[ad_1]
It was a group that called itself the Committee Against Mara Insensitivity that, more than 43 years ago, sent a small plane over Giants Stadium three weeks after The Fumble with the infamous “15 years of lousy football … we’ve had enough” banner.
It is just five years of lousy football now, except it feels like 15. … Or 10 lousy years with no playoff win … two head coaches fired after two years, and now a third with a 4-12 record who has been forced to sell that you are what your foundation and culture says you are.
So Joe Judge brings a maddening and extenuating set of circumstances that have conspired against him to the Giants sideline in the season finale Sunday at MetLife Stadium against Washington. He also brings a 10-22 career record, and Jake Fromm back again as his quarterback, and though the natives can’t possibly be as restless as they were on that lousy, ugly day on Dec. 10, 1978, they are a good bet to honor his invitation to boo his ass out of the stadium if the Giants stink up the joint for a sixth straight time.
Until further review, the odds still favor ownership staying the course with him. “It’s up to us to show a little more patience with this coach than perhaps we have over the last few years because he is a first-time head coach,” John Mara said on the day Judge was introduced.
It is never good business, of course, to decide the fate of your head coach on the three last hours of a season … even when desperate times call for desperate measures from desperate owners.
Yet as ill-advised as it is for the ownership of any professional team to bend to the whim of public opinion, their mettle would understandably be tested by the sight of disenchanted, disgruntled Giants fans — the ones not disguised as empty seats — who just might decide to follow the lead of Jaguars fans planning a clown-costume revolt down in Jacksonville.
Even if this ain’t some clown-show organization.
Their mettle could also be tested by loud, angry chants of “Joe must go” should he decide to punt on fourth-and-2 at the Ron Rivera 48 in any given quarter … should somebody be flagged for offsides on a failed field goal … or this … or that.
The Woody Johnson Jets did fire Eric Mangini following a loss to Chad Pennington and the Dolphins in the 2008 regular-season home finale that decided the AFC East. The New York Times reported: “Two sources in the organization, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said that as of Sunday morning, the Jets planned to retain Mangini.”
So Judgment Day can come at you faster than Lawrence Taylor used to turn the corner.
Judge will be staying as long as Mara and Steve Tisch yearn for the day when the Giants were a bastion of stability and continuity, enough to override any degree to which they may have wavered on whether he is the right coach.
As long as they are content identifying a blue-chip general manager with personnel chops who at least shares a philosophy and vision with Judge for 2022, though not necessarily beyond.
And as long as Judge agrees to make sweeping changes on his offensive staff and details a plan to take Daniel Jones — barring some unforeseen play for Russell Wilson — to the next level. Because ownership decided to retain Tom Coughlin following the 2006 season only after it liked what he had to say about helping Eli Manning become a franchise quarterback.
No one knows better than Mara that the likes of George Young don’t grow on trees. And neither do the likes of Coughlin or Bill Parcells.
In a perfect NFL world, of course, ownership would be blown away by a prospective GM the way it was by Judge when he interviewed, and then would clean house because the prospective GM insists on hiring his own head coach. But the Giants haven’t been living in any perfect world.
The big difference between Judge’s second season and Ben McAdoo’s — aside from McAdoo’s ill-fated Manning benching for Geno Smith — is that Judge hasn’t lost the locker room. He did lose Jones after Nov. 28, and the defense all but spent the rest of the season pleading with Mike Glennon and Fromm to “just hold ’em.” Though no one was confusing the Giants with The Greatest Show on Turf while Jones was attempting to stay in one piece behind that offensive line and locate Kenny Golladay, even before Judge fired offensive coordinator Jason Garrett.
Judge would have been better served saving his passionate, defiant 11-minute rant behind closed doors to ownership if for no other reason than it resulted in unneeded collateral damage landing at the feet of Rivera and Pat Shurmur. He didn’t do himself any favors there.
And Judge saying that the hardest thing to change is how people think conveniently overlooks the evidence that the hardest thing for him to change is how people play.
A year ago at this time, Mara was convinced he had found the CEO and leader he had been missing since the end of the Coughlin Era. At this point, he probably wouldn’t mind Golladay and Saquon Barkley swinging 7 irons at each other on the sideline if it meant the Giants were back in the playoffs.
For Giants fans, the highlights of another lost season were the Manning and Michael Strahan jersey-retirement ceremonies. Followed by, ahem, a free medium Pepsi for season-ticket holders.
No one wants to hear about the injuries, everyone has them. Dave Gettleman, whose four-year reign as GM will end on Sunday, got a mulligan following the 2019 season after spending the 2018 season fighting cancer. If Judge gets his mulligan, he will need better players and coaches, and an illuminating blueprint for his Dark Ages offense.
If, as expected, Judge gets his mulligan, he himself will need to be better, especially on game days. Because Judgment Day can come at you faster than the “Goodbye Allie” chants that rang out once the late Allie Sherman stopped winning.
[ad_2]