Are the New York Giants the Most Overlooked Team in the NFL?
Every year from 2011 to 2015, the New York Giants won between six and nine games. Then they suddenly won 11 in 2016 and just three in 2017. The 2016 team made the playoffs and was ranked eighth in the NFL in Defense-adjusted Value Over Average (DVOA) at Football Outsiders, while the 2017 team posted the second-worst record in the NFL and had the worst DVOA in the NFC.
Which of those seasons was an anomaly? If 2016 was a fluke and the Giants are in a downward spiral as quarterback Eli Manning ages, we'd be right not to consider them contenders in 2018. But if 2017 was merely a speed bump for a team that finally found a groove one year prior, we might want to take them seriously.
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I'm here to urge you to consider the latter.
The Giants aren't getting a lot of love this offseason, and it's easy to figure out why. They're coming off a last-place finish in their division; their new head coach, Pat Shurmer, is a rather conventional retread who still smells a bit like the Cleveland Browns team he went 9-23 with from 2011 to 2012; they're sticking with the same old quarterback for a 15th consecutive year; and their division-rival Philadelphia Eagles are the toast of the football world after winning their first-ever Super Bowl in February.
Whether or not you believe the Giants erred by not using their No. 2 overall pick on a potential quarterback of the future, it would be hard to argue that the team didn't vastly improve in both free agency and the draft. But that doesn't seem enough to convince many that they're primed to bounce back and compete for a playoff spot after a highly embarrassing 13-loss campaign.
Even after moving up four spots in Elliot Harrison of NFL.com's latest power rankings, they still rank in the bottom 10. The Score ranked them 22nd. USA Today's Nate Davis and Bleacher Report's Chris Simms were kinder 17th and 14th, respectively), but even in those they remain in the middle of the pack. According to OddsShark, oddsmakers have the set the over/under on their win total at 7.5 games.
A nasty-looking schedule could have played a role in that determination, but even that is a trap considering the year-to-year fluctuations in team performance. Every year, teams turn from bad to good and vice versa. Regardless of the Giants' schedule, they're a strong candidate to go from good in 2016 to bad in 2017 to good again in 2018 for the following reasons.
OBJ is back
Missing one of the top offensive weapons in the NFL for practically the entire year was a big reason why the Giants won just three games last season. But Odell Beckham Jr. is almost totally recovered from a broken ankle—he's been on the field taking part in individual drills during organized team activities, according to ESPN.com's Jordan Raanan—and it finally looks as though he isn't going anywhere.
Beckham was the subject of trade buzz for much of March and April, but now it appears we can take that 2017 Giants team and add a 25-year-old superstar who caught 90-plus passes for 1,300-plus yards and 10-plus touchdowns in three consecutive Pro Bowl seasons to start his career.
And he's joined by several key additions
It's possible the Giants will eventually regret not drafting a quarterback second overall, but No. 2 overall pick Saquon Barkley has a much better chance to make a major immediate impact than any other offensive player in this year's draft. After tearing it up during his last two years at Penn State, Barkley is listed as an overwhelming favorite to win Offensive Rookie of the Year on OddsShark.
That has to excite Giants fans. Their team averaged just 3.9 yards per carry overall last year and hasn't had a Pro Bowl running back since Tiki Barber in 2006.
Manning and Beckham should benefit greatly from a more balanced attack with Barkley in the backfield.
The addition of free-agent left tackle Nate Solder brings some much needed big-game experience and reliability to an offensive line that hasn't gotten the job done in recent years, too. The 30-year-old Solder spent the last seven years protecting Tom Brady's blindside in New England, and the Patriots made the Super Bowl in each of his last three relatively healthy seasons.
Throw in the high-ceiling second-round rookie guard Will Hernandez and free-agent addition Patrick Omameh (who was a solid starter at left guard in Jacksonville), and the Giants line might actually be an asset rather than a liability in 2018. They lost interior offensive linemen Justin Pugh and Weston Richburg in free agency, but both lacked consistency and had issues staying on the field anyway.
The defense is so much better than what we saw in 2017
The Giants' offensive shortcomings left a talented defense in a lot of bad spots last season. It's not as though they turned it over a lot (ranking in the middle of the pack with 22), but they finished last in the NFC with an average drive length of just two minutes and 22 seconds.
Star defenders Damon Harrison, Olivier Vernon and Landon Collins were still superb, and rookie Dalvin Tomlinson also shined up front, but the task was often too tall for a defense that was on the field more often than any other unit in the conference.
That group has just too much talent to again surrender 24.3 points per game. It gave up just 15.3 during the final 10 games of last season but never appeared to be firing on all cylinders. It didn't help that 2016 Pro Bowl cornerback Janoris Jenkins and 2016 first-round corner Eli Apple were both hit by team-mandated suspensions (Jenkins for showing up late after the bye week, Apple for conduct detrimental to the team). And both were called out by teammates, with Collins going so far as to refer to Apple as "a cancer" on ESPN Radio.
You'd have to think a new coaching staff will help bring a fresh feel to that locker room, which should help the Giants to live up to their talent on defense. For what it's worth, new general manager Dave Gettleman has already told the New York Post's Steve Serby that Apple has "a clean slate," while Jenkins is confident those issues are in the past.
"I promise y'all that Jackrabbit (his nickname) says it won't happen this year, what happened last year," he told reporters last week. "There won't be any animosity between players, no disrespecting the coach. There will be none of that. New York Giant football is back."
The law of averages could be on their side
Injury rates typically vary from year to year, which could be good news for a Giants team that had to deal without Beckham, Jenkins, Vernon, Sterling Shepard and a multitude of starting offensive linemen for extended stretches last season.
In adjusted games lost—a formula Football Outsiders utilizes to quantify the impact that injuries have on each team—the Giants were the least healthy team in football in 2015, the seventh-healthiest team in 2016 and then the eighth-least-healthy in 2017.
Thus, the law of averages would mean the Giants have better injury luck in 2018.
What about Eli?
The Giants could get strong seasons from all of their stars and promising youngsters Evan Engram, Tomlinson, Apple and Shepard could continue to improve, but if Manning doesn't deliver, it probably won't matter.
He posted his second-lowest quarterback rating in the last 10 years in 2017, so the 37-year-old has to prove that a lack of help led to such a poor season. With his best supporting cast in years, it is time for Manning to prove he can hold off Father Time.
But he doesn't have to look far for inspiration. Brady won MVP last season at the age of 40, while Drew Brees made the Pro Bowl with a league-high 72.0 percent completion rate and a yards-per-attempt average of 8.1 at the age of 38.
Manning made the Pro Bowl the last time the Giants averaged more than 100 rushing yards per game (2015) and the last time they averaged more than 4.0 yards per carry (2012), and the running game should be even better this year than it was in each of those seasons. What's more, 2012 was also the last time Manning had a Pro Bowl offensive lineman (guard Chris Snee), and while that's no guarantee this year, Solder is the closest thing Manning's had to a Pro Bowl-caliber offensive lineman since he was last at his best.
With Beckham, Barkley and Solder, Manning might not have to be as good as Brady or Brees in order for the Giants to succeed.
If he isn't running on fumes and those around him can stay healthy, they could make a run in a division that is always wide open and hasn't had a repeat champion since 2004.
There are several teams that struggled in 2017 but could emerge in 2018, but you get the feeling there are higher expectations for a lot of those franchises. The Houston Texans are getting a lot of buzz with Deshaun Watson and J.J. Watt coming back; the Indianapolis Colts, Denver Broncos and Oakland Raiders wouldn't be surprising contenders if their quarterbacks can come through; and nobody is looking past the high-momentum San Francisco 49ers.
But the Giants? Tough division, tough conference, tough schedule and completely overshadowed by the world-champion Eagles and the always-popular Dallas Cowboys. They just might be the league's most overlooked franchise.
Brad Gagnon has covered the NFL for Bleacher Report since 2012.
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