So far, not so good… What we said last week! For just about every pre-season games, an NFL team’s priorities are to a) avoid injuries and b) have the starters and top reserves outplay their respective counterparts. After achieving both in their pre-season opener against Carolina, the Giants weren’t so fortunate in week two in Chicago. Literally right from the opening kick-off, the Giants played like a team that just wanted to break camp, get home, and get on with the regular season. In a game that was the reverse mirror image of the Carolina game in which the starters dominated the first half, the Giants were down 17-3 at the break in Chicago and had just 5 first downs and under 100 yards of total offense in the first half, while allowing the Bears 80 and 92-yard TD drives.
Worse, the Giants suffered yet another injury on the defensive line when reserve DT Jay Alford, who had been having a strong camp, was carted off the field with a knee injury. And while the Giants haven’t yet conceded that Alford will be out for an extended period, if not the entire season, the early diagnosis isn’t good as Alford tore the MCL and partially tore the ACL in the knee. The Giants are going to let Alford rest the knee in the hopes that he can avoid what would be season-ending surgery to repair the damage to the ACL, however, that sounds like it may be a bit of a longshot.
In fact, there has to be some concern within the organization that the injury situation, which was mostly just a minor annoyance earlier in the summer, could have a major impact on the regular season. In particular, there is a very good chance that the Giants could be without at least three starters on defense - CB Aaron Ross, DT Chris Canty and LB Michael Boley - when they open against Washington on September 13th. Ross is back on the sidelines after re-aggravating the hamstring strain that caused him to miss the past 2 and a half weeks of practice and there is currently no timetable for his return. Same for Canty who reportedly has a slight tear in his hamstring and underwent a radical new therapy earlier in the week. The Giants report that the early returns are ‘hopeful‘ but it is simply not a good sign when a football player ever has to start exploring alternative therapies. Meanwhile, Boley is definitely out of the season opener as he serves a one-game suspension for an old domestic violence incident back in days in Atlanta. How soon and often Boley plays after that, though, will depend on how quickly he heals from off-season hip surgery.
The Giants should still be okay, though, on the corner if Ross were to miss any extended time as both Kevin Dockery and Terrell Thomas have been solid in his absence in pre-season. The Giants also have plenty of useful bodies who can fill in at WLB for Boley, though, none has his big-play potential. There is concern, though, about the defensive front. Indeed, the Giants’ off-season attempt to build up some depth on the defensive line is in shambles at the moment. Indeed, the Giants are down to just 2 healthy DTs - Fred Robbins and Barry Cofield - although the hope is that free agent sign DT Rocky Bernard will be back in uniform when the Giants play the Jets Saturday night after sitting just about all of training camp to date with an injury of his own. Still, if both Alford and Canty are out for any extended time the Giants will need another DT - likely either Jeremy Clark or Leger Douzable - on the roster to at least take a few snaps every now again to rest the regular rotation. It gets especially worse if Canty is out for awhile as he is not only a likely starting DT, but he was also projected to be the nominal 4th DE on the roster. Again if Canty isn‘t gong to be available any time soon, the Giants may also be forced to keep a 4th DE such as Dave Tollefson, although the latter hasn‘t done next to nothing in the two pre-season games to date.
The possible loss of Alford also implies double jeopardy for the Giants, of course, as he is also the team’s FG long-snapper. Punt LS Zak DeOssie will assume those duties Saturday against the Jets. Indeed, figure that FG and extra point attempts by the Giants just could be the most meaningful plays in the Jets’ game this weekend.
And the increasingly complicated perms and combs facing the Giants in putting together their 53-man opening day roster extend to several other positions in addition to the defensive line. The starting offensive line, of course, is set but the back-up situation appears to be still very much in a state of flux. Figure that 2009 second rounder William Beatty is a lock to make the squad on potential alone, however, he was no better against the Bears than he was in week one when he really struggled, especially in pass protection, versus Carolina. That means that unless the Giants see something in Beatty that we are missing, they will likely have to keep Guy Whimper around as insurance at LT. At the same time, each of OGs Kevin Boothe and Tutan Reyes and C Adam Koets all bring something to the table and it may come down to who can do the most on game day as to who gets the final 1-2 roster spots upfront. Boothe can play both OG and RT and was solid enough filling in in stretches last fall, while Reyes can play all three spots upfront and is the most experienced of the trio. For his part, Koets has also played all three spots in his Giants’ career and was one other than Shaun O’Hara to get any snaps at C versus the Bears. Koets, though, likely didn’t win any points with the coaching staff when he false started late in the game costing the team a chance to go for a short 4th down conversion.
It is also hard to figure how the Giants ultimately resolve the depth issues in the secondary. The Giants, who probably would like to carry 9-10 Dbs, have four solid corners and three decent safeties, but there is a huge drop-off after that. Truth be told, both of 2009 draftees DeAndre Wright and Stoney Woodson have looked badly overmatched in the two pre-season games to date. Wright was the main culprit in week one versus the Panthers, but Woodson looked out to sea against the Bears as he was beaten badly on a 3rd and 17 when he couldn’t close down on a simple slant route; was beaten a second time on the same route (although the ball was overthrown) and then was left in the wake of an undrafted Bears’ rookie receiver on another 3rd down conversion. In fact, undrafted rookie free agent CB Bruce Johnson was the first corner off the bench when the Giants went to their nickel package Saturday against the Bears. Johnson, though, did give up a big gainer, although the case can be made that he actually had pretty good coverage on the play. Johnson also came back to knock down a pass later in the game, but both he and Wright were steamrolled on a receiver screen that gave Chicago yet another 3rd and long conversion. Meanwhile, Travonti Johnson has been the only safety other than Kenny Phillips, Michael Johnson and C.C. Brown who evenly remotely looks like he can play at the NFL level, but again there is still a big talent gap to the other three.
With MLB Antonio Pierce out of Saturday’s game with a minor injury, back-ups Chase Blackburn and Jonathan Goff got plenty of snaps. Unfortunately for Blackburn, the only play anyone will remember was Matt Forte’s ridiculously easy 32-yard TD run on which Blackburn was sealed off. For the most part, though, Blackburn played relatively well. He is very active on his feet, uses his hands well to keep blockers off his legs and has good balance and acceleration. Blackburn also gets into the hole quickly and has good lateral range. Indeed, a pretty good case can be made that he was around the ball far more than one often sees from Pierce, who has tended to get hung up on blocks way too often over the past year or so. However, while decisive and aggressive, Blackburn does appear to guess at times, though, and will over-commit at times and will get caught out of position as he did to some degree on the Forte TD run. Blackburn also gets decent drops in coverage and can run down receivers in the flat, but looks to lack the quickness and aility to actually match up in man coverage.
For his part, Goff also didn’t look out of place, but still has a ways to go before he‘d be ready to start in the NFL. Goff does have pretty good quickness and acceleration as well as very good lateral range; he’s also a very solid wrap-up tackler who runs through the ball-carrier. Goff has also been solid for a LB in coverage with a nice break on balls thrown in front of him, although he may not have the speed to stay with receivers in the seam. Goff, though, has a tendency to get caught up in the traffic between the tackles and once engaged struggles to find the ball and get back into the play.
And while we were focused on the LBs, Clint Sintim, the Giants other second round pick this year, got some unexpected minutes against Chicago when veteran Danny Black was knocked out early with a head injury. As noted in the Carolina game two weeks ago, Sintim was very strong at the point of attack and was very effective going forward, but really struggled when forced to play in reverse. Sintim also was one of the players victimized on Forte’s long TD run as he appeared to have responsibility for the cut-back lane, but like Blackburn got picked off and never got close to closing the play down.
This and that: There were a few positives to come out of the Chicago game. In particular, the running game was working on all cylinders with all three backs making consistent gains, while Danny Ware chipped in a solid KO return. For the record, Brandon Jacobs was the 3rd down back throughout the first half, suggesting that he could be a true every down back this fall. The Giants also had one interesting formation in which both Ware and Ahmad Bradshaw were on the field together, with the latter lining up in the slot… No one else on the Giants had much of a game against the Bears so it would be unfair to single out anyone in particular, however, it didn’t appear as if either of safeties Michael Johnson or C.C. Brown had much of a game; both starting OTs also allowed sacks… We can confirm a Kevin Boss sighting in Chicago as the TE appeared to be the target on a long pass that David Carr hoofed far over is head while under pressure. We can be corrected but according to our notes that was the first pass thrown Boss’ way in the two pre-season games to date… Hard to know what it means, but neither rookie QB Brett Romar nor #4 RB Allen Patrick got on the field against the Bears; should be interesting to see whether Romar gets the mop-up action Saturday versus the Jets… According to the assistant coaches, the Giants have supposedly ditched the zone blitz, or at least dramatically reduced the number of times its called, however, there were at least 3-4 such calls against the Bears; for the record, none did much… It will be a busy ten days or so for the Giants’ staff coming up. Following the annual cross stadium derby with the Jets on Saturday night at 8 PM ET (the NFL Network replay is Sunday morning at 10 AM ET), the Giants will have to make their first cuts by Tuesday as NFL teams get down to the 75-man roster limit. The Giants will be right back on the field next Thursday against New England and then have to get down to the opening day 53-man roster by next Saturday.
What is an eli worth? … We have had several correspondents ask what we thought of the Giants extending the contract of QB Eli Manning earlier this summer to the tune of $97.5M over 6 years including $35M guaranteed. The implied question, of course, is did the Giants overpay to lock up Manning through the middle of the next decade. And the simple, implied answer is who knows! And the simple, implied corollary to the implied answer is does it really matter! Certainly Manning, who became the league’s highest paid player when he re-signed, isn’t the best player in the NFL. He isn’t even a tier 1 QB, however, he’s a solid second tier QB who is a legitimate franchise player and when a team has a franchise QB it has to do what it has to do to keep him around because franchise QBs are just so hard to come by. Just ask the folks who run the teams in Washington, Detroit, Minnesota, Tampa Bay, San Francisco, Miami, Buffalo, Cleveland, Jacksonville, Houston, Denver, and Oakland, just about any one of which would gladly pony up that kind of money if Manning were ever to hit the free agent market.
It is also significant to note that Manning likely isn’t going to be the league’s highest player for very long. Indeed, given the inflation inherent in sports salaries these days, Manning likely won’t be anywhere near the top paid player in the league by the time his deal runs out in 2015 or so. And while they may have just been following the precedent set by the Giants, just days after Manning resigned, San Diego extended QB Phillip Rivers to a contract with very similar numbers to Manning.
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