutely no way did I suggest that what we saw on HK was the totality of what was discussed. That is a ludicrous suggestion to make, and again you know this. Sometimes it is hard to have a rationale discussion when someone says things that are obviously disingenuous.
I won’t continue this discussion with you, other than to say that I think it is fair to suggest what some people said on HM may be a reflection of what they believe. If you want to argue it was a performance and everyone is completely different than they were portrayed and believe very different things than what they were on the show saying, you can argue that all day and make a great case that nobody can ever know anything and discussing anything is pointless.
the meetings reminded me of the scene in Money Ball with the scouts
I don't disagree. My point, further up in the chain, is that John Mara truly only has a small personal minority stake in the team.
He has a job to do, which is generate value for the other owners. And that is as CEO and President of the company. Schoen isn't a CEO figure.
The Giants are the second most valuable franchise in the league, and have won the third fewest games in league over the last 10 years. Clearly winning isn't the lynchpin in creating value.
The Giants aren't John Mara's pet project. It's a job. And yes winning is an important outcome, but creating value for the dozen plus other owners who have entrusted him with authority is also important to him.
I like your POV on this and agree with you on the separation of power within the team. Never thought of it that way.
RE: to be honest the whole thing seems staged as i watched it
theres little to no authenticity to this whole thing.
i get it as fans we want to consume every piece of news/media/content about this team and try to dissect it, but this to me seems contrived.
i will focus on results/actions/actual moves than some soundbites when judging this FO.
Of course it is staged to an extent. Few people speak their mind freely when they know a camera is recording them and will broadcast all the juiciest parts to the entire world. That will make most people measure what they say and how they say it.
JS “Daniel is making a lot of money and we need to figure out if he’s the guy”. How the fuck do you give him that contract if you don’t believe he is the guy?
Really seems like Mara pushed the jones contract after rewatching this
you can't be serious! The video clearly shows Mara pushed keeping BARKLEY and wanted to keep him again...
I don't disagree. My point, further up in the chain, is that John Mara truly only has a small personal minority stake in the team.
He has a job to do, which is generate value for the other owners. And that is as CEO and President of the company. Schoen isn't a CEO figure.
The Giants are the second most valuable franchise in the league, and have won the third fewest games in league over the last 10 years. Clearly winning isn't the lynchpin in creating value.
The Giants aren't John Mara's pet project. It's a job. And yes winning is an important outcome, but creating value for the dozen plus other owners who have entrusted him with authority is also important to him.
any ceo walks and chews gum or they dont succeed.
tim cook's job is bigger than winning market share with iphones, but if any of his top products fails it's not good. it's not his job to personally get the designs/features of those specific products right, it's his job to hire the right people to do that at scale across all the products they sell and be as involved as he needs to be pushing those people to do their best work.
mara's success/failure as lead owner/CEO is almost entirely whether or not he hires the right people. i'm not the biggest joe schoen fan but the thing im most encouraged by is that he has strong convictions in certain things (particularly positional value) and we saw yesterday that even when pressed by a variety of private counter arguments he stuck to his convictions - which also turned out to be different than one of the top GMs in the sport. all any of us can do (mara included) is hope he is right because everyone's interests (fan's, owner's, schoen family's) are aligned in that.
cares about winning. The franchise has established high standards to meet in its history. Taking heat with the media and fans is just one component when things are not going well.
JM then has to deal with a lot of other Mara's. Many of them probably have different ideas of what needs to be done moving forward. Then you add in the Tisch side.
cares about winning. The franchise has established high standards to meet in its history. Taking heat with the media and fans is just one component when things are not going well.
JM then has to deal with a lot of other Mara's. Many of them probably have different ideas of what needs to be done moving forward. Then you add in the Tisch side.
The Tisch side is probably the main reason that Schoen was hired in the first place.
I'm guessing we won't see Tisch in the Giants building having discussions with Schoen. That's rather telling.
I propose all Hard Knocks threads moving forward include the following disclaimer:
"Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms or supports one's prior beliefs or values."
Months of work and hours of conversation boiled down to a few clips simply cannot yield certainty in any one area, so take the edits with a grain of salt. There's good info there, but I don't think anything can be viewed with end-all certainty.
I propose all Hard Knocks threads moving forward include the following disclaimer:
"Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms or supports one's prior beliefs or values."
Months of work and hours of conversation boiled down to a few clips simply cannot yield certainty in any one area, so take the edits with a grain of salt. There's good info there, but I don't think anything can be viewed with end-all certainty.
In the discussion around Barkley and McDonnell’s comments around losing their offensive identity. The question in his mind was clearly around replacing a really good player that they could market as opposed to how do we make a terrible offense better.
Some in the front office seem more focused on the individual players than on the overall success/failure of the team.
THIS.
The one thing that didn't leave me with a warm and fuzzy feeling was the lack of a big picture discussion. What are we doing? How are we trying to build this? What is our vision?
Instead, I came away with a totally REACTIVE mindset, rather than PROACTIVE. I've personally seen this before in government organizations.
Now, I'm hoping we simply were not privy to the big picture, strategic discussions. But if those did not occur and everything is done piecemeal, yikes.
I didn't sense that Schoen or Brown was being reactive. He identified their needs and met those needs through draft (get #1 receiver), trades (Burns), and free agency (OL). He was not going to overpay for a RB, unlike the previous GM he understands the value of the position. And we aren't seeing all of their discussions, not by a long shot.
The lack of an ability of Mara/McDonnell to think creatively or with any strategic vision is obvious.
The biggest takeaway for me from this episode was how utterly useless and unqualified McDonnell is. I doubt he says anything insightful or clever in any episode of HK.
cares about winning. The franchise has established high standards to meet in its history. Taking heat with the media and fans is just one component when things are not going well.
JM then has to deal with a lot of other Mara's. Many of them probably have different ideas of what needs to be done moving forward. Then you add in the Tisch side.
The Tisch side is probably the main reason that Schoen was hired in the first place.
I'm guessing we won't see Tisch in the Giants building having discussions with Schoen. That's rather telling.
Agreed. I wish the Tisch family owned the team outright instead of the Maras.
You are making an awful lot of strange arguments to support your point. In absolutely no way did I suggest that what we saw on HK was the totality of what was discussed. That is a ludicrous suggestion to make, and again you know this. Sometimes it is hard to have a rationale discussion when someone says things that are obviously disingenuous.
I won’t continue this discussion with you, other than to say that I think it is fair to suggest what some people said on HM may be a reflection of what they believe. If you want to argue it was a performance and everyone is completely different than they were portrayed and believe very different things than what they were on the show saying, you can argue that all day and make a great case that nobody can ever know anything and discussing anything is pointless.
we can move on but to be clear i never said the way people were acting was performative. just that we are only seeing a very small amount of the 40 minutes chosen to be shown by producers focused on creating compelling TV people watch, which is not necessarily an accurate representation of how they spent the 40,000+ minutes of real time spanned in the episode.
you are extrapolating from a few conversations that some are "more focused on individual players than the overall success of the team" as if the former has nothing to do with the latter. i think that is the strange argument, especially if understood that what is shown is only a fragment of what was discussed (and the most intentionally controversial fragments at that).
cares about winning. The franchise has established high standards to meet in its history. Taking heat with the media and fans is just one component when things are not going well.
JM then has to deal with a lot of other Mara's. Many of them probably have different ideas of what needs to be done moving forward. Then you add in the Tisch side.
The Tisch side is probably the main reason that Schoen was hired in the first place.
I'm guessing we won't see Tisch in the Giants building having discussions with Schoen. That's rather telling.
Agreed. I wish the Tisch family owned the team outright instead of the Maras.
No argument here. Tisch knows what he doesn't know. And Mara doesn't.
Eric - don't you take what you saw in concert w/ what they did?
The one thing that didn't leave me with a warm and fuzzy feeling was the lack of a big picture discussion. What are we doing? How are we trying to build this? What is our vision?
Instead, I came away with a totally REACTIVE mindset, rather than PROACTIVE. I've personally seen this before in government organizations.
Now, I'm hoping we simply were not privy to the big picture, strategic discussions. But if those did not occur and everything is done piecemeal, yikes.
from Brandon Brown's outback analogy, to the Barkley discussions, to the Bowen question about edge guys vs interior penetrators, what i saw in the show aligns with the decisions they made (burns, barkley, etc) - emphasis on premium positional value is their proactive vision for how they are trying to build this org.
i suspect this will continue as the episodes move forward and the draft focuses in on QBs/WRs, which are now basically tied with EDGE as the most expensive positions other than QB.
It seemed very clear this team is going the way of Joe Schoen's plan and all the conversations were opening that plan up for discussion and ultimately shutting counterpoints down.
I think some people's expectations for owners of sports francises
is warped. Every team owner would have conversations with their GM about what they plan to do with their star player. And every one of them would have an opinion. There is nothing dysfunctional about any of what we saw. The flaw is on some fan's expectations. The fact that Schoen clearly made the call is exactly what you would hope/expect.
1 other thing surprisingly not brought up much yet - Christian Wilkins
anyone else casually wondering if they weren't better off signing him and keeping the 2nd round pick instead of the Burns trade?
Wilkins is lower ceiling/higher floor than Burns, but a very very good player.
at #39 the Giants would have been able to take the trade Carolina took from LAR which was an outright steal picking up a 2025 2nd and moving down to #52. Or they could have taken Max Melton, Kool-aid, Fiske, Dejean at #39.
signing him instead of the burns trade would have canceled out the McKinney comp pick for sure, but the value of pick #39 is a significant difference.
footage, and if there was genuine interest in Maye, but this first episode re-confirms my belief all along that Schoen has always been very comfortable with Jones as his QB. And did I hear Schoen say they had a three-year plan with Jones...?
When he said that Mahomes couldn't win behind the Giants OL - I believe he may have been referencing the Miami game as an example - that probably made quite a number of posters feel good around here...
If Schoen actually considered the notion of signing and trading Barkley with the FT #2, I find it even more befuddling they didn't trade him at the deadline in 2023.
I see it completely different. He's pissed off he's paying him $40M and he better deliver this year through airing it out. He referenced $40M multiple times almost in a tone that he was annoyed.
There was the exchange with Brown and McDonnell where Schoen talks about needing to address QB mainly given Jones' injuries. I'm sure Maye was the guy they targeted, but they'll edit that out I imagine. Next week focuses on QB.
The sense I got it Schoen is pissed off he's paying him $40M.
We definitely see this differently. I concluded Schoen is pissed off because Jones is always injured, not because he can't be the answer. And he feels they need a better solution at back-up QB in case Jones gets injured again.
To me, the $40M refrain is Schoen saying they have their QB, he just needs a better supporting cast. Which is underscored by the Pat Mahomes remark; and how even a magician like Mahomes could not win with the Giants supporting cast (I don't believe that, btw).
I came away from the episode pretty underwhelmed with the entire group of decision makers - Schoen, Brown, Rossetti, Hickey, etc. Seeing Abrams made me want to throw up in my mouth.
Daboll is the only guy who impresses me out of all this current regime...
I would love to have them gather their scouting staff together in a room and break out a draft board from 3 years ago and critique how they did in the draft. Did they prioritize the wrong skills? I remember one Judge draft where i think everyone they drafted was a captain on their team. Where they to focused on their immediate needs or they board just fell wrong for them, just what problems can be fixed.
RE: 1 other thing surprisingly not brought up much yet - Christian Wilkins
anyone else casually wondering if they weren't better off signing him and keeping the 2nd round pick instead of the Burns trade?
Wilkins is lower ceiling/higher floor than Burns, but a very very good player.
at #39 the Giants would have been able to take the trade Carolina took from LAR which was an outright steal picking up a 2025 2nd and moving down to #52. Or they could have taken Max Melton, Kool-aid, Fiske, Dejean at #39.
signing him instead of the burns trade would have canceled out the McKinney comp pick for sure, but the value of pick #39 is a significant difference.
I’d rather have Burns than Wilkins & the pick. Burns is much more of an impact player.
we don't really need to be focused so much on Schoen eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches... what the hell was that?
Because he’s the main character and they’re trying to give viewers background on who he is and where he’s come from. That he’s a blue collar guy who rose through the ranks on the road is important, highlighting that he still eats PBJs is a nice visualization of the point.
Because that gets into competitive advantage arena. We saw plenty to understand that the team is reforming the roster construction (away from RB, building the line, as example). There was talk of one big player verses speedreading out across the needs. I wouldn't expect really much more than what was shown. They aren't going to give you too many glimpses into future of QB position outside of we need to support DJ, he's our guy, for obvious reasons.
It was mixed messaging. There seemed genuine lines from Schoen about the reality of Jones not only being hurt, but being injury prone (history is the best way to predict the future).
But then there was the strong impression that they want him to have one more year because of the contract.
HOWEVER... we don't know what was edited out. Since they are "stuck" with Jones, they may not want to have released footage that said otherwise. And even if Jones was on the way out, they certainly wouldn't want to look low class (same with Wink, Saquon, Xavier, etc.).
The draft episode is going to be fascinating with how much they reveal about the trade-up opportunity and how they stitch together the narrative on why they drafted Nabers.
About barkley. Did I mishear or did he say "i dont want to be in a position to have to draft a RB high again" and when Schoen said we can get one in free agency he said "dont commit to anything".
He hasnt learned anything over the past 4-5 years.
You aren't going to get full transparency on anything QB related
That's too way close to inside on a team's inner thinking regarding the most important position. You'll get some soft hints, but the overall message will be we need to support DJ. As it should be. I don't want their intentions broadcasted to the country. Next April is too freaking important.
RE: RE: 1 other thing surprisingly not brought up much yet - Christian Wilkins
anyone else casually wondering if they weren't better off signing him and keeping the 2nd round pick instead of the Burns trade?
Wilkins is lower ceiling/higher floor than Burns, but a very very good player.
at #39 the Giants would have been able to take the trade Carolina took from LAR which was an outright steal picking up a 2025 2nd and moving down to #52. Or they could have taken Max Melton, Kool-aid, Fiske, Dejean at #39.
signing him instead of the burns trade would have canceled out the McKinney comp pick for sure, but the value of pick #39 is a significant difference.
I’d rather have Burns than Wilkins & the pick. Burns is much more of an impact player.
not sure i agree with the "much more". wilkins has been a good player and a top 10 DL each of the past few years. he was picked 13th a few picks ahead of burns/dex for a reason. he is a really good player. he'd also probably add more than burns against the run, and while he's not an explosive pass rusher like a top edge, last year he had 10 sacks and 58 pressures. burns had 9 sacks, 40 pressures and in his best year was 13 sacks 68 pressures.
so again there's obvious pass rush upside with an edge > idl that's probably worth the added run defense from wilkins, but is it enough that it was worth the 39th pick? ive been a fan of both burns/wilkins since their draft years, i think it's a close call either way and id have been happy with either outcome.
I don't disagree. My point, further up in the chain, is that John Mara truly only has a small personal minority stake in the team.
He has a job to do, which is generate value for the other owners. And that is as CEO and President of the company. Schoen isn't a CEO figure.
The Giants are the second most valuable franchise in the league, and have won the third fewest games in league over the last 10 years. Clearly winning isn't the lynchpin in creating value.
The Giants aren't John Mara's pet project. It's a job. And yes winning is an important outcome, but creating value for the dozen plus other owners who have entrusted him with authority is also important to him.
any ceo walks and chews gum or they dont succeed.
tim cook's job is bigger than winning market share with iphones, but if any of his top products fails it's not good. it's not his job to personally get the designs/features of those specific products right, it's his job to hire the right people to do that at scale across all the products they sell and be as involved as he needs to be pushing those people to do their best work.
mara's success/failure as lead owner/CEO is almost entirely whether or not he hires the right people. i'm not the biggest joe schoen fan but the thing im most encouraged by is that he has strong convictions in certain things (particularly positional value) and we saw yesterday that even when pressed by a variety of private counter arguments he stuck to his convictions - which also turned out to be different than one of the top GMs in the sport. all any of us can do (mara included) is hope he is right because everyone's interests (fan's, owner's, schoen family's) are aligned in that.
I'm not entirely sure if you are agreeing or disagreeing with me. But my train of thought is directed at Hbart's description of Schoen as the CEO figure and Mara as the BOD. That's the contention I am disagreeing with and the point I'm illustrating.
RE: RE: RE: 1 other thing surprisingly not brought up much yet - Christian Wilkins
anyone else casually wondering if they weren't better off signing him and keeping the 2nd round pick instead of the Burns trade?
Wilkins is lower ceiling/higher floor than Burns, but a very very good player.
at #39 the Giants would have been able to take the trade Carolina took from LAR which was an outright steal picking up a 2025 2nd and moving down to #52. Or they could have taken Max Melton, Kool-aid, Fiske, Dejean at #39.
signing him instead of the burns trade would have canceled out the McKinney comp pick for sure, but the value of pick #39 is a significant difference.
I’d rather have Burns than Wilkins & the pick. Burns is much more of an impact player.
not sure i agree with the "much more". wilkins has been a good player and a top 10 DL each of the past few years. he was picked 13th a few picks ahead of burns/dex for a reason. he is a really good player. he'd also probably add more than burns against the run, and while he's not an explosive pass rusher like a top edge, last year he had 10 sacks and 58 pressures. burns had 9 sacks, 40 pressures and in his best year was 13 sacks 68 pressures.
so again there's obvious pass rush upside with an edge > idl that's probably worth the added run defense from wilkins, but is it enough that it was worth the 39th pick? ive been a fan of both burns/wilkins since their draft years, i think it's a close call either way and id have been happy with either outcome.
That’s fair - but Wilkins was on a much, much better team. I’m excited to see what Burns can do.
About barkley. Did I mishear or did he say "i dont want to be in a position to have to draft a RB high again" and when Schoen said we can get one in free agency he said "dont commit to anything".
He hasnt learned anything over the past 4-5 years.
He did make that comment about drafting a RB high again, and it was pretty cringeworthy. As if to imply that A, they ‘had’ to draft a RB at #2 overall, and B, that it would be necessary to use a Day 1-2 pick on a RB again
McDonnell’s question about “what’s our identity on offense” if they lose Saquon is symptomatic too.
The identity for the last few years has been more often than not it’s hard for the offense to even cross the 50. How about moving fhe football and scoring more points as an identity?
or the reality that most good rbs are high (day 2) picks. the guy they signed to replace him had been a day 2 pick.
as hopeful as we want to be re tyrone tracy the odds say most day 3 picks end up like eric gray and arent ready to contribute in year 1 if ever. before barkley there was a decade of proof in the form of paul perkins, wayne gallman, andre brown, andre williams, michael cox, darel scott, that finding ahmad bradshaw's isnt so simple.
JS “Daniel is making a lot of money and we need to figure out if he’s the guy”. How the fuck do you give him that contract if you don’t believe he is the guy?
Really seems like Mara pushed the jones contract after rewatching this
you can't be serious! The video clearly shows Mara pushed keeping BARKLEY and wanted to keep him again...
Unrelated. If you aren’t sure if jones is the guy you don’t sign him long-term to a massive contract
Tim McDonnell's Body Language in the only clip where he spoke
I wish we had a body language expert on this thread. From a quick google.
Quote:
The Mouth Guard:
The mouth guard is one of the few adult gestures that is as obvious as a child's. The hand covers the mouth and the thumb is pressed against the cheek as the brain sub-consciously instructs it to try and suppress the deceitful words that are being said. Sometimes this gesture may only be several fingers over the mouth or even a closed fist, but its meaning remains the same.
It was mixed messaging. There seemed genuine lines from Schoen about the reality of Jones not only being hurt, but being injury prone (history is the best way to predict the future).
But then there was the strong impression that they want him to have one more year because of the contract.
HOWEVER... we don't know what was edited out. Since they are "stuck" with Jones, they may not want to have released footage that said otherwise. And even if Jones was on the way out, they certainly wouldn't want to look low class (same with Wink, Saquon, Xavier, etc.).
The draft episode is going to be fascinating with how much they reveal about the trade-up opportunity and how they stitch together the narrative on why they drafted Nabers.
We are going to hear largely what they want us to hear.
I propose all Hard Knocks threads moving forward include the following disclaimer:
"Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms or supports one's prior beliefs or values."
Months of work and hours of conversation boiled down to a few clips simply cannot yield certainty in any one area, so take the edits with a grain of salt. There's good info there, but I don't think anything can be viewed with end-all certainty.
Excellent post. We see what we want to see.
Yes, but we also saw what we saw.
Right or wrong (different subject), Mara was arguing a certain position. We saw it. It happened.
Art Stapleton
@art_stapleton
I was fortunate enough to be able to screen next week's Hard Knocks episode, and while not providing any spoilers is part of the deal, I think overall Episode 2 is better than Episode 1 because of the content at the Combine. #Giants100
I'm actually relieved to see Mara and Schoen debating these topics behind closed doors, and Schoen having the authority to make a decision counter to his boss's wish.
The worst scenario is Mara expressing these feelings to the press, and whether he means to or not, putting indirect pressure on Schoen.
If he's putting direct pressure on Schoen, and he then allows him to make an autonomous decision, that is good.
I keep going back to why was he franchised after 2022? It's seems clear to me that if it were up to Schoen, the no brainer would have been to franchise Jones and let Barkley test the market. This is where I think Mara did come into play after the success of 2022 including the playoff win.
My guess is John Mara is a good-hearted man, who naively thinks everything can work out nicely.
I think he believes in a world where the nice, well liked players are also the best players and with a team full of those good guys, the Giants can win Super Bowls. And that will in turn make his siblings and the Tisches lot of money.
And when those good players (include the coaches and staff) get a little older, they'll voluntarily retire and ride off happily.
Quote:
In comment 16547741 Mike from Ohio said:
Quote:
Some in the front office seem more focused on the individual players than on the overall success/failure of the team.
isn't one kind of related to the other? the literal job descriptions of most everyone in any FO below GM is focusing on individual players.
I am talking about what Mara, Schoen and McDonnell are focused on. Are you suggesting they should be more focused on individual player success than team success?
Sure, a RB coach should be concerned about the success of the RBs. Clearly that is not what my post was about. I think you know that.
i am suggesting that individual player successes are entirely linked to team successes and the job of the FO is to find players who will be individually successful because those individual successes = team success. when any player gains yards or scores touchdowns, their team gains yards and gets points. teams arent trying to build rosters of players who are individually unsuccessful.
the show cuts together months worth of things they are "focused on" into a narrative that will be compelling for TV. Barkley is by far the most recognizable player on the team and one of the bigger storylines of the offseason so that's what TV is focusing on.
if you think 40 minutes is an accurate guide to what they were in reality (not tv) more/less focused on does that mean you think the team wasn't focused on OL since it hardly came up beyond a few throwaway lines?
I think this might be true of some NFL owners, but not John Mara. Despite my criticisms of him as an owner, the Giants are his family and he is passionate about the success of this team like any rabid fan would be. If you asked Mara behind closed doors if he would accept a 10% decrease in NFL revenue in exchange for a Giants SB win, he would take it in a heartbeat.
I don't disagree. But this where I think many people forget John Mara personally owns less than 5% of the team.
Some in the front office seem more focused on the individual players than on the overall success/failure of the team.
THIS.
The one thing that didn't leave me with a warm and fuzzy feeling was the lack of a big picture discussion. What are we doing? How are we trying to build this? What is our vision?
Instead, I came away with a totally REACTIVE mindset, rather than PROACTIVE. I've personally seen this before in government organizations.
Now, I'm hoping we simply were not privy to the big picture, strategic discussions. But if those did not occur and everything is done piecemeal, yikes.
My guess is that's where the energy was, and that will become more clear in the episode about Nabers.
What I found interesting was that he referred to the fork when discussing Daniel, he's referring to the out next year. I still think it's a long shot that he does enough to earn a restructure but they're going to give him a shot that's more inline with Schoen/Daboll's identity. I'm a little skeptical about our OL issues being sorted but we'll see.
I won’t continue this discussion with you, other than to say that I think it is fair to suggest what some people said on HM may be a reflection of what they believe. If you want to argue it was a performance and everyone is completely different than they were portrayed and believe very different things than what they were on the show saying, you can argue that all day and make a great case that nobody can ever know anything and discussing anything is pointless.
i get it as fans we want to consume every piece of news/media/content about this team and try to dissect it, but this to me seems contrived.
i will focus on results/actions/actual moves than some soundbites when judging this FO.
He has a job to do, which is generate value for the other owners. And that is as CEO and President of the company. Schoen isn't a CEO figure.
The Giants are the second most valuable franchise in the league, and have won the third fewest games in league over the last 10 years. Clearly winning isn't the lynchpin in creating value.
The Giants aren't John Mara's pet project. It's a job. And yes winning is an important outcome, but creating value for the dozen plus other owners who have entrusted him with authority is also important to him.
I like your POV on this and agree with you on the separation of power within the team. Never thought of it that way.
i get it as fans we want to consume every piece of news/media/content about this team and try to dissect it, but this to me seems contrived.
i will focus on results/actions/actual moves than some soundbites when judging this FO.
Of course it is staged to an extent. Few people speak their mind freely when they know a camera is recording them and will broadcast all the juiciest parts to the entire world. That will make most people measure what they say and how they say it.
Really seems like Mara pushed the jones contract after rewatching this
you can't be serious! The video clearly shows Mara pushed keeping BARKLEY and wanted to keep him again...
He has a job to do, which is generate value for the other owners. And that is as CEO and President of the company. Schoen isn't a CEO figure.
The Giants are the second most valuable franchise in the league, and have won the third fewest games in league over the last 10 years. Clearly winning isn't the lynchpin in creating value.
The Giants aren't John Mara's pet project. It's a job. And yes winning is an important outcome, but creating value for the dozen plus other owners who have entrusted him with authority is also important to him.
any ceo walks and chews gum or they dont succeed.
tim cook's job is bigger than winning market share with iphones, but if any of his top products fails it's not good. it's not his job to personally get the designs/features of those specific products right, it's his job to hire the right people to do that at scale across all the products they sell and be as involved as he needs to be pushing those people to do their best work.
mara's success/failure as lead owner/CEO is almost entirely whether or not he hires the right people. i'm not the biggest joe schoen fan but the thing im most encouraged by is that he has strong convictions in certain things (particularly positional value) and we saw yesterday that even when pressed by a variety of private counter arguments he stuck to his convictions - which also turned out to be different than one of the top GMs in the sport. all any of us can do (mara included) is hope he is right because everyone's interests (fan's, owner's, schoen family's) are aligned in that.
JM then has to deal with a lot of other Mara's. Many of them probably have different ideas of what needs to be done moving forward. Then you add in the Tisch side.
He knows he's the paying the guy a lot of money, and wants to see if he can succeed.
The Giants weren't replacing Jones.
JM then has to deal with a lot of other Mara's. Many of them probably have different ideas of what needs to be done moving forward. Then you add in the Tisch side.
The Tisch side is probably the main reason that Schoen was hired in the first place.
I'm guessing we won't see Tisch in the Giants building having discussions with Schoen. That's rather telling.
"Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms or supports one's prior beliefs or values."
Months of work and hours of conversation boiled down to a few clips simply cannot yield certainty in any one area, so take the edits with a grain of salt. There's good info there, but I don't think anything can be viewed with end-all certainty.
Excellent post. We see what we want to see.
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I propose all Hard Knocks threads moving forward include the following disclaimer:
"Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms or supports one's prior beliefs or values."
Months of work and hours of conversation boiled down to a few clips simply cannot yield certainty in any one area, so take the edits with a grain of salt. There's good info there, but I don't think anything can be viewed with end-all certainty.
Excellent post!
Plus one on this being an excellent post
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In the discussion around Barkley and McDonnell’s comments around losing their offensive identity. The question in his mind was clearly around replacing a really good player that they could market as opposed to how do we make a terrible offense better.
Some in the front office seem more focused on the individual players than on the overall success/failure of the team.
THIS.
The one thing that didn't leave me with a warm and fuzzy feeling was the lack of a big picture discussion. What are we doing? How are we trying to build this? What is our vision?
Instead, I came away with a totally REACTIVE mindset, rather than PROACTIVE. I've personally seen this before in government organizations.
Now, I'm hoping we simply were not privy to the big picture, strategic discussions. But if those did not occur and everything is done piecemeal, yikes.
I didn't sense that Schoen or Brown was being reactive. He identified their needs and met those needs through draft (get #1 receiver), trades (Burns), and free agency (OL). He was not going to overpay for a RB, unlike the previous GM he understands the value of the position. And we aren't seeing all of their discussions, not by a long shot.
The lack of an ability of Mara/McDonnell to think creatively or with any strategic vision is obvious.
The biggest takeaway for me from this episode was how utterly useless and unqualified McDonnell is. I doubt he says anything insightful or clever in any episode of HK.
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cares about winning. The franchise has established high standards to meet in its history. Taking heat with the media and fans is just one component when things are not going well.
JM then has to deal with a lot of other Mara's. Many of them probably have different ideas of what needs to be done moving forward. Then you add in the Tisch side.
The Tisch side is probably the main reason that Schoen was hired in the first place.
I'm guessing we won't see Tisch in the Giants building having discussions with Schoen. That's rather telling.
Agreed. I wish the Tisch family owned the team outright instead of the Maras.
I won’t continue this discussion with you, other than to say that I think it is fair to suggest what some people said on HM may be a reflection of what they believe. If you want to argue it was a performance and everyone is completely different than they were portrayed and believe very different things than what they were on the show saying, you can argue that all day and make a great case that nobody can ever know anything and discussing anything is pointless.
we can move on but to be clear i never said the way people were acting was performative. just that we are only seeing a very small amount of the 40 minutes chosen to be shown by producers focused on creating compelling TV people watch, which is not necessarily an accurate representation of how they spent the 40,000+ minutes of real time spanned in the episode.
you are extrapolating from a few conversations that some are "more focused on individual players than the overall success of the team" as if the former has nothing to do with the latter. i think that is the strange argument, especially if understood that what is shown is only a fragment of what was discussed (and the most intentionally controversial fragments at that).
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In comment 16547820 Lines of Scrimmage said:
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cares about winning. The franchise has established high standards to meet in its history. Taking heat with the media and fans is just one component when things are not going well.
JM then has to deal with a lot of other Mara's. Many of them probably have different ideas of what needs to be done moving forward. Then you add in the Tisch side.
The Tisch side is probably the main reason that Schoen was hired in the first place.
I'm guessing we won't see Tisch in the Giants building having discussions with Schoen. That's rather telling.
Agreed. I wish the Tisch family owned the team outright instead of the Maras.
No argument here. Tisch knows what he doesn't know. And Mara doesn't.
The one thing that didn't leave me with a warm and fuzzy feeling was the lack of a big picture discussion. What are we doing? How are we trying to build this? What is our vision?
Instead, I came away with a totally REACTIVE mindset, rather than PROACTIVE. I've personally seen this before in government organizations.
Now, I'm hoping we simply were not privy to the big picture, strategic discussions. But if those did not occur and everything is done piecemeal, yikes.
from Brandon Brown's outback analogy, to the Barkley discussions, to the Bowen question about edge guys vs interior penetrators, what i saw in the show aligns with the decisions they made (burns, barkley, etc) - emphasis on premium positional value is their proactive vision for how they are trying to build this org.
i suspect this will continue as the episodes move forward and the draft focuses in on QBs/WRs, which are now basically tied with EDGE as the most expensive positions other than QB.
Wilkins is lower ceiling/higher floor than Burns, but a very very good player.
at #39 the Giants would have been able to take the trade Carolina took from LAR which was an outright steal picking up a 2025 2nd and moving down to #52. Or they could have taken Max Melton, Kool-aid, Fiske, Dejean at #39.
signing him instead of the burns trade would have canceled out the McKinney comp pick for sure, but the value of pick #39 is a significant difference.
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footage, and if there was genuine interest in Maye, but this first episode re-confirms my belief all along that Schoen has always been very comfortable with Jones as his QB. And did I hear Schoen say they had a three-year plan with Jones...?
When he said that Mahomes couldn't win behind the Giants OL - I believe he may have been referencing the Miami game as an example - that probably made quite a number of posters feel good around here...
If Schoen actually considered the notion of signing and trading Barkley with the FT #2, I find it even more befuddling they didn't trade him at the deadline in 2023.
I see it completely different. He's pissed off he's paying him $40M and he better deliver this year through airing it out. He referenced $40M multiple times almost in a tone that he was annoyed.
There was the exchange with Brown and McDonnell where Schoen talks about needing to address QB mainly given Jones' injuries. I'm sure Maye was the guy they targeted, but they'll edit that out I imagine. Next week focuses on QB.
The sense I got it Schoen is pissed off he's paying him $40M.
We definitely see this differently. I concluded Schoen is pissed off because Jones is always injured, not because he can't be the answer. And he feels they need a better solution at back-up QB in case Jones gets injured again.
To me, the $40M refrain is Schoen saying they have their QB, he just needs a better supporting cast. Which is underscored by the Pat Mahomes remark; and how even a magician like Mahomes could not win with the Giants supporting cast (I don't believe that, btw).
I came away from the episode pretty underwhelmed with the entire group of decision makers - Schoen, Brown, Rossetti, Hickey, etc. Seeing Abrams made me want to throw up in my mouth.
Daboll is the only guy who impresses me out of all this current regime...
Wilkins is lower ceiling/higher floor than Burns, but a very very good player.
at #39 the Giants would have been able to take the trade Carolina took from LAR which was an outright steal picking up a 2025 2nd and moving down to #52. Or they could have taken Max Melton, Kool-aid, Fiske, Dejean at #39.
signing him instead of the burns trade would have canceled out the McKinney comp pick for sure, but the value of pick #39 is a significant difference.
I’d rather have Burns than Wilkins & the pick. Burns is much more of an impact player.
Because he’s the main character and they’re trying to give viewers background on who he is and where he’s come from. That he’s a blue collar guy who rose through the ranks on the road is important, highlighting that he still eats PBJs is a nice visualization of the point.
It was mixed messaging. There seemed genuine lines from Schoen about the reality of Jones not only being hurt, but being injury prone (history is the best way to predict the future).
But then there was the strong impression that they want him to have one more year because of the contract.
HOWEVER... we don't know what was edited out. Since they are "stuck" with Jones, they may not want to have released footage that said otherwise. And even if Jones was on the way out, they certainly wouldn't want to look low class (same with Wink, Saquon, Xavier, etc.).
The draft episode is going to be fascinating with how much they reveal about the trade-up opportunity and how they stitch together the narrative on why they drafted Nabers.
He hasnt learned anything over the past 4-5 years.
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anyone else casually wondering if they weren't better off signing him and keeping the 2nd round pick instead of the Burns trade?
Wilkins is lower ceiling/higher floor than Burns, but a very very good player.
at #39 the Giants would have been able to take the trade Carolina took from LAR which was an outright steal picking up a 2025 2nd and moving down to #52. Or they could have taken Max Melton, Kool-aid, Fiske, Dejean at #39.
signing him instead of the burns trade would have canceled out the McKinney comp pick for sure, but the value of pick #39 is a significant difference.
I’d rather have Burns than Wilkins & the pick. Burns is much more of an impact player.
not sure i agree with the "much more". wilkins has been a good player and a top 10 DL each of the past few years. he was picked 13th a few picks ahead of burns/dex for a reason. he is a really good player. he'd also probably add more than burns against the run, and while he's not an explosive pass rusher like a top edge, last year he had 10 sacks and 58 pressures. burns had 9 sacks, 40 pressures and in his best year was 13 sacks 68 pressures.
so again there's obvious pass rush upside with an edge > idl that's probably worth the added run defense from wilkins, but is it enough that it was worth the 39th pick? ive been a fan of both burns/wilkins since their draft years, i think it's a close call either way and id have been happy with either outcome.
He has a job to do, which is generate value for the other owners. And that is as CEO and President of the company. Schoen isn't a CEO figure.
The Giants are the second most valuable franchise in the league, and have won the third fewest games in league over the last 10 years. Clearly winning isn't the lynchpin in creating value.
The Giants aren't John Mara's pet project. It's a job. And yes winning is an important outcome, but creating value for the dozen plus other owners who have entrusted him with authority is also important to him.
any ceo walks and chews gum or they dont succeed.
tim cook's job is bigger than winning market share with iphones, but if any of his top products fails it's not good. it's not his job to personally get the designs/features of those specific products right, it's his job to hire the right people to do that at scale across all the products they sell and be as involved as he needs to be pushing those people to do their best work.
mara's success/failure as lead owner/CEO is almost entirely whether or not he hires the right people. i'm not the biggest joe schoen fan but the thing im most encouraged by is that he has strong convictions in certain things (particularly positional value) and we saw yesterday that even when pressed by a variety of private counter arguments he stuck to his convictions - which also turned out to be different than one of the top GMs in the sport. all any of us can do (mara included) is hope he is right because everyone's interests (fan's, owner's, schoen family's) are aligned in that.
I'm not entirely sure if you are agreeing or disagreeing with me. But my train of thought is directed at Hbart's description of Schoen as the CEO figure and Mara as the BOD. That's the contention I am disagreeing with and the point I'm illustrating.
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In comment 16547841 Eric on Li said:
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anyone else casually wondering if they weren't better off signing him and keeping the 2nd round pick instead of the Burns trade?
Wilkins is lower ceiling/higher floor than Burns, but a very very good player.
at #39 the Giants would have been able to take the trade Carolina took from LAR which was an outright steal picking up a 2025 2nd and moving down to #52. Or they could have taken Max Melton, Kool-aid, Fiske, Dejean at #39.
signing him instead of the burns trade would have canceled out the McKinney comp pick for sure, but the value of pick #39 is a significant difference.
I’d rather have Burns than Wilkins & the pick. Burns is much more of an impact player.
not sure i agree with the "much more". wilkins has been a good player and a top 10 DL each of the past few years. he was picked 13th a few picks ahead of burns/dex for a reason. he is a really good player. he'd also probably add more than burns against the run, and while he's not an explosive pass rusher like a top edge, last year he had 10 sacks and 58 pressures. burns had 9 sacks, 40 pressures and in his best year was 13 sacks 68 pressures.
so again there's obvious pass rush upside with an edge > idl that's probably worth the added run defense from wilkins, but is it enough that it was worth the 39th pick? ive been a fan of both burns/wilkins since their draft years, i think it's a close call either way and id have been happy with either outcome.
That’s fair - but Wilkins was on a much, much better team. I’m excited to see what Burns can do.
He hasnt learned anything over the past 4-5 years.
He did make that comment about drafting a RB high again, and it was pretty cringeworthy. As if to imply that A, they ‘had’ to draft a RB at #2 overall, and B, that it would be necessary to use a Day 1-2 pick on a RB again
McDonnell’s question about “what’s our identity on offense” if they lose Saquon is symptomatic too.
The identity for the last few years has been more often than not it’s hard for the offense to even cross the 50. How about moving fhe football and scoring more points as an identity?
as hopeful as we want to be re tyrone tracy the odds say most day 3 picks end up like eric gray and arent ready to contribute in year 1 if ever. before barkley there was a decade of proof in the form of paul perkins, wayne gallman, andre brown, andre williams, michael cox, darel scott, that finding ahmad bradshaw's isnt so simple.
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JS “Daniel is making a lot of money and we need to figure out if he’s the guy”. How the fuck do you give him that contract if you don’t believe he is the guy?
Really seems like Mara pushed the jones contract after rewatching this
you can't be serious! The video clearly shows Mara pushed keeping BARKLEY and wanted to keep him again...
Unrelated. If you aren’t sure if jones is the guy you don’t sign him long-term to a massive contract
The mouth guard is one of the few adult gestures that is as obvious as a child's. The hand covers the mouth and the thumb is pressed against the cheek as the brain sub-consciously instructs it to try and suppress the deceitful words that are being said. Sometimes this gesture may only be several fingers over the mouth or even a closed fist, but its meaning remains the same.
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It was mixed messaging. There seemed genuine lines from Schoen about the reality of Jones not only being hurt, but being injury prone (history is the best way to predict the future).
But then there was the strong impression that they want him to have one more year because of the contract.
HOWEVER... we don't know what was edited out. Since they are "stuck" with Jones, they may not want to have released footage that said otherwise. And even if Jones was on the way out, they certainly wouldn't want to look low class (same with Wink, Saquon, Xavier, etc.).
The draft episode is going to be fascinating with how much they reveal about the trade-up opportunity and how they stitch together the narrative on why they drafted Nabers.
We are going to hear largely what they want us to hear.
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I propose all Hard Knocks threads moving forward include the following disclaimer:
"Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms or supports one's prior beliefs or values."
Months of work and hours of conversation boiled down to a few clips simply cannot yield certainty in any one area, so take the edits with a grain of salt. There's good info there, but I don't think anything can be viewed with end-all certainty.
Excellent post. We see what we want to see.
Yes, but we also saw what we saw.
Right or wrong (different subject), Mara was arguing a certain position. We saw it. It happened.
@art_stapleton
I was fortunate enough to be able to screen next week's Hard Knocks episode, and while not providing any spoilers is part of the deal, I think overall Episode 2 is better than Episode 1 because of the content at the Combine. #Giants100
@DDuggan21
This is the one scene that seemed like it was done for the cameras. Schoen really needed to lay these points out to his top lieutenants in an offseason meeting?
https://x.com/DDuggan21/status/1808461348600201445 - ( New Window )
@rydunleavy
Tim McDonnell asked the best question of this episode.
Whats our offensive identity going to be without Saquon?
NFL front office isnt the place for yes men. Everyone knew what Joe Schoen wanted to do.
One of #Giants lieutenants HAD TO raise the counterpoint
Micromanaging ?
Still going with this narrative ?
@rydunleavy
Tim McDonnell asked the best question of this episode.
Whats our offensive identity going to be without Saquon?
NFL front office isnt the place for yes men. Everyone knew what Joe Schoen wanted to do.
One of #Giants lieutenants HAD TO raise the counterpoint
The best question?????? OMFG
The worst scenario is Mara expressing these feelings to the press, and whether he means to or not, putting indirect pressure on Schoen.
If he's putting direct pressure on Schoen, and he then allows him to make an autonomous decision, that is good.