NFL seasons sometimes are fleeting. One year you have a good season, go to the playoffs and think you are a Super Bowl contender. Everything is looking up correct, or so you think. The next year it just falls apart. Nothing goes right and instead of being in the playoffs, you are just waiting for the season to mercifully come to an end.
The New York Giants 2017 campaign was nothing short of a disaster that everyone just wants to move on from. This team went from 11-5, making the playoffs for the first time in four seasons to hitting rock bottom, double-digit loses, and will end up with the second pick in the 2018 Draft.
A Season To Forget
The New York Giants 2017 season was awful. They fired Head Coach Ben McAdoo 12 games into the season which is the first time the New York Giants have fired a Head Coach during a season since they fired Bill Arnsparger in 1976.
McAdoo’s 28 regular season game tenure is the fewest games coached by a Giants football coach since 1930. Ben McAdoo finished with a 13-15 career record. Regarded as a risky hire, this coach proved the job was too much for him. McAdoo was an offensive guy but the offense did nothing but struggle. The Giants offense scored 21 points or less 19 out of the 28 games he coached.
The team was also not very competitive, suffering eight losses of 10 points or more. Plenty of questions remain about this team. Who will be the Head Coach (it’s being reported that Vikings OC Pat Shurmur will be hired as soon as this week)? What players will remain on the team? What will this team do in the draft?
We will look at two aspects of this organization, the hiring of Dave Gettleman as the team’s General Manager and what do you do with Giant’s Cornerback Eli Apple.
Remaking The New York Football Giants
The firing of Giant’s former General Manager Jerry Reese came as no surprise. Reese’s first five seasons were great, going 49-31 and winning two Super Bowl trophies, however, in his last six seasons he went 41-54 and his drafting history was awful.
Being the General Manager since 2007, he drafted six Pro Bowl players but only had four players from his draft classes sign a second contract with the team. Enter David Gettleman, who is not a stranger to the Giants’ organization.
Gettleman spent 15 seasons in the Giants organization as a Pro Personnel Director. Gettleman also has 12 years’ experience as a scout for the Buffalo Bills, Denver Broncos, and the New York Giants. I like this hire because unlike Reese, Gettleman is a great team builder and good draft evaluator. Gettleman comes to the Giants from the Carolina Panthers were he compiled a 40-23-1 record, the Panthers won three division titles and made a Super Bowl run. Gettlemen drafted players Star Lotulelei, Kawann Short, Kelvin Benjamin, Shaq Thompson and Christian McCaffrey. He signed free agents Ted Ginn Jr., Roman Harper, and Captain Munnerlyn.
Gettleman’s style is to draft well and bring in free agents for discount prices. He will have to make a decision with the number two pick in this year’s draft, either to take a franchise quarterback, another star role player, or trade back and potentially take an offensive lineman.
Gentleman needs to rebuild the offensive line and also find a reliable running game for whoever plays quarterback.
Another issue on this team (among many) is Giant’s Cornerback Eli Apple. Apple, the 10th pick in the 2016 NFL Draft out of Ohio State has had a decent two years. He has tallied up 100 tackles, 15 pass deflections, and an interception. However, he is turning into a bad apple in the locker room, pardon my pun.
Safety Landon Collins called his teammate a cancer. It makes you take notice when a teammate says that. Coming into the 2016 draft, scouts questioned Apple’s maturity. He has said some derogatory comments to the media and was suspended for the last game of the season. This guy is extremely talented and has shown flashes of being a good player, however, if these issues continue the Giants will have no choice but to move him.
Decisions have to be made if the Giants want to be back among the elite franchises again. This a proud franchise, four Super Bowl championships, 32 playoff appearances and 16 division titles. This organization must get on the same page to get back on track. If they do not, they will be the East Coast version of the Cleveland Browns.