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Dave Gettleman made a promise to Giants fans at his introductory press conference he has yet to keep, “We’ve got to fix the O-line, let’s be honest,” Gettleman said. “Let’s not kid each other. I told you at the top, big men allow you to compete and that’s what we’ve got to fix.” Don’t just …
Dave Gettleman made a promise to Giants fans at his introductory press conference he has yet to keep,
“We’ve got to fix the O-line, let’s be honest,” Gettleman said. “Let’s not kid each other. I told you at the top, big men allow you to compete and that’s what we’ve got to fix.”
Don’t just tell us, Dave.
Show us.
Because it’s still not fixed.
The fourth pick of next Thursday night’s virtual NFL draft — or a trade not too far down, as Gettleman will “seriously entertain” engaging a partner below him (if he can find one) for the first time in his career — would go a long way toward fixing it.
Go ahead and finally do it if you can Dave, do your darndest to trade down and get the player you very well may have drafted at No. 4 anyway and recoup the third-round pick at last that you burned in the Leonard Williams trade with the Jets.
It is past time to stop wasting the best years of Saquon Barkley’s career, and it is time to give Daniel Jones more of a fighting chance than Eli Manning had at the end so he can make that second-year leap.
“You know my feeling,” Gettleman said on a conference call. “It’s very, very difficult for Saquon to run the ball if he doesn’t have holes and it’s going to be difficult for Daniel to throw the ball when he’s on his back.”
Unless Gettleman grades the freakish Isaiah Simmons the way he graded Barkley in 2018, or close to how the late, great George Young graded Lawrence Taylor, or unless there is a precipitous drop-off from Simmons’ grade to his top-graded tackle, he should make the pick that sends Jones and Barkley to Hog Heaven. Or as Gettleman might put it, Hog Mollie Heaven.
If Joe Judge won’t even mention the name of his franchise quarterback, he sure as hell won’t mention any names on that defense he has inherited. Simmons would be the playmaker who keeps offensive coordinators awake all night that is sorely missing on Big Blue. But a fortress offensive line can at the very least help keep a flailing defense off the field.
“Joe and I are of the same mentality,” Gettleman said, “that really and truly the offensive line sets a tone for the team. It really does. I think of all the teams that I’ve been with that have gone to Super Bowls, and the offensive lines were the tone-setters. You think of the offensive line in ’07 and ’11 when we beat the Patriots, OK? Those groups set the tone.
“We’re going to do everything we can go make sure we replicate that.”
Nate Solder is on his last legs. Cameron Fleming should be a swing tackle. Center is unsettled, and Shaun O’Hara isn’t coming out of retirement. Gettleman keeps saying he likes versatile lineman Nick Gates … who has started three games.
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It doesn’t mean you reach for a tackle. Gettleman knows from John Mara putting him on notice that he cannot afford to make an Ereck Flowers mistake. Former GM Jerry Reese made Flowers the ninth-overall pick in 2015. Tom Coughlin referred to Flowers as an aircraft carrier. The aircraft carrier sank.
Gettleman has to pick the right tackle. To play right tackle. Or left tackle.
“Is it a pressure point? To a degree. I’m not going to deny that,” Gettleman said. “But it’s about getting the right guys. It’s about not panicking.”
Panicking would be drafting a tackle for the sake of drafting a tackle and passing on the wondrous, shape-shifting Simmons.
“It’s when you have precipitous drops in your evaluation,” Gettleman said, “that’s when you get into trouble.”
The consensus around the league is there are four tackles — Jedrick Wills, Tristan Wirfs, Mekhi Becton and Andrew Thomas — in the upper tier. If Gettleman chooses to wait until his 36th pick to grab a tackle, he cannot afford a precipitous drop in the value of that second-round tackle.
“There are tackles throughout the draft,” he said. “There’s a lot of talent there.”
There was a lot of talent at Alabama, where Judge cut his teeth under Nick Saban as assistant special teams coach from 2009-11, where Wills started and from where Judge plucked Burton Burns to coach Barkley.
“Joe hired Burton to coach the running backs and he’s been at Alabama, so just think about all of the insight we get into the ’Bama kids,” Gettleman said.
Keep that promise, Dave. Roll Tide or not.
