Tom Coughlin – Page 5 – Keefe To The City

Feb 1, 2012

Giants-Patriots Will End a ‘Friendship’

This column was originally published on WFAN.com on Feb. 1, 2012. Super Bowl XLVI might be too much for me to handle. The magnitude of the game, the storylines for the main characters and the

This column was originally published on WFAN.com on Feb. 1, 2012.

Super Bowl XLVI might be too much for me to handle. The magnitude of the game, the storylines for the main characters and the impact the result will have on New York and Boston might be too much for anyone to handle. So that’s why with a game as important for the history of two franchises and two rival cities, I felt there was only one thing to do.

As he does for every big New York-Boston game in every sport, Mike Hurley of CBS Boston joined me for an epic email discussion to talk about what’s at stake on Sunday in the biggest Super Bowl ever.

Keefe: Where do I begin? I think Super Bowl XLVI is pretty much the climax of our friendship (if our relationship can be considered a “friendship”). I say it’s the climax because this is it. One of us is going to experience the glory of a championship on Sunday night and the other is going to be on life tilt and likely questioning why they even like sports in the first place. I don’t see how we will be friends on Monday. My Giants and your Patriots are meeting in the biggest, most important and most significant Super Bowl in Super Bowl history. That’s not a stretch at all. It really is. There’s so much at stake in this game, for the quarterbacks and coaches involved, and for the fans and the two rival cities. That’s why I don’t know where I should begin, but I think I just might have the place: Feb. 3, 2008.

It’s a day you have said never happened. You have claimed that the 2008 calendar went from Feb. 2 to Feb. 4 in the city of Boston even though it didn’t anywhere else, the same way that Boston celebrates the third Monday of April (Patriots’ Day) by people skipping work and class and getting hammered while the Red Sox play at 11 a.m. and the Boston Marathon takes place as the rest of the country endures a normal Monday. (I’m not saying it’s a bad thing. I love Marathon Monday, and I’m thankful for the four years it allowed me to play afternoon beer pong rather than sit in a media law class.)

Feb. 3, 2008 will forever be part of the Top 5 Sports Days of My Life. It might be No. 1 and it’s hard to say that anything can ever rival it unless maybe the Yankees come back from a 3-0 deficit against the Red Sox in a future ALCS, and trail by four runs with two outs and no one on base in the bottom of the ninth of Game 7 before coming back to win the series in walk-off fashion. Then we’ll have to talk.

Super Bowl XLII is important on so many levels, but it’s even more important to me because it made up for the 2004 ALCS. It salvaged my college career in Boston and let me graduate on a winning note after having to watch the Red Sox win twice while living there. For you, it ended the “Perfect Season,” added to the Patriots’ championship drought, gave Tom Brady and Bill Belichick Super Bowl losses and pretty much devastated your life.

Immortality was stolen from Brady and Belichick in Arizona and the Giants’ win prevented us from having to hear about the 2007 Patriots as the best team ever forever. Instead, the Patriots celebrated their colossal failure by hanging a banner in Gillette Stadium to commemorate the perfect regular season. And fortunately they haven’t gotten the memo that it’s a terrible reminder and an embarrassment to New Englanders as it continues to hang at the stadium.

Take me back to Feb. 3, 2008, before I even knew you. Tell me about Mike Hurley during and after Super Bowl XLII and how that game has changed and shaped the way you think and feel about the Patriots. Part of me thinks this is a bad place to begin and that you might have a Rambo-like flashback and drive to New York City right now with a bandana tied around your forehead and dual bullet belts wrapped around your torso with an AK-47 in your hand in search of me, but I’m willing to take that chance.

If you need any help conjuring up some memories of Super Bowl XLII, maybe this will help.

Hurley: Hello, Neil. How are you? If you just told me in that long and winding email, I am sorry but I didn’t read it. I made it through the first paragraph before I blacked out.

I did catch the end though, so we can start there. In February 2008, I was just a young buck trying to make my way in sports media as an intern at WPRI in Rhode Island. I was in the Pats’ locker room, holding microphones in the middle of massive scrums in front of players’ lockers before they left for Arizona. I looked at these players and thought, “Will the Patriots win by 20 points? Thirty points? Should the Giants even fly to Glendale? That’s a lot of hotel money that would go to waste.”

Then the game started, and FOX showed the greatest quarterback in history, Thomas Edward Patrick Brady Jr., on the sideline, not playing, a full seven minutes into the game, while the third-best Manning brother (go Cooper!) drove his team for a painstaking 60 some-odd yards and took nearly 10 minutes to do it. I knew then that I wouldn’t see the blowout that I had previously expected, but I still thought the Patriots would win. They had to win. They were the best team ever. Yeah, they played a couple of vanilla playoff games in the January cold at home, but in Arizona, they’d go back to the five-wide shotgun offense that allowed them to beat teams 150-7 all season long.

But they didn’t, and it was painful, but I said to myself, “Whatever, it’s time to grow up. I’ll just become a media guy and not care about stuff like this anymore, because what’s the point?” I believed it, too, and I went to sleep with no problem. But then I woke up around 2:30 a.m., and the entire game replayed in my head from start to finish. Every. Single. Play.

That was the last time I watched Super Bowl XLII, and I hadn’t even watched a highlight (besides the helmet catch and Plaxico touchdown) until last week. I’ve now had to Google “Super Bowl XLII box score” a dozen or so times in the past week and a half, and it’s killed me every single time.

What’s killed me even more is that 16-0 banner hanging at Gillette. I don’t know why they didn’t just print a banner that said “We lost one time to the Giants,” because that’s all I see when I look at that thing.

Keefe: Media Day came and went without really anyone saying anything that can be considered bulletin board material. Unless the Giants want to hang up the transcript of Rob Gronkowski using the word “day” 49 times in one sentence and somehow get pumped about it. There weren’t any real “guarantees” but rather a lot of “expect” and “hopefully.” And to my dismay, Tom Brady didn’t laugh sarcastically at anyone on the Giants.

Brady is the biggest sports star in Boston and it’s no surprise that you wear his jersey to bed and have a Fathead size cutout of that picture of him shirtless holding a goat on your bedroom wall. And because Tom Brady is who he is, and has done what’s he done, the Patriots are favored by three points in the Super Bowl and no one really feels confident betting against arguably the best quarterback in the history of football. But in reality he might not be the better quarterback in this game. (That’s right I said it.)

Tom Brady is the Patriots. Everyone is favoring the Giants in almost every matchup on the field, except every argument always comes back to, “Well, the Patriots have Tom Brady.” And yes, TB12 has the three rings, but he also has had a lot of inconsistent games in the playoffs in recent years and most recently as the Patriots’ win over the Ravens. Did Brady pick apart an 8-8 Broncos team that ran a high school offense at Gillette Stadium? Yes. But aside from six-touchdown performance against a team that didn’t belong in the NFL playoffs, he really hasn’t played a good postseason game (and by good, I mean a game where you say, “Tom Brady won that game for the Patriots”) since the 2007 divisional round against Jacksonville and before that he hadn’t been good since 2006 wild-card round against the Jets. I’m sure you’re aware of all of this.

There is a common idea that “Tom Brady can’t have back-to-back bad games in the postseason,” but he can, and he has. I feel like Bostonians aren’t worried about Brady in this game and aren’t even considering the possibility that he might be average or worse like has been in eight of the 12 Patriots playoff games since their 2004 Super Bowl win over the Eagles.

How worried are you that Tom Brady might come out on Sunday and look like the Tom Brady that threw no touchdowns and two interceptions (and another two that were called back because of penalties)?

Hurley: I’ll look past your little “Manning is better than Brady” bit that you tried to sneak in there, mostly because it made me laugh too hard. Say whatever you want about Brady, but even if he were missing a leg and his left arm, he’d probably be able to avoid losing twice to the Redskins in the same season. He definitely wouldn’t throw four interceptions.

But there is reason to have some concern over Brady heading into Sunday. He was pretty bad against the Ravens, with the missed pass to wide-open Rob Gronkowski and the Lardarius Webb interception sticking out. Those mistakes were on Brady, but in terms of the overall numbers, you have to give credit to the Ravens’ defense. It was a unit that allowed just 11 passing touchdowns all season long and had 15 interceptions, so the Patriots knew the best way to score would be on the ground. Brady took care of one of those himself, too, thereby creating this photo that should become legendary in Boston sports history.

All that said, I don’t wear Tom Brady underoos, or whatever you suggested. I’m actually as harsh a critic of Brady as you’ll probably find in Boston. I believe he’s among the greatest of all time, and I still think he’s better than most of the quarterbacks in the league right now, but in no way is this the same quarterback that was in his prime four years ago. He’s certainly capable of having bad performances in back-to-back games … I just don’t think he will.

The Giants’ defense is horrible. The Patriots’ defense gets all the bad press, but the Giants’ defense is just as bad and maybe a little worse. Did you know the Giants allowed 25 points per game this year, and the Patriots allowed just 21.4? Did you know that despite that horrific New England secondary, the two teams allowed opposing QBs to throw for the exact same passer rating (86.1)? Or that the Patriots had more interceptions (23) than the Giants (20)?

Brady is going to have a day. He learned his lesson in the Super Bowl That Never Happened that he’s going to need to get rid of the ball quick, and the offense will game plan against that ferocious New York rush.

So no, I’m not worried at all that Brady will struggle on Sunday … unless is Plax is playing defense.

Keefe: Why isn’t Ray Lewis playing up near the line more on the touchdown in that picture? Did he just concede the touchdown and think, “Well, I’m going to try and break Tom Brady in half after he scores?” This is as much of a mystery to me as Lee Evans not holding onto the ball and the Ravens not calling timeout before the potential game-tying field goal.

Yes, the Giants’ defense was horrible. That’s right … was horrible. That was before the defensive line got healthy and the linebackers weren’t taking turns missing games due to injuries. The Giants lost most of their defense in preseason, and still managed to get it together enough times during the season and down the stretch to reach the Super Bowl, so I have to give them credit and you should too.

The Patriots are sort of similar in that it took them most of the season to figure out how to defend against the pass and how to prevent points on every drive. The problem is even if the Giants’ secondary plays as bad as they did for a lot of the season, they still have a great pass rush, and probably the best in the game, which can cancel out the bad secondary. What do the Patriots do well on defense? Hope that receivers don’t hold on to the ball tight enough or long enough in the end zone so they can knock it down? And the interception number is hard to put any faith in when the Giants played the hardest schedule in the league and saw Brady, Rodgers and Brees among others in the regular season. But, hey, if you’re content with the Patriots’ regular season numbers including four games against Mark Sanchez and Chad Henne/Matt Moore, then I guess we have come a long way from when you expected more from the Patriots.

Let’s be honest here … both teams hit massive, and I mean massive parlays to be playing in this game on Sunday. The Giants needed Tony Romo to overthrow a wide-open Miles Austin. They needed Victor Cruz to score a 99-yard touchdown against the Jets and change the momentum in a must-win game. They needed to beat the Cowboys again in Week 17 to make the playoffs. They needed the Falcons to win and the Lions to lose in Week 17, so that they could face the Falcons instead of the Lions in the wild-card round. They had to go to Green Bay and beat the Packers who hadn’t lost in Green Bay since Oct. 17, 2010. They needed the 49ers led by Alex Smith to miraculously come back in the final minute against the Saints and eliminate the Saints because if the Giants had to go to New Orleans in the NFC Championship Game, they weren’t coming back. Then in the NFC Championship, they needed the 49ers’ backup punt returner to let a punt go off his knee to give the Giants great field position to score then they needed the refs to prematurely blow the whistle on an Ahmad Bradshaw fumble, and then they needed the same backup punt returner to fumble in overtime. To cap things off, they needed Steve Weatherford to handle a snap on the game-winning field goal that included a slippery and soaked ball that had to be held in the mud.

The Patriots’ parlay didn’t last as long, but it was every bit as ridiculous. They needed the 8-8 Broncos to knock off the Steelers (one of only three teams to beat the Patriots in the regular season) in order to play the much lesser opponent in Denver at home. Then they needed the Ravens to not notice Julian Edelman covering Anquan Boldin for the majority of the game. They needed Joe Flacco to throw a brainfart interception to destroy a great drive. They needed John Harbaugh to not go for it on fourth-and-1, but later go for it on fourth-and-6. They needed Lee Evans to incredibly not hang on to the ball in the end zone. And finally they needed a combination of the Billy Cundiff not being ready because he didn’t know what down it was and the field-goal unit rushing on the field, and Harbaugh going into the offseason with a timeout to spare for Cundiff to miss a chip shot. I can’t sit here and say the Patriots shouldn’t be in this game like some people are because going by that logic then the Giants shouldn’t be here either.

We talk all the time about how many insane things have to happen to win a championship. I should know. I needed Mike Carey to take an extra millisecond to find his whistle on a near Eli sack and then for the ball to land in the middle of four Patriots stuck to David Tyree’s helmet for the Giants to win Super Bowl XLII. It’s amazing to me that the Patriots ever won three Super Bowls in four years when you think of the one-game elimination format and how every single snap can change the outcome of a season.

It’s been a while since things had to break right for the Patriots to get where they are. Would you say the last time they needed this many things to break just right was during their 2001 run? Where does this Patriots team stack up for you in the Tom Brady Era?

Hurley: You say so many things in these email exchanges — many which make you look like a stupid person — that I can’t possibly respond to all of it. I’m sure you’re right though. The Giants only faced Hall of Fame quarterbacks and the Patriots only faced bums. Seems reasonable.

Regarding whether or not the Patriots needed to catch more breaks this season than any other since ’01, the answer is absolutely not. Like you said, every single champion needs tons of breaks. So as not to bore everyone to tears, I’ll run through what the Patriots needed to win those three Super Bowls:

A comeback in the snow, The Tuck Rule, an absolutely impossible kick in the snow, a Drew Bledsoe touchdown pass, a Troy Brown lateral to Antwan Harris on a blocked field goal, the lack of penalty in 2001 for punching a quarterback in the face, a dropped Drew Bennett pass, a few Peyton Manning brainfarts, a John Kasay kick out of bounds, and a big pile of Donovan McNabb’s vomit.

What was crazy is that despite all of those fortunate breaks, everyone in New England expected the Patriots to win every single year for the next three seasons. That obviously didn’t happen, but it helped everyone appreciate just how special that little run is.

I do agree that a ton has gone right for the Patriots this season, namely that the AFC was as weak as I ever remember it being. The best team (Pittsburgh) was too banged up to win in January, so it left a free-for-all. So it left the Patriots, who I feel are much closer to mediocre than they are great, to take advantage and make it to the Super Bowl and play the Giants, who to me are in that same class. And yet, what makes it so great is that we’re all anticipating one of the best Super Bowls ever.

In terms of where this team stacks up in the Tom Brady era, I’m a little biased. I’m more of an old-school football fan. I miss defense. I love 6-3 games. I miss when players were allowed to hit each other. I miss watching the Patriots’ defensive backs be bullies. I miss Romeo Crennel calling in the signals from the sidelines with his big red jacket on. I miss the underdog Tedy Bruschi breaking down and tackling all-world running back Marshall Faulk in the open field. You know?

So as fun as it is to watch Rob Gronkowski, Aaron Hernandez and Wes Welker run roughshod over opposing defenses, I’ll always miss the defense-first Patriots. This year’s team, you’ll probably notice, is, umm … not a defense-first team.

Keefe: I do say a lot of things, but most of them are true, and we both know that. (That’s not a joke or sarcasm. Ask A.J. Burnett and Boone Logan). But one thing I was wrong about was Tom Coughlin.

I never said that Coughlin should be fired midseason and I don’t think I said definitively that he should be fired after the season (at least not in writing, but maybe in a tweet). I did say that the Giants would fire him after the season if the team didn’t make the playoffs, and he was 5:41 in Dallas away from that happening. Now he’s being compared to Bill Parcells, everyone is guessing how long his extension will be for and there are debates as to whether or not he will be in the Hall of Fame. The Giants’ turnaround is remarkable, but Coughlin’s turnaround in the public eye and in Giants history might be more amazing.

It’s weird because the same thing sort of happened with Bill Belichick. No, his job status and legacy weren’t in question, but everyone was ripping his general managerial decisions and questioning his draft strategies. His young defense was getting dominated and lit up and after the Patriots lost back-to-back games to the Steelers and Giants, a lot of people wondered if the Hooded One’s reign was slowly coming to an end.

But here are the Patriots, back in the Super Bowl with a supposedly terrible young defense that just shut down the Broncos (maybe not that hard) and the Ravens (maybe not that hard either but it happened), and about to face one of the best offenses in the game. No one is complaining about Belichick’s roster and personnel decisions now.

Were you one of the ones to question him during the year? When did this young defense finally begin to understand his coaching style and his system and turn it around?

Hurley: I love Tom Coughlin, I really do, but I did find more than a little bit of humor when everyone was talking about him getting fired, when just a few short weeks earlier, his players lifted him above their heads in the visiting locker room in New England. It was very Rex Ryan, regular-season Super Bowl of him, which was funny, but I’m not completely sick, so I’m happy things turned around for him.

I don’t remember what I had for breakfast, let alone what I thought of Belichick three months ago, but I do think you’d have to be nuts not to wonder how a defense with Julian Edelman taking serious snaps was going to compete in the (wait for the emphasis) National Football League. Between Phillip Adams and James Ihedigbo and Nate Jones and Sterling Moore, you had to wonder how exactly the Patriots were even competing, let alone winning. That was always a question mark.

I didn’t bash Belichick though because I think this past offseason was perhaps his finest ever in finding free-agent talent. No, not in Chad Ochocinco and Albert Haynesworth, but in Brian Waters and Andre Carter. Waters has been outstanding at right guard, and if it weren’t for his steady play, the loss of center Dan Koppen in Week 1 would have been catastrophic. Carter was just an absolute monster and provided some serious veteran leadership for the rest of the locker room to follow. It definitely took a while to all come together, but the team ended up getting the job done.

Oh, and you can’t really crush a guy for his draft decisions when he snags Rob Gronkowski in the second round and Aaron Hernandez in the fourth round, thereby creating a completely new dynamic for Tom Brady’s offense.

Keefe: A day after the championship games, you told me the Giants were going to win the Super Bowl. The same person who is pro-Patriots everything and the same person who ripped apart (and rightfully so I guess) the Giants in every picks column this year and whined about having to watch the Giants on FOX in Boston told me that the Giants would beat the Patriots. I’m not sure if it was your attempt at a joke or a reverse jinx or maybe you had a few too many Bud Lights in you when you told me this, but I couldn’t believe it.

Fast forward to Tuesday when you tell me that the Patriots are going to beat the Giants. I knew it would come eventually. I knew that you weren’t going to go into this Super Bowl and pick the Giants to win, especially after what they did to you four years ago. If the ’72 Dolphins or ’85 Bears were playing the Patriots this weekend I wouldn’t expect you to pick them over your Patriots. You told me that you re-watched the Week 9 game and that the Patriots are going to win by 11 points, so maybe you can explain what you saw and expect for those reading this.

To me, the Giants are the better team. They got healthy and hot at the right time and are following the 2007 blueprint (as Disney-esque as it seems, all the similarities are there). They already beat the Patriots in Foxboro without Hakeem Nicks, David Baas and Ahmad Bradshaw (I know you think Bradshaw doesn’t count). Now the Giants are even better than they were then and playing the Patriots at a neutral site this time. Umm, yeah…

I love the questions being asked about whether or not the Giants can stop Rob Gronkowski (if he’s healthy) and Aaron Hernandez and Wes Welker. I’m pretty sure I watched the Giants beat the Patriots with those three in Week 9. And aside from tight end, the Giants are superior in every part of the game, and without Gronkowski or without him at 100 percent, I’m not sure the Patriots are superior anywhere. But I guess watching Julian Edelman and Chad Ochocinco catch passes will be fun. Though it won’t be as much fun as watching Edelman play defense against the best wide receiver trio in the league.

It was fun being your “friend.” I’m sorry our friendship had to end this way.

I’m going with Giants 21, Patriots 17.

Hurley: I’ll admit, I was very down on the Patriots after that Ravens game. How could you not be? And I looked at what the Giants had done in the past five games, and I looked at the two teams, and I couldn’t honestly say that the Patriots were the better team. Like many others, I thought the Giants would be four-point favorites, and I was stunned to see they were 3.5-point underdogs.

I’ve done a lot of thinking since then, and I re-watched that Week 9 meeting at Gillette. I was at that game, but I forgot most of it. And as I watched, I couldn’t help but think the Patriots looked to be the superior team. It was ugly, and the Giants, of course, won the game, but I watched as the Patriots simply outplayed the Giants.

You said you’re “pretty sure” you watched the Giants beat Welker and Gronkowski in Week 9, but Welker had nine catches for 136 yards and Gronkowski had eight catches for 101 yards and a touchdown say otherwise. Hernandez had four catches for 35 yards and a touchdown, too. Where the Patriots lost that game was in turning the ball over. They did it four times. You should never still be in a football game when you turn the ball over four times, but the Patriots led by three points with 1:36 left on the clock. That speaks to the Patriots being a much better team that day.

Considering that the Patriots only had 17 giveaways all season, I think it’s safe to assume they won’t repeat those mistakes this time around. If they hold on to the ball, that alone should make the difference in winning or losing.

Yes, the addition of Bradshaw into the equation makes no difference, because the Giants are the worst running team in the NFL and every single time Kevin Gilbride calls for a handoff on Sunday it will be a win for the Patriots. Nicks is a big addition, but Kyle Arrington can stick with him enough to limit a breakout game. Victor Cruz was the biggest problem in Week 9 and he will be again in the Super Bowl. He’ll rack up a ton of yards, but the Patriots will keep him out of the end zone, just like they did last time. And field goals aren’t going to win this game.

I agree that it’s sad that our relationship has to end, though I feel that way for different reasons.

Patriots 34, Giants 23.

Blogs • Giants

Dec 19, 2011

A Giant Embarrassment

I wasted part of my Sunday watching the Giants, and I should have known better. With the Giants suffering a humiliating loss, I decided to look at some of the postgame comments from the team in an attempt to make sense of the mess at MetLife Stadium.

If you wasted part of your Sunday watching the Giants, I don’t feel sorry for you. I don’t feel sorry for anyone like myself that watched the Giants game because we all should have learned by now. We should have known better than to think that the team that had their season saved in a span of five minutes and 41 seconds of improbable events last Sunday night would do anything other than take their second chance for granted.

I was prepared for the Giants season to be over with 5:41 left last week and the Giants trailing the Cowboys by 12 points. But then they had to come back and win and suck me in and make me believe they could make the playoffs and maybe go on the sort of run we saw from them four years ago. I’m a sucker. No really, I am. I have fallen for this same act year after year and I fell for it again because of last Sunday. When will I lean? Better yet, will I ever learn?

The Redskins had absolutely nothing to play for on Sunday. Absolutely nothing. Other than that the game was on their schedule and that it was their one of their last three chances to add to or improve their season stats and that a win would screw up the Giants’ season, they had no incentive to win on Sunday. But maybe playing for nothing was enough for them.

The Giants had everything to play for. They were given a second life in their season to make the second season and three games in a row at home to win and set up an easy path to the postseason where they would host a playoff game for the first time since 2008 and just the second time since 2005. But maybe playing for everything wasn’t enough for them.

I watched Mean Streets on Friday night and I can’t stop thinking about how the New York Giants are Johnny Boy (Robert DeNiro) from the movie and how the fans are Charlie (Harvey Keitel). Johnny Boy is a screw-up that everyone else knows as a loser and a joke and someone they wouldn’t want to associate with, but somehow Charlie sees the good in him after growing up with him and feels the need to support him and vouch for him and his debts by giving him unlimited chances to turn his life around. But Johnny Boy takes Charlie for granted and never changes his reckless lifestyle.

Like Johnny Boy telling Charlie he will pay off his debts next week and then the week after that and then the week after, the Giants keep promising to be prepared next week and the week after and the week after that. Following the loss to the Redskins they made their excuses to the media and then preached change for their Christmas Eve game against the Jets. The same change they have promised after the other six losses this season. And if they lay an egg against the Jets and the Cowboys lose to the Eagles, they will tell us that the Week 17 game against the Cowboys is the only game that has mattered all along. It won’t end until there isn’t another week for them to prepare for. It won’t end until Tom Coughlin is packing up his desk and office into empty Amazon and Dell cardboard boxes and wondering what he’s going to do in 2012.

I honestly wish the Giants lost on last Sunday night against the Cowboys. I’m serious. It would have made this loss a lot easier knowing that the season were over and would have given me an extra week to accept the idea that the Giants wouldn’t be playing in the postseason for the third straight year and would have allowed me to try and fathom how another year of Eli Manning’s prime has been wasted by this team and this coaching staff.

I don’t understand “optimism” when it comes Giants fans. This team isn’t good. Their 7-7 record says so. Their 1-5 run since beating the Patriots says so. Their -38 point differential says so. Their two losses to Rex Grossman and losses to Charvaris Whiteson, Alex Smith and Vince Young say so. By the end of Sunday’s game I was so depressed that I needed a good laugh and with 4:12 left, Corey Webster provided it when he broke up a pass in the end zone for a would-be touchdown and then celebrated to the fans sitting in the back of the end zone. The Redskins were leading 23-3 at the time. (Granted Webster and Jason Pierre-Paul have been the only two consistently good defensive players this year, but really? Save the celebrations for another time.)

It was the same old song and dance from the Giants after their embarrassing loss to the Redskins that reopened the wound they stitched up last Sunday. Tom Coughlin and his players threw out a lot of clichés and a lot of promises to blow smoke up everyone’s ass that cares about this team and to those that have wasted 15 weeks waiting for some form of consistency.

Let’s look at some of the postgame quotes from the Giants as they search for answers as to how Rex Grossman (you know the guy who lost his job to John Beck this season) beat them twice in the same season.

Chris Canty on blowing an easy opportunity for a win: “We had a tremendous opportunity here against a division opponent and we let it slip through our fingers. We didn’t take advantage of it and we did not play New York Giants football.”

There’s no truth to the rumors that Chris Canty will be hosting a HBO comedy special this offseason. The guy is hilarious, isn’t he? Wait, he was serious when he said, “We did not play New York Giants football?” Is this real life? You didn’t play New York Giants football? Umm, actually that’s exactly what you did. I know you’re semi-new around here, but what happened against the Redskins is what Giants football is. Being humiliated at home and losing to four-win teams and playing .500 football and being undisciplined and unprepared is Giants football.

Antrel Rolle on the frustrating loss: “I have said that we are the better team but they [Washington] beat us twice so clearly they’re the better team at this moment.”

It doesn’t matter what Antrel Rolle says at the end of the day. He can say that Washington sucks or that the Giants will do this or that they will accomplish that, but none of it matters at the end of the day. At the end of the day, does anyone believe anything that Antrel Rolle says anymore at the end of the day? If Rolle told me that Christmas is this Sunday, I wouldn’t believe him at this point.

Last week we had to here about how he was mad at Cris Collinsworth’s analysis of him not covering Dez Bryant. According to Rolle, he was right where he was supposed to be. But then this week, Rolle missed several tackles and many big plays happened on his side of the field. Was he where he was supposed to be on every play against the Redskins? Maybe Collinsworth was on to something?

Rolle has spent most of his time this year guaranteeing stuff like Ray Zalinsky. Does he even know what “guarantee” means? It means, “to promise or assure a particular outcome.” Can we just use guarantees in sports for significant events like playoff games and championships? Antrel Rolle shouldn’t have to guarantee postseason berths. With this team and this talent, that should be a given at the end of the day.

Tom Coughlin on the lack of running plays in the first half: “We planned to do more and have more. The first three plays were three incomplete passes in a row and had we have gotten a first down, you would have had a good mix of run and pass but that didn’t take place. You didn’t see many plays in the first half. The first 15 probably had more passes than runs but not to an excessive extent. It just didn’t work out the way we would have liked it to.”

How can you plan to do more running and not do it? You do realize that you are the head coach and therefore you have the final say, right? And you do realize that your team calls its own offensive plays, right? So, if you plan on running it more, you can. You can run it as many times as you want. You can run it on every play if you want. You can run it on zero plays if you want. What does that answer even mean?

Tom Coughlin on how to improve the pass coverage: “You just keep working at it and keep trying. We keep maneuvering around and changing coverages and trying to get people in the best possible spots. We are trying to understand what the opponent will do to us. That continues.”

I take it Coughlin didn’t fully grasp the “trail and error” method in school. If you try something and it fails, try something else. It doesn’t seem like the defense keeps working at anything other than just playing the same way they have played all season.

Prince Amukamara on how tough it was for the secondary: “The quarterback made plays, the receivers made plays and they completed passes on us.”

Ah, nothing like Prince Amukamara going with the “Bill Belichick” in the postgame. (The “Bill Belichick “is saying “They made more plays than we did.” It’s the ultimate copout.)

I’m glad he noticed that the Redskins completed passes on the Giants since most of those passes were on his side of the field. I remember when everyone was talking about the defense’s struggles earlier in the season, but the consensus was “the secondary will get better when Prince is healthy.” Is it possible that the secondary is worse off with the Giants’ first-round as part of it? I think it’s certainly a question that can be asked. It seems funny now that I included him as part of the devastating injuries when I talked with the Daily News’ Ralph Vacchiano prior to the start of the season.

Brandon Jacobs on the emotion and passion from the Giants: “We didn’t play well. We were disappointed in each other. We disappointed our fans. We just have to play better. We didn’t want it bad enough the first time we played these guys and we didn’t want it bad enough this time.”

How is it possible that the same guy who gave us that quote also gave us this one just a few weeks ago?

“I’m playing for my teammates, my brothers. That’s who I care about. I don’t care about anybody else to be honest with you. I don’t care if [fans] cheer for me another day. They could boo me every day.”

So the guy who doesn’t care about the fans and doesn’t care about being booed all of a sudden feels bad that he let the fans down? If there’s only two games left in the Giants season, at least there’s only two games left of Brandon Jacobs as a Giant.

Justin Tuck on the loss: “Obviously the one word that comes to mind is disappointing, a little bit embarrassed. Knowing what we had at stake, it is disappointing.”

Disappointing? Why that’s a nice way to put it. But just “a little bit embarrassed?” You lost to the four-win (before today) Redskins at home. You lost to Rex Grossman again. I would say you could use “embarrassed” without “a little bit” in front of it. We’re way passed being “a little bit embarrassed.”

And, how about Tuck and Rolle’s war of words after the game? If the season is going to go down in flames, they might as well make a spectacle of it.

Antrel Rolle is in no place to criticize or call anyone out on this team. He has made a lot of public promises and has acted as a leader to the media, but in reality he has been one of the team’s biggest defensive problems. How many shots of a wide open receiver catching a third-and-long pass and then Rolle and Aaron Ross entering the pictures five seconds later are we going to see?

Justin Tuck is in no place to get mad over criticism. Yes, he has been injured, and I’m not going to say he hasn’t been as injured as he has led people to believe like other members of the league and the media have suggested, but Tuck has been a disappointment. He was supposed to be the face of the defense starting when Michael Strahan, but he has had a hard time living up to that status consistently.

I’m just glad we can add locker room divide and using the media to as a trash-talking messenger to the problems this Giants team faces. It wouldn’t be a second-half collapse without it!

Justin Tuck on if the Giants can make the playoffs: “I still have the most confidence in this football team. Sometimes we come out and lay an egg and today we laid an egg but I have seen us rebound so many times in my short career here and I know the character of the guys in that locker room.”

There were a lot of times during Will Ferrell’s Saturday Night Live career when I wondered how he was able to keep a straight face. There was his Robert Goulet and Gus Chiggins and Mr. Tarkanian and hundreds of others. Most of the time I wondered how he was able to keep a straight face while other cast members (mainly Jimmy Fallon who actually used Saturday’s SNL monologue to make fun of himself for this) laughed at Ferrell’s performance. Well, Justin Tuck used his best Will Ferrell SNL impression with this quote. Seriously, how do you say you “still have the most confidence in this football team?” I think I have less confidence in this team than I did in last year’s team that starred in the Week 15 Eagles debacle, or 2009’s team that started out 5-0, finished 8-8 and gave up 85 points in their last two games. Confidence? I don’t think so.

I could see “Sometimes we come out and lay an egg” painted on the Giants’ locker room wall or on a sign hanging in the tunnel on the way from the locker room to the field. But sometimes the Giants lay eggs? The Giants have lost five of six. That means in the last six games they have laid an egg 83.3 percent of the time. Is that “some of the time?” OK, if you don’t want to use a sample size, then they are 7-7 and have laid an egg 50 percent of the time this season. Half of the time, isn’t “sometimes” it’s “half of the time.”

Tuck’s “short career” is now seven seasons. That’s not exactly “short.” In that time the Giants have lost 20-0 at home in the first round of the playoffs; lost in the first round in the playoffs; had maybe the best Super Bowl run in history; lost in the first round of the playoffs at home; missed the playoffs; missed the playoffs; and right now might miss the playoffs again. So aside from the glorious 2007 playoff run, they have rebounded in exactly zero other seasons. Somehow, Tuck must have erased this from his memory.

Eli Manning on what to tell the fans after the loss: “We’re competing and we’re trying to win. We didn’t play as well as we needed to today and Washington played better than us. We’re sorry about that, but we’re going to get back to work and get ready for the Jets.”

I have nothing negative to say about Eli Manning. Yes, he threw three interceptions and had his worst game of the season in a game the Giants should have won. When it rains, it pours with the Giants and every Giant seemed to have their worst game of the season today. But Eli is also the reason for the team’s seven wins, so he’s allowed to have a bad game every once in a while. The rest of the team gets to have one every week, so it’s not surprising that he finally decided to have one too to balance things out. (He also made the perfect pass to Hakeem Nicks that Nicks dropped for a would-be touchdown, which was the turning point of the game. If Nicks catches it, the Giants take a 7-3 lead, and suddenly the Redskins, who have nothing to play for are playing a meaningless game from behind rather than with house money.)

Like Eli said, the Giants are sorry, even if sorry doesn’t make it and doesn’t make a team make the playoffs. But don’t worry, everyone, the Giants are going to get back to work and get ready for the Jets next week, just like Johnny Boy telling Charlie he will have the money for his debts next week. And the Giants will keep telling us this until they run out of weeks to prepare for. They always do.

Blogs • Giants

Dec 12, 2011

Part Of The Solution And Problem For Giants

The Giants came away with the win, which is all that matters. But despite the elation from last night that has carried over into today, it’s time to look at the old saying, “If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem.”

This column was originally published on WFAN.com on Dec. 12, 2011.

Five minutes and 41 seconds. That’s the amount of time that separated Tom Coughlin and his coaching staff from turning in their three-weeks notice and guaranteeing that they wouldn’t be part of the New York Giants organization after Week 17.

I was prepared to open this column with an exchange between Michael Scott and Pam Beesly on the day they found out that the Michael Scott Paper Company was broke.

Michael Scott: Did I ever tell you about the day that Steve Martin died?

Pam Beesly: Steve Martin’s not dead, Michael.

Michael Scott: I know. But I always thought, that the day that he died would be the worst day of my life and I was wrong. It’s this.

That’s what Sunday night was shaping up to be. Another terrible memory added to the now long list of terrible memories and moments in recent Giants history. And with five minutes and 41 seconds left in the game, the Giants trailing by 12 points with two timeouts and a defense that couldn’t get a stop, I thought the Giants’ season was over. Actually I knew it was over. Dez Bryant had just been left so open on the field that the there wasn’t another player on the TV when the NBC camera found the him and the ball, and Rambo-like flashbacks of DeSean Jackson backpedaling into the end zone while dancing and laughing in Week 14 in 2009 clouded my mind. The season was over.

I had used the commercial break to ease the pain of the Giants’ loss, and convince myself that they didn’t deserve to be in the playoffs, and that if they did make the playoffs they would just get embarrassed anyway. I remembered thinking that the season was over after their Week 1 loss to the Redskins and that they weren’t going anywhere in 2011 with the injuries, and that getting to Week 14 was an accomplishment. It was like I had just used my entire checking account on a bar tab, and I was trying to justify it to myself, and trying to think of a way to twist it so that I wouldn’t feel so terrible about what had happened. “It was worth it. You only live once. This is what your 20s are for.” When in reality, it’s hard to justify buying $10 beers and $18 drinks for four hours the same way it’s hard to rationalize getting repeatedly sucked back into the Giants over the course of a season and constantly believing the team will come back.

I was willing to do anything to have the Giants win Sunday’s game in the form of a dagger that the Eagles delivered to the Giants in Week 14 last year. I said I would watch Saturday Night Live every week for the next five years. I would listen to Nickelback and only Nickelback from now until the end of January. I would read Snooki’s book and watch Pan Am and Kourtney and Kim Take New York. I would only use the ends of loaves of bread for sandwiches for the next month, and wake up at 4 a.m. all winter and run 10 miles. I would watch the Seahawks-Rams on Monday Night Football and attend a Nets game this year. I would do any of these things for the Giants to beat the Cowboys and keep their postseason aspirations alive. (So, yeah, I have a lot of horrible things to do and accomplish. And I probably should have said I would do these things if they beat the Cowboys and made the playoffs because if they lose to the Redskins or the Jets or the Cowboys and then don’t make the playoffs, that’s going to be devastating.)

Last night wasn’t the type of game that the Giants win. It was the type of game that the Giants lose. Never, ever, ever the type of game that they come back and win. It was the type of game where they drag you along and lead you on before they break your heart, only to put it back together before shattering it again with a sledgehammer. And they did their best to do this, and they tried to do it right up until the final play of the game (or the final play that mattered which was the missed field-goal attempt since the actual final play was an Eli Manning kneel).

That’s not me being negative or pessimistic. That’s me being a realist. Even Giants owner John Mara agrees with me, and he owns the team! He said so after the game: “The best thing is we got our season back tonight. It would be nice to have an easy tin for a change, but I don’t know if that is in our DNA.”

The Giants did get their season back like I thought they would before the game, but not with 5:41 left to play. They took care of their own business for the first time since beating the Patriots five weeks ago and they temporarily paused the second-half collapse, which is something they haven’t been able to do in past seasons.

The Giants won because they played with urgency when they had no other choice. I talked about this a few weeks ago. The Giants play to the level of their opponent, and they don’t play at the level we expect them to play at until the fourth quarter when it’s nearly too late and when one mistake will end the game. But really they won because of a series of crazy plays that happened in the final “five minutes and 41 seconds” that we will hopefully look back on in a few months as the turning point for this Giants season.

– The Giants go 80 yards in 2:27 to score and don’t use any timeouts, leaving them both timeouts and the two-minute warning.

– The Giants finally stop the run, and put the Cowboys into a third-down situation and only burned one timeout in doing so.

– Instead of running the ball on third-and-5 and trying to take additional time off the clock and hoping for a first down to end the game, the Cowboys try to pass for the first down. Tony Romo jussssst overthrows a wide-open Miles Austin, which would have resulted in a touchdown pass. The incompletion stops the clock, saves the Giants their final timeout (which they would go on to use to ice Dan Bailey) and the two-minute warning and forces the Cowboys to punt and play defense.

– Cowboys punter Mat McBriar only punts the ball 33 yards to the New York 42 giving the Giants great field position with 2:12 left.

– The Giants botch a snap and get saved by a Cowboys penalty. Eli Manning gets nearly sacked, but throws the ball with his left hand, but the play doesn’t count because of a Cowboys penalty.

– Mario Manningham drops a perfectly thrown ball in the end zone that would have given the Giants the lead. At the time I was going insane. When in reality, a touchdown there would have given the Cowboys even more time to work with and they would have sent the game into overtime or possibly won the game. The drops turns out to be a blessing in disguise.

– Jake Ballard catches an 18-yard pass, but is tackled at the Dallas 1 to kill additional time. If he gets in the end zone there, the Cowboys have more than the 46 seconds they ended up being left with.

– The Giants convert a two-point conversion on a … wait for it … wait for it … wait for it … DRAW PLAY TO D.J. WARE! Kevin Gilbride, you genius you!

– The Cowboys have 46 seconds and no timeouts, starting at their own 20. I don’t know what the chance of getting into field-goal range is given those circumstances, but it’s low. Really, really, really low.

– The Cowboys get to the New York 29 and kick a game-tying field goal, but Tom Coughlin calls timeout to ice Dan Bailey. On Bailey’s second attempt, Jason Pierre-Paul blocks the attempt and the Giants win.

The Giants came away with the win, which is all that matters. And it is all that matters because if the season ended today, the Giants would be the No. 4 seed with a home game in the first round (even though I would rather have them on the road in the postseason). But even with a win that saved their season, they were an iced kicker away from going to overtime where a coin flip would have decided their season. So, despite the elation from last night that has carried over into today, let’s look at the old saying, “If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem” and how it pertains to three Giants from each side of it.

PART OF THE PROBLEM

Kevin Gilbride
Kevin Gilbride sometimes calls plays as if Tyler Palko is his quarterback and Adrian Peterson is his running back. OK, it’s not sometimes. It’s all the time. And because of that, I spent halftime last night creating Monster and CareerBuilder accounts for Gilbride to use following this season. I sent the user names and passwords to kgilbride@giants.com, but I’m not sure if that’s his email or not.

Cris Collinsworth said Gilbride told him in their pregame conversation, “If we can run it, I’m not going to do anything else.” At least Gilbride isn’t a liar.

Manning threw for 149 yards in the first half. The Giants started with the ball in the second half, and came out with a seven-yard screen pass to Ahmad Bradshaw, and then back-to-back running plays with Bradshaw that went for a combined one yard, forcing the Giants to punt. I understand that the Giants were probably thinking that Bradshaw would have fresh legs since he was bench for the first half, but Eli Manning just picked apart the Dallas secondary for a half.

Then at the end of the third quarter, they didn’t get a third-down play off in time, so the game went to a TV timeout. Out of the break, the Giants ran the ball with Bradshaw on third-and-2 from their own 41. He lost three yards, as Jay Ratliff was ready for the run as if he could read Gilbride’s mind. Speaking of which … does Gilbride really need to cover his mouth with the play chart when speaking into his headset? You don’t need X-ray vision to see through the chart to know that he’s mouthing “draw with Jacobs” or “inside handoff to Ware.” Actually, I want to see what it says on Gilbride’s play chart. I picture just a blank chart with “DRAWS AND SCREEN PASSES!!!” written in huge letters in bad penmanship in red marker. I mean with less than five minutes to go and down by 12, and just two timeouts left, the guy ran a shotgun draw to Bradshaw.

Jets fans probably think this is nothing compared to what Brian Schottenheimer calls for their team, but he has Mark Sanchez to work with. Gilbride calls plays like he has Mark Sanchez and not Eli Manning.

Giants Defense (Minus Jason Pierre-Paul)
If one of my friends had been living overseas since Labor Day without Internet or any access to the American sports world and just moved back today and wanted to catch up on the NFL season and the Giants, and asked me to describe the 2011 Giants defense to them, I would say: “If there’s 30 seconds on the clock at the end of either half and the opposing team has the ball at their own 20 with no timeouts left, I don’t feel confident in the Giants being able to stop them from scoring.” Am I wrong?

I would rather watch Boone Logan face Josh Hamilton with the bases loaded and two outs in Game 7 than watch the Giants play defense. That’s not an exaggeration. For all the negative tweets and words I have written about the Yankees left-handed specialist who can’t get lefties out, he doesn’t even come close to the frustration level that the Giants defense brings out in me (and I’m assuming all Giants fans).

When the Cowboys got the ball with 1:38 left in the first half, I tweeted “If there is a line available on “Will the Cowboys score before the end of the half?” … I’m willing to wager a lot of money on it.” The Cowboys fumbled on the first play and the Giants recovered, and I got responses from people laughing at me. But when the Giants went into their “Settle for a Field Goal” red zone offense and barely took any time off the clock, the Cowboys got the ball back again with 1:03 left in the first half. They went 49 yards in 48 seconds and kicked a field goal to retake the lead. I didn’t need to tweet back as those who doubted me and believed in the Giants’ defense. It wasn’t worth it.

As of right now, if the Giants were to make the playoffs and win their first-round game, they would likely go to Green Bay to face the Packers. And while they played the Packers tough (but still lost!), that was at home. I can’t think of a worse thing to watch than having to go to Green Bay with the Packers coming off a bye week and watching a rest Aaron Rodgers and his offense just go to town on the Giants’ defense. Actually I can think of a worse thing to watch: Tom Coughlin trying to brave the cold and frigid temperatures of Green Bay like he did in the 2007 NFC Championship Game. (I would link to a picture here, but I plan on trying to sleep later.)

Ahmad Bradshaw
Bradshaw missed four games because of a cracked bone in his foot. You would think he would be itching to play and wanting to prove himself after missing 25 percent of the season. You would think.

I’m not mad at Tom Coughlin for benching Bradshaw here because even though it might have cost the Giants their season and Giants fans like me the season, it could have potentially cost Coughlin his job and his career. Sunday’s game was the most important game of Coughlin’s coaching career outside of Super Bowl XLII. He is 65 years old and isn’t going to get another head coaching job after he’s done with the Giants, and if he lost on Sunday, he would have basically fired himself. If he felt it was that important to bench his No. 1 running back for the first half of a must-win game then I have to stand by that decision because he put his livelihood in danger, and to me, only my football season as a fan was in danger because of it. Though you might be able make a case that Coughlin’s livelihood and my football fandom are equal.

Coughlin has been about discipline and old-school football since his first day on the job with the Giants. If you know who he is and what he’s about as I’m sure Bradshaw does, then no one is to blame for reportedly missing curfew and being benched other than Bradshaw. But yeah, Tom Coughlin has some pretty strong “principles” if he’s willing to go to war without one of his best players for breaking a team violation.

PART OF THE SOLUTION

Eli Manning
The world is full of silence from the Eli Manning critics today. Six fourth-quarter wins this season, his third 400-yard passing game of the year and he’s now tired with his brother and Johnny Unitas for he most (14) fourth-quarter touchdown passes in single-season history. We are far removed from the “Gee, golly” Eli days.

Sure, there are still those brain farts in the game where Eli panics and goes to the back-foot, off-balance throw that makes time stand still and makes your heart drop like when you drive past a cop doing radar going 20 mph over the speed limit. You hope the cop doesn’t pull out and come after you the way that you hope Eli’s errant pass finds the sidelines or hits some open ground.

There isn’t anyone that I would rather have with the game on the line in the two-minute drill in the league. (I say this a lot, but I don’t care. I’ll say it again!) Does that sound crazy? Maybe, but it isn’t if you watch Eli play every week and not just on national TV. With 5:46 left I didn’t think the Giants would win, but when it got to the point that Eli had the ball and a chance to go down the field and score the go-ahead touchdown, I knew he would find a way to get it done. I think the only two New York athletes I feel confident with in certain situations are No. 42 in the ninth inning and Eli Manning in the two-minute drill. Maybe Mark Teixeira with the bases loaded? Oh, wait…

Eli Manning has been so good that when you factor in the all of the drops between Hakeem Nicks, Victor Cruz and Mario Manningham throughout the season (and if it weren’t for the drops last night he might have thrown for 500-plus yards) and that Kevin Gilbride is calling his plays for him, Eli is actually even better than his numbers suggest he is.

Jason Pierre-Paul
If you’re not a Giants fan, you might not know who Jason Pierre-Paul was at this time yesterday. But I’m pretty sure after last night and now this morning, you know who he is.

It’s guy like JPP that make me feel bad when I berate the Giants defense because why should a guy like that get lumped into the conversation with guys who don’t do their job like Aaron Ross? It’s unfair to JPP. So, I’m giving him this space for me to honor him and separate him from the rest of the defense and those that don’t give the effort needed to prevent second-half collapses.

A safety, a forced fumble, two sacks, eight tackles and blocked field goal … in one game! If the Giants don’t give JPP a platinum copy of this game on DVD, I’m willing to buy him the NFL Rewind version of it iTunes. It’s the least I can do for him for saving my football season.

Brandon Jacobs
Brandon Jacobs is in the A.J. Burnett Zone and there’s no returning. I made this clear about three weeks ago.

I can’t stand Jacobs and his fall since the 2007 season has been devastating. But for one game, Jacobs used some of Steve Urkel’s “Boss Sauce” and hopped into the transformation machine and came out as 2007 Brandon Jacobs. He ran north and south, and east and west, and ran people over and held on to the ball and scored two touchdowns. He ran for 101 yards on 19 carries (averaging 5.3 yards per carry) and it was the first time since Week 14 last year. I could have done without whatever it was that he did in the end zone after his first touchdown, but I have accepted the fact that he still thinks he is as good as he was three and four years ago, and he is going to act like it.

If the Giants can get that kind of effort from Jacobs from here on out (and I don’t think they can but I hope they can), they will have two thirds of Earth, Wind and Fire for the stretch run and into the postseason. And the last time they had anything close to resembling that three-headed running monster they reached the postseason. (Yes, they lost in the first round, but after two straight years without the playoffs, I’m worried about getting to the playoffs first.)

On Friday, I said if we’re lucky we will get to relive this Game 7, do-or-die, must-win scenario again in Week 17. I will be ready for it.

Follow Neil on Twitter @NeilKeefe

Blogs • NFL

Feb 5, 2010

Can They Be Giant Killers Again?

There’s more than just a second Super Bowl in four years on the line for the Colts on Sunday.

This column was originally posted on WFAN.com on Feb. 5, 2010.

With the Giants’ last game being 33 days ago against the Vikings, and their last meaningful game being 46 days ago against the Redskins, every Giant not named Eli Manning will spend Super Bowl Sunday the same way as me: watching it on CBS.

Without a horse in the race, the decision is whether to back the Colts or Saints on Sunday. Considering the Saints’ role in the demise of the 2009 Giants, the decision is a rather easy one.

When the Giants were 5-0, winning games by an average of 16 points and suggesting that the Raiders leave the AFC West for the Pac-10, they were the class of the NFL. The G-Men were being recognized the same way they had been in 2008, before Plaxico Burress’ fateful night on the town. Flying high behind one of the game’s most potent offenses and arguably the league’s best defense, the Giants had become the favorite to represent the NFC on Super Sunday nearly a third of the way through the season. A trip to the Superdome changed that.

The undefeated, but also truly untested Giants arrived in New Orleans as three-point underdogs in Week 6. They left The Big Easy with their self-esteem destroyed, their first loss on the season and their status as an elite team in jeopardy.

Before the Bayou Blowout, the Saints were trying to finish the feel-good story they began writing during the 2006 season when their magic ran out in the NFC Championship. Even after a 4-0 start to begin the season, no one was giving the Saints the credit they deserved, but a bye week and chance to prepare for the Giants changed that.

It’s likely that the injuries and incompetent backups would have caught up with the G-Men eventually, but the Saints were the first team to realize the Giants defense was overrated. The Saints exposed the holes in the Giants defense, and their season began to quickly take on water. Had the Giants and Saints met later in the season, the Giants would have been three-point underdogs … in the first quarter.

Following the 21-point loss to the Saints, the Giants didn’t win again for five weeks and had a six-week period between wins. While losing streaks of that caliber might be acceptable in Cleveland, St. Louis and Oakland, they aren’t in the Tri-state area.

The blowout had a lasting effect on the Giants, as late-game meltdowns became a Sunday ritual. A franchise built around and remembered for its strong defensive units, the Giants allowed 24 points or more in eight of their remaining 10 games. They limped to the finish line with two of the worst losses in franchise history coming in Weeks 16 and 17.

Following the loss to the Saints, Tom Sheridan became a deer in headlights when the competition was no longer the Chiefs or Raiders. His job security became a weekly discussion, and his time with the Giants led to Osi Umenyiora – the supposed face of the Giants’ defensive future – contemplating retirement rather than ever being part of a debacle like the 2009 season again.

Super Bowl XLIV is just two days away and the Giants are already over a month into their offseason. The future of the defense is now in the hands of Perry Fewell, and seemingly for the first time since their win over the Patriots, Tom Coughlin haters have remembered the call-in line to The Fan. The Giants have had to watch the division rival Cowboys put their postseason problems to rest and the Jets emerge as the city’s top team for the time being. It can all be traced back to the bayou, back in Week 6.

The Saints are 60 minutes of football away from something much bigger than Mardi Gras. They are one win away from giving their feel-good story a fairytale ending and from pulling off the second Super Bowl upset in three years. They have made it hard not to join the Who Dat Nation for one day.

But should the lasting image of the 2009 NFL season be the visor-wearing Sean Payton embracing Jeremy Shockey? Is seeing New Orleans win its first Super Bowl enough to want Jeremy Shockey to win a Super Bowl? Is the Saints getting their Walt Disney-like win worth knowing that Jerry Reese’s trade of the disgruntled and disrespectful tight end worked out in New Orleans’ favor? No, no and no.

This Sunday should be about Peyton Manning joining an elite group of quarterbacks and adding to his case as the best to ever play the game. It should be about Bill Polian justifying the benching of his starters so we don’t have to hear about how it backfired all offseason. It should be about the Colts taking over for the Patriots as the team and face of the NFL.

Who dat say dey gonna beat dem Saints?

The Colts.

Tag: Tom Coughlin

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Part Of The Solution And Problem For Giants

Can They Be Giant Killers Again?