Break up the Giants!!!

December 1, 2020

Hands up anyone who figured the Giants would be in first place on the first day of December after they started the season 0-5. And no, none of you guys who were bitching that the Giants ‘would never win a game this year!’ don’t get to put your hands up. Yet here we are on December 1st and incredibly the Giants lead the division after winning four of their last six games including the last three in a row.

It was a pretty good Thanksgiving all-around for the Giants after Dallas lost at home to Washington on Thursday afternoon. Heading into the week, the NFC East looked like it would come down to a mad 6-week sprint (or at least as much as NFC East teams can ‘sprint’ these days) to the finish with all four teams within a half game of each other. And the Cowboys, who had just one opponent on their remaining schedule with a winning record, looked to be very much in the driver’s seat. Not any more, though, as the Cowboys, who are 31st in the league behind only the dismal Jets in net points for-and-against, looked like they have pretty much given up the ghost, at least for this season in losing badly to the No-names.

Indeed, for lack any better clichés, the Giants appear to be in the proverbial driver’s seat in the division; at least they are one team in the NFC East that actually controls its own destiny. That’s the good news. The bad news is that the Giants’ remaining schedule is the most difficult of the teams in the division with four of their remaining games to be played against teams very much in playoff contention. That probably makes their season finale against the Cowboys a must-win situation. However, win just one of the other four and it would mean that either Philadelphia or Washington would have to win 3 of their final 5 games to overtake the Giants. And while both the Eagles and No-names have slightly easier remaining schedules than the Giants, there aren’t many easy games left on either’s docket.

Of course, the Giants’ job won’t be any easier if QB Daniel Jones is forced to miss more than a game or two after sustaining that hamstring injury late in Sunday’s win over Cincinnati. You can win a game or two with Colt McCoy filling in. After all, he’s not a wide receiver plucked off the practice squad. He’s a guy who has been around for over decade, knows the game and likely won’t beat himself. At the same time, though, he’s also still more of a game manager type who will need some help.

Game balls from the win in Cincinnati:

Strange, strange game against the Bengals. If one only looked at the stats it looked like a blowout for the Giants who held the Bengals to a measly 155 yards and 11 first downs. But Cincinnati was able to hang around thanks in large part to a special teams KO return TD, as well as the fact that the Giants left too many points on the field when they failed to click on a couple of potential scoring plays that were there to be made and also had a red-zone turnover.

It was an interesting game from the perspective that while it was a relatively dominating (at least from a statistical perspective) win, it actually wasn’t all that easy settling on game ball awards. Certainly, it didn’t appear as if any one player had a particularly great game. However, those that were merely good included:

OLB/ERs Jabaal Sheard and Niko Lalos … To be honest, we didn’t publish ‘studs and duds’ lists in the two previous 2 weeks, but if we had, the ERs would have been at the top of the ‘duds’ list. We would have been particularly critical of OLB Kyler Fackrell, who probably should have been asked to buy a ticket for the last several games for all the impact that he’s had. Indeed, we weren’t even sure he was playing on Sunday, until we heard that he’d been injured in the 3rd quarter with a calf injury.

But the fact is that the numbers for the entire ER group have been abysmal so far this year. As a group, Giants’ ERs have, for example, a total of just 7.5 sacks on the year. For the record, you’d really like at least one of your edge rushers to have at least that many all by himself by this point of the season. And with Fackrell going on IR for a while, it means the Giants’ current ER crew have a combined total of 2.5 sacks with Jabaal Sheard and rookie Carter Coughlin tied for the team lead among active players at the position with one each. Ouch! All – or at least much – was forgiven on Sunday, though, when Sheard’s last-minute strip sack of Bengals’ QB Brandon Allen which was recovered by Leonard Williams literally saved the game. We should also note that while Sheard made the play, Coughlin was also involved as he had gotten some penetration on the other side of the field that blocked Allen’s escape route.

Meanwhile, Sunday was the first time in the 63 years that we have been a Giants’ fan that we had to ask ourselves ‘who the heck is that?’ after a Giants’ player made a play in a regular season game when OLB Niko Lalos intercepted a deflected pass to give the Giants great field position early in the 4th quarter. Lalos was also later involved in the tackle that forced the fumble that Logan Ryan recovered.

For the record, Lalos is an unheralded rookie free agent from Dartmouth of the Ivies, although it should be noted he was good enough coming out of high school that he at least got an offer to walk on at Ohio State. In fact, he’s from the same high school in Akron as LeBron James who gave his something of a shout out after the game. Lalos was reasonably productive at Dartmouth where he was a 2-year starter who had 11 career sacks. Could Lalos emerge as a viable contributor to the Giants’ D down the road? It’s possible. He’s got a great motor and is smart (he’s an IVY League Economics major), but he’s limited athletically and has a ceiling similar to Dave Tollefson-type.

Safeties Jabrill Peppers and Logan Ryan … No surprise that the Giants’ defense really started to improve when these two guys started making plays. And they were all over the field on Sunday, combining for 12 tackles including one for loss. They also broke up three passes, while Ryan had a big forced fumble that he ultimately recovered late in the game. And just for the record, rookie FS Xavier McKinney, the Giants second round pick this past April, did make his pro debut on Sunday after missing the first three months of the season with a foot injury. However, McKinney didn’t actually play all that much getting just 14 total snaps including only 5 in the regular defense. And for the record, didn’t make an impact.

The Big Uglies … Another solid game by the offensive line which seems to gain in confidence with each passing week. RT Cam Fleming did get hit with a couple of penalties, including an unnecessary hold that wiped out what should have been a late-game first down that would have iced things. Overall, though, the unit did a nice job keeping the pocket clean such that there were no sacks and only 3 total hits on QBs Jones and McCoy.

And maybe the most interesting development along the OL the past couple of weeks has been that while OG Will Hernandez has returned after missing a couple of weeks with a covid infection, he hasn’t been able to displace rookie replacement Shane Lemieux from the starting line-up. And the unit hasn’t looked like it’s missed a bit. The early analysis of Lemieux was that he was a road grader in the run game, but was limited protecting the passer, but there’s been almost no noticeable pressure from that spot since the first or so that he started.

Stars with an asterix: DE/DT Leonard Williams had another strong game recording his team-leading 6th sack of the year, along with a couple of other QB hits. Unfortunately, he also was tagged with a silly roughing the passer penalty that gave the Bengals a free 15-yards that was a big plus in their late-game rally.

Meanwhile, just about every fan’s favorite whipping boy is TE Evan Engram who, no question, has struggled at times this year. And losing a fumble in the red zone that took away a scoring chance in a tight game was the kind of mistake that the Giants haven’t been making during the current winning streak. However, the Giants don’t win this game without Engram’s 6-catch, 129-yard outing against Cincinnati that included a pair of big gainers that set up scores.

And the fact is that if the Giants are going to win the division they are going to need big plays from Engram, because they just aren’t likely to get many from other players. In fact, we quite expect Engram to be back again next year. Arguably, one area the Giants are likely to want to improve this off-season is their big-play ability on offense. And given that the Giants also have issues elsewhere in the line-up and you can only so many things in a single off-season, Engram likely will still be the best big-play option the Giants have at the position this winter.

And some duds:

The coverage teams: A 103-yard KO return and a 30-yard punt return with the game on the line. And then after the initial KO-TD return, PK Graham Gano kept pooching his subsequent KOs that consistently gave the Bengals good field position. Enough said! What’s weird about all that is that the Giants’ coverage units have been really good all year.

WR Golden Tate: The Giants really need some people to step up at WR and unfortunately Tate hasn’t been one. He was targeted 9 times against the Bengals but ended up with only 4 receptions for a measly 36 yards. The Giants expected more when they signed Tate to that big contract two years ago!

Next up: Seattle … On paper, this looks like something like a mismatch as the 4-7 Giants have to travel across the country to play the 8-3 Seahawks led by MVP candidate Russell Wilson. And whether Daniel Jones plays or not, the Giants are never going to out-talent Seattle.

However, this could be something a trap game for the Seahawks. They will be coming off a 6-day week after travelling across the country to play in Philadelphia on Monday night. They lead the NFC West and have the Giants, Jets and Washington coming up over the next three weeks. As a result, they could well be feeling just a little too good about themselves and maybe could get caught peeking ahead just a little bit to their final two games against the Rams and 49ers.

Then there’s the fact that these aren’t your father’s Seahawks that just used to beat up on people not that many years ago with that big physical, imposing defense. Not any more. Indeed, the Seahawks are 32nd and dead last in the NFL in total defense and are allowing almost 50 passing yards per game more than any other team in the league.

Enjoy the week!