Today is the final part of a 3 part series, asking for accountability and change within the Giants organization. The past 2 days, we discussed replacing Tom Coughlin and Jerry Reese. Part 3 centers around Ronnie Barnes, who heads medical services for the Giants.
Let me first put together some qualifiers. Just like with Mr. Reese and Mr. Coughlin, Mr. Barnes has served the Giants organization for many years. In fact, Barnes has been with the Giants for 38 years. That in and of itself should be lauded. All 3 men have done great things for this venerable franchise. We have tried to make sure that our criticism is as objective as possible. We do not challenge anyone’s efforts or best intentions. As a NY Giants blog, we represent the interests of the paying customer, the avid fan who ultimately pays for everyones’ salaries. The people who read this blog are lifelong fans. Speaking for myself, I have been watching Giants games longer than Mr. Barnes has been with the team, back to ~1969. So the sport and the team are in this readerships’ blood every bit as much as it is in Mr. Barnes.
Jim Collins: “Confront the brutal facts.”
Jack Welch: “Change before you have to.”
Jack Welch: “An organization’s ability to learn, and translate that learning into action rapidly, is the ultimate competitive advantage.”
Professional sports is a performance business. If you are not performing, you are not in business. We noticed that the Giants were having plenty of injuries. The issue was that it wasn’t just a one year occurrence. It had been happening year after year. It was the Fall of 2014. Instead of looking for excuses, this blog did what we always do. We went looking for the data. If you want to be objective, you have to look for data and let the data tell you what is happening.
Frequent visitors to this site can skip down to the “typical structure” paragraph. Newer visitors and those who want a quick review can get the updated summary here…
Football Outsiders reports annual data on Adjusted Games Lost (AGL) due to injury. They had annual articles on each year’s AGLs for all 32 teams. We went through the links and compiled the data for all 32 teams (1=best, 32=worst with most injuries).
YEAR NY Giants AGL Ranking
2009 19
2010 22
2011 25
2012 24
2013 32
2014 32
2015 30*
* 2015 data is sourced from ManGamesLost because Football Outsiders final results will not be available until after the season is finished.
This blog reached the conclusion that the Giants have a structural problem which is causing sustained above normal injury rates. In the past season and a half after making this conclusion, we set out on an odyssey to learn more about what the Giants were doing in their strength and conditioning program. We also read up on what others were doing and what they were saying. We conducted interviews with fitness and medical professionals about sports injuries. All of this work, along with INCREMENTAL DATA, supported the original conclusion- that the Giants have a structural problem which is causing excessive injuries greater than the NFL average. The research was aggregated in a single link, the NY Giants Injury Catalog.
At first, we believed that Strength and Conditioning Coach Jerry Palmieri and his boss Tom Coughlin were the ones who needed to be held accountable for this massive problem. It was not until a couple of months ago when both Victor Cruz’s and Will Beatty’s injury rehabs failed that we started looking beyond S&C into the medical side of the story. That was when we read a seminal piece on Ronnie Barnes from 2013. It changed everything. It even explained the lack of media coverage (more on that later).
Typical structure has OWNERSHIP> GENERAL MANAGER> ALL DEPARTMENTS. Medical services is part of the hierarchy. Note how only EX-Giants (no current Giants) spoke for the interview. It is absolutely stunning that Barnes has more power and authority than anyone in the organization except the owners themselves. In an article republished in 2015 that was originally published in 2005, Mike Lupica refers to Ronnie Barnes as a “Giant for life.” He wasn’t kidding.
At risk of stating the obvious, injuries matter in the NFL. One need only look at the Dallas Cowboys with and without Tony Romo this season to understand how important player health is to team success. Beason vs Unga? Cruz vs Randle? Newhouse vs Beatty? The list is seemingly endless. Hankins. Kennard. Donnell. Fells. Please stop me, I am going to be sick. Do not fall into the trap of some of the (lack of) correlation studies between winning and injuries. They are flawed because they do not hold so many other variables out of the analysis. A perfect example of this is how the Patriots this season are the most injured team, yet they are on their way to a bye. The amateur statistician would ergo conclude that you can overcome injuries, so quit complaining about it and accept your injuries. That is utter nonsense, and we as Giants fans can attest to direct competition with the Patriots in seeing how different the opponent was when Edelman broke his foot in Q1. The Patriots have been far less dominant seemingly ever since that moment. Adding the loss of Amendola, the Patriots were 8-0 with a 16 pt average margin of victory pre Edelman injury, and 4-3 with a 4 pt average margin of victory post Edelman. Injuries matter. They have consistently and persistently sapped Giants competitiveness.
At the heart of the issue for Mr. Barnes and Giants injuries is- When does accountability for results matter? You tell me the answer to that question and I will tell you how Mr. Barnes is going to be treated. If there is no accountability, then the Giants can wipe up the bottom of the NFL and compete with two arms tied behind their backs (ask JPP how one arm feels) as long as Barnes has a pulse. If there is accountability, then ownership must demand results. Up to now, ownership has been making inquiries but has accepted the unacceptable.
John Mara, when speaking to the media on December 30, 2014 at the end of the 2014 season, made this comment on the injury situation:
“I’m very frustrated about the number of injuries that we’ve had. We spent so much time last offseason addressing that and talking about how we are going to fix that… adjustments to what was being done in the weight room, and this GPS tracking system. For some reason we are here again leading the league in that category. We cut down on the number of soft tissue injuries and all of a sudden we get all of these broken bones and torn tendons and torn biceps. I just don’t have an answer for that right now, and obviously we will spend a lot of time this offseason talking about that and looking at ways we can improve on that.”
Let’s review what we have. (1) End of 2013 season, Giants finish dead last in injuries, 5th consecutive year in bottom half of the NFL, steadily worsening trend. The medical brain trust, which is completely and totally Barnes’ show, discusses how to fix it. (2) End of 2014 season, Giants finish dead last again in injuries, 6th consecutive year in bottom half of the NFL. The Giants medical brain trust, led by Ronnie Barnes, discusses how to fix the injuries. (3) End of 2015 season, once again the NY Giants are at virtually the bottom of the NFL once again. They are in 30th place and for all intent and purposes are essentially last again for the 3rd consecutive year in all but name. Despite all attempts to make internal changes, nothing the Giants have done has resulted in ANY improvement.
Our blog is not filled with medical and training expertise. Our expertise is in risk and data analysis. When we queried medical professionals outside the organization for a better understanding of best practices, the conclusion was simple: (1) much greater use of flexibility/range of motion training (2) less strength training (3) other publicly disclosed “changes” initiated by the Giants were not going to materially change results nearly as much as (1) and (2).
Let’s recount the Giants Barnes/Hanlon Medical PR campaign of changes referred to in (3) above:
(a) Sleep studies
(b) GPS tracking
(c) Diet
(d) Weight room adjustments
(e) Spa days
Frankly it is dubious to believe there are significantly positive “weight room adjustments” being made when 4 months after this press conference, Will Beatty tears his pectoral muscle on his second lift of weights. And Mara clearly misspoke when he referred to 2014 injuries not being soft tissue but then mentions torn biceps, which are soft tissue.
The Giants changes to address this injury problem are obviously a failure. They are not doing the two things our experts maintain is the only true way out- much greater flexibility/range of motion training and less strength training. This solution is boring and time consuming. It is not sexy or glamorous. It is the route to success, and everything we have read (from John Fox to John Elway to Luke Richesson to Walter Thurmond to a former First Round Draft pick) all indicate the Giants are not doing enough of this. (We highlighted the publicly disclosed training moves of the Denver Broncos numerous times over the past 2 seasons. In 2015, they are 3rd fewest in the NFL in injuries with fully 41% of the injuries of the Giants.)
So what about Mr. Barnes? Why is it necessary for him to be replaced? The 2013 article is clear in linking Barnes to all changes in a medical capacity. Since we continue to see no positive changes, Barnes needs to be replaced in order to start over and get someone new who can work independently without oversight from Barnes. Barnes is the Pope. Barnes runs the show, reporting directly to Mara. He is accountable only to Mara, so it is only Mara who can fire him. Given how entrenched Barnes’ power is, it is no surprise why the media doesn’t bother talking this up. Coughlin or Reese may ultimately be gone, but apparently Barnes will outlast all of them. The media has to protect their jobs and they realize Barnes is too tight with the owner to ever see the ax, so they aren’t going to tilt at that windmill. We queried one media member: “Everyone is focused on TC & JR status. What about status of favorite son Barnes (accountability for injuries/medical)?”
Don’t hold your breath on that one. #GiantsBeforeMinnyhttps://t.co/dyZdBN8mmy
— Jordan Raanan (@JordanRaanan) December 26, 2015
Summary: The Giants are aware of a persistent injury problem. They claim to be making changes, but the changes are ineffective. Barnes is the supreme authority on all medical matters for the Giants organization. The past 7 years have seen a steadily worsening trend, with an acute crisis which is perpetually derailing team competitiveness. Mara has asked for changes, but Barnes has not been able to correct the problem. In the best interest of the team, Barnes needs to step aside and let someone else come in to fix the problem. We are extremely doubtful this will occur because John Mara is too close to Barnes to take the necessary steps. Barnes needs to be held accountable for Giants injuries. If not now, when? How many seasons of mediocrity will Mara tolerate before he confronts the brutal facts and facilitates true change?
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