Back in 2016 it was Ben McAdoo holding the reins and in 2018 Pat Shurmur came to town-now it’s two years on and previously unknown Pats Special Teams coach Joe Judge wowed 69 (don’t even start) year-old Dave Gettleman and 65 year-old John Mara.

Mara & Gettleman: “Wow, you actually brought black licorice? None of the kids these days like that stuff but it suits us just fine. I like the stripe of your jib, young fella!”

Judge: [smiles to himself after realizing he’s got the job in the bag]

The New Coach: I really don’t know anything about him but he’s going around preaching ‘teaching’ and ‘accountability’. Apparently Giants players are running laps after making mental miscues. Something that Saquon hasn’t seen, “since Middle School”. So here we are, he’s an authoritarian ‘my way or the highway’ guy-no wonder he impressed the oldies in charge of hiring. And this is the thing that bugs the hell out of me-the Giants org is conservative from the top down. This team certainly will not see an innovative offensive coordinator or try to stick it out with a game-changing ‘problem child’. There’s talk that Judge is interested in ‘hybrid’ players (those can play multiple positions) to better disguise looks on D. We shall see. I should add that Jason Garrett wandered over from the Cowboys and will be running the O. Many have guffawed but his regular season teams were just fine and capable. As for his failures in the playoffs, well, his new team won’t be sniffing that anytime soon.

The New QB: Is Daniel Jones legit? It’s difficult to say for sure but I think he was thrown into an impossible situation and came out alive. All his practicing came against a Giants D that I’ve spent considerable amount of time whining about how slow they are at each level. So I think that the speed of the game coupled with a very lousy O-line (I think PFF ranked them 30th?) that allowed pressure constantly added up to him being overwhelmed at times. The good? His arm strength was better than advertised, he’s mobile, which opens up the playbook, he’s fearless and he’s a hard worker. The bad? The fumbles of course, a receiving corps that has no depth if there is an injury (and there will be an injury), a lack of pocket awareness and this whole Covid thing fucking with his learning curve.

The Draft: Most talkers and typers gave the draft an ‘A’. Certainly OT Thomas and DB McKinney will start and I’ll bet that 4th rounder CB Darnay Holmes will win the slot corner job at some point-even though he only played outside in college. A curious thing that Gettleman did was draft linebackers with 4 of his last 5 picks. This is how he does things-if there’s an obvious weakness he just throws players (draft picks and UDFA’s) at the spot and hopes for the best. He did the same with the secondary last year and there was no cream rising to the top, let me tell you what. If he had faith in his ability to pick talent wouldn’t he spread the love around? PLUS he signed two more lbs in free agency by the names of Kyler Fackrell and Blake Martinez. And there are at least six holdovers from last year, three of which are likely starters. Gah.

The Outlook: Slow steady progress? Maybe? Of course you won’t see any evidence out of the gate because they face the Steelers, Bears, 9ers, Rams, Cowboys, Football Team, Eagles and Bucs to start. I see two winnable games there. Now overall they’re supposed to have the 7th easiest sked so perhaps in the second half they’ll be pitted against some Division II schools that need a nice payday. How many wins? Vegas has them at 5.5/6 last time I checked and I’d pick 5 I guess.

I guess I should say, “5 if there’s a full season”. I guess everyone is waiting for the first cluster to fuck but teams have been in their facilities for a few weeks now and there hasn’t been any alarm bells that have rung, so-and it pains me to say this-“Well done so far, NFL!” I said it earlier and still feel that if there’s a significant event across multiple teams the league will shut down for a few weeks, fiddle about with stricter protocols and hop right back onto the money train. Someone, somewhere might even yell “YEE HAW!” while doing so.