giant head coach declare his resignation
Four Super Bowl trophies are on display at the Giants’ East Rutherford, New Jersey headquarters, illustrating the team’s period of stability and patience over their five general manager changes since 1974. However, ten seasons have passed since their last championship and five since their previous postseason trip, and in their universe, that little window of time may as well be an epoch.
The Giants started a new transformation on Monday, the day after yet another disaster of a season came to a merciful end with a 22-7 home loss to Washington that lowered their record to 4-13. Dave Gettleman, the general manager of the Giants, announced his retirement, but that was just the beginning. They sacked Coach Joe Judge on Tuesday night following their second consecutive day of meetings. Judge oversaw six straight losses to end the season, all by a margin of at least 11 points. He is the third consecutive Giants coach to fail to survive more than two seasons.
Co-owner John Mara of the team released a statement following Judge’s resignation, saying, “I indicated before the season started that I wanted to feel good about the way we were headed when we played our last game of the season.” “We have decided to make this choice because, regrettably, I am unable to make that comment.”
Despite the Giants’ front office stability over the previous few decades, they have had difficulty finding a coach who has the longevity and success of Tom Coughlin, who left the position in January 2016 after 12 seasons. Ben McAdoo, who took his position, made it to the playoffs in his first season but was eliminated in the second. The team had its worst four-year run since 1975–78 under the subsequent two coaches, Pat Shurmur and Judge, both of whom Gettleman hired. Their records were 19–46.
Seeking beauty on a soggy, chilly Sunday afternoon in New Jersey during a meaningless Giants vs. Washington football game.
January 10, 2022
Before joining the Giants, Judge had no head coaching experience at all. He had worked for the New England Patriots as a wide receivers coach and special teams coordinator. Any trust that Judge had developed with the team’s supporters and management during their disastrous 6-10 N.F.C. East season evaporated in a whirlwind of personnel missteps, on-field incompetence, and news conference blindness.
A week after Judge defended his play for eleven minutes after the Giants lost to Chicago 29-3, saying that he had heard from several former players that they wished they were still on the team, the Giants only managed 177 yards against the Washington Redskins. In a show of surrender or indifference, they then called back-to-back quarterback sneaks on second-and-11 and third-and-9 from inside their own 5-yard line.
Judge remarked following the event, “Obviously, the fans deserve better than what we delivered them this year.” “We should have done better as a team this year than we did.”
The Giants are one of three clubs looking for a coach and general manager this off-season, along with Minnesota and Chicago.
At the close of the 2017 season, Gettleman, 70, a longtime Giants executive who helped form the 2015 N.F.C. champion Carolina Panthers, took over a team that included a head coach vacancy, a leaky offensive line and quarterback instability. He departs from the team with a head coaching vacancy, a poor offensive line, and quarterback instability. The Jets, who also finished 4-13 but have a young quarterback in Zach Wilson and strong leadership from Coach Robert Saleh and General Manager Joe Douglas, are in better shape than the Giants for the first time in a long time.
Since Gettleman’s first draft in 2018, the Giants have gradually and somewhat predictably fallen apart. With the second overall pick, he chose Saquon Barkley over a quarterback or even the highly skilled guard Quenton Nelson, who was selected by the Colts, despite the diminished value of running backs.
Due to injuries and the Giants’ subpar run blocking, Barkley was only able to carry for 627 yards and two scores over the course of the previous two seasons, missing 18 games.
Following the 2019 campaign, Mara expressed his optimism that Gettleman would serve as general manager for a long time, adding that the owners believed he could put together a “fantastic” club. No, he didn’t.
Gettleman gave offensive lineman Nate Solder ($62 million) and receivers Golden Tate ($37.5 million) and Kenny Golladay ($72 million) large contracts in free agency that ultimately backfired. After giving wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. a massive contract extension that made him the best paid receiver in the league, he traded him to Cleveland in exchange for three underperforming players: Oshane Ximines, Dexter Lawrence, and Jabrill Peppers.
Additionally, Gettleman selected Daniel Jones with the sixth overall choice in the 2019 draft. Despite facing a weak offensive line, Jones has not collapsed or shown any clear signs of being the team’s long-term quarterback.
Gettleman did make some smart decisions, like selecting receiver Kadarius Toney and left tackle Andrew Thomas in the 2020 NFL Draft, signing cornerback James Bradberry prior to the season, and trading back in the April draft last year—his first as general manager—to acquire another first-round pick in the 2022 draft.
The two first-round picks, at Nos. 5 and 7, now impart to an unnamed Giants executive the same mission given to Gettleman four years prior: bring back to respectability a declining organisation, the team that once featured George Young, Ernie Accorsi, and Jerry Reese.
