1) Late yesterday, I was in the car and a caller asked Francesa’s wide ranging opinion of the Giants on a number of fronts.
Francesa noted who he felt were the top 3 Giants on the roster. This was not a question about potential or future. The question was: who are three best players NOW? Pls comment and pick your 3. Obviously I know who my three are, but I do not want to influence the debate (even if I could, lol!) in any way. I am sure you all have your opinions.
2) After that, who amongst those three has the status and commands the respect to be the leader of either unit, dare I say unquestioned leader of the team? Share that answer too.
3) It’s sports, so I can be allowed to take a tangent for a moment. A rare perk as a blogger. Last night my daughter got the Coaches Award for Cross Country Track.
4) Okay, back to the Giants, I am at the Awards Dinner and bump into another rabid Giants fan who is apoplectic about how the season has gone. This guy wants both Gilbride and Sheridan gone. When the subject of Sheridan came up, he said what did it for him was the San Diego game- “Rivers is going into these 3 step drops and we have all of these blitzes coming in from the ends with zero chance of getting there in time. Adjustments? Make some adjustments.” Separately, the lack of push up the middle this year makes a 3 step drop less of an issue.
I went back to watch the SD game to look at the Giants a little more carefully. Made it through the first half of the game. A few things jumped out:
- Jacobs is so slow, he goes wide and the LBer is tracking him for his cut into one hole, nope, now a second hole around end, same LBer trips him up for a nice loss. TOO PASSIVE. RUN THE LBer OVER. Not your 2007 or 2008 Jacobs. This had less to do with the blocking of the OL, which is at fault on other plays, mind you. But Jacobs is not finishing.
- Simms (referring to the 3 losses making them 5-3): “They played against 3 blitzing/pressure teams, and you’ve got to make them pay.” Helloooo Gilbride.
- A really successful Gilbride play! On 3rd and 10 Eli has nothing downfield and checks down to a delayed crossing route by the TE, who is wide open. As we have mentioned in previous posts, teams like the Patriots have won Super Bowls with little sh*t dumpoffs to Faulk that move the chains on 3rd down conversions. Yes, Bradshaw is banged up (and we’re not implying you use him at this moment in time), but a scatback guy like that can get you a first down, sustain a drive, control the ball, GIVE YOUR OFFENSE MUCH NEEDED RHYTHM, cure what ails you. After watching them convert with this checkdown, it convinces me more than ever that the personnel on offense is way more than ample to play against any defense in the league.
- When you watch the Giants blitzes, they are not disguised. All the QB does is give a false snap in cadence and he sees and lets his OL see who is coming. When was the last time you saw the Giants show blitz, even THROUGH the snap and then pull back into coverage? You have to have different coverages out of the same look. If some blogger with NFL Rewind using an antiquated internet video player in his spare time can get tendencies… do you think that teams who do this for a living are figuring SOMETHING out? I want to see the Giants back away from their blitz look as often OR MORE often than when they show it. Instead, it is anecdotally near 100% that when the Giants are showing blitz they bring blitz. These are the things that add up and cost you.
Anyone who has the time, subscribe to this NFL Rewind package. It is not great but it is dirt cheap, no ads in the rewind, the stop and go sucks, but it is powerful to be able to view the last two seasons (’08, ’09) of EVERY GAME of EVERY TEAM for $25.00. If we had one guy every week that took turns and broke down the film for this blog, we would ALL BENEFIT. Are YOU in? (For the rest of the season, we need 5 people to do this, everyone can take 1 game and that person can give us a report.)
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