Loading ...The New York Giants have long been heralded as a class organization. Although there have been a few hiccups here and there, Big Blue generally does a commendable job in keeping its players out of trouble with both the law and the NFL itself.
However, today, the league has come down hard on starters David Baas and Kevin Boothe for physically engaging Tampa Bay Buccaneers defenders after their controversial actions during Eli Manning's kneel down on the final play of the contest. Furthermore, safety Kenny Phillips was fined $30,000 for his crushing blow to Bucs receiver Vincent Jackson.
Both Baas and Boothe were fined $7,875 for striking their opposition in the head and neck areas. On the film, both can be seen engaging Buccaneers defenders in a scrum that carried over to the traditional head coaches hand shake immediately after the game. Surprisingly, Giants head coach Tom Coughlin was not pleased with Greg Schiano's decision to knock down Eli Manning in the final play.
Kenny Phillips' fine stems from a vicious hit he put on Bucs wideout Vincent Jackson. Jackson broke loose of coverage and was in the process of catching a 12-15 yard pass from quarterback Josh Freeman when he was blindsided by Phillips over the middle of the field. There was no penalty called on the play, and the energy gained from the hit propelled the Giants to improve their defensive play for the rest of the game.
In both situations, the Giants had no choice but to put themselves in jeopardy of Roger Goodell imposing stiff penalties. Obviously, the Giants had to retaliate after the Bucs went after Eli Manning on the final play of the game. Not only was the play dangerous, but it put the health of the team's franchise player in question. Big Blue had no choice but to make it known the it will not tolerate cheap shots to it's premier athletes.
With that, Kenny Phillips' hit was a turning point in the game. The Giants looked lethargic until Phillips' devastating hit on the Bucs premier offensive weapon finally injected some life into the defense. It might be fair to say that without that hit, the Giants would have gone to Carolina with an 0-2 record last night.
As unfortunate as it is that the players must take money out of their own pockets to pay for things they would probably do over again if given the chance, the NFL's crusade on player safety has made this a weekly occurrence. The Giants have avoided stiff fined for the most part so far. However, Roger Goodell's policy is so subjective that it doesn't allow players to know what is legal and what isn't until they receive a letter in the mail from the league office. In short, getting fined is just part of the game now, and players are just going to have to deal with it.
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Nothing to be mad about really, these guys make a ton of money, there wasnt any penalties called on the field and all the fines goes to charity.
Yeah you knew the KP one was coming.
Not going to argue if it was an illegal hit.
Another poster mentioned it, I believe Dirt, that had the uniforms been switched, and Barron put that same exact hit on Nicks, every Giants fan would be correctly screaming for a flag.
I have no problem with the fines but think it’s ridiculous that Mason Foster paid less for his hit to the helmet that concussed Hixon than KP did for what was a borderline perfect hit.
In the end, happily pay the fines guys and the team should make it up to you in your next contract. Those are all plays no one should want you to take back.
Just wanted to make one final comment on the discussion regarding some of our upcoming roster decisions.
Jerry Reese doesn’t bat 1.000, no G.M. does, but at the end of the day he gets a lot more right than he gets wrong. And what I admire most, is that he has a disciplined philosophy in terms of building a team, one in which he sticks to.
Being a Mets fan makes me appreciate this even more. There’s nothing worse than an ownership/front office that changes philosophies every 3 years. Or just has no idea what they’re doing.
As my brother said this morning, being a Giants fan more than makes up for the misery of being a Mets fan.
Great Post, couldnt agree more. I’ll even take it one step further..Being a Giants fan more than makes up for the Misery of being a Met AND a Knick fan..
Is ff55 ghost writing football articles for Yahoo! now?
http://tinyurl.com/9ujyqxg
Great article.
Some observations about a couple of favourite gripes around here. Gilbride seems to have improved the speed of his communication with Eli this off-season and we haven’t seen near as many, if any delay of game penalties thus far. Gilbride also seems to be working the draw play into the offence much better and it hasn’t been near as obvious when he is going to use it so we have seen much better production out of it than past seasons.
Not too happy to point these things out because I haven’t been a huge fan of Gilbrides in the past, but if he can change and keep up the sort of offensive domination we have seen the last two games then maybe I can also change my opinion of him.
It’s more than the last 2 games, man. For the last few years we have had a high flying offense capable of scoring in bunches.
Nate – If KG needs to dominate like he did last night in order for you to give him credit then you need to readjust your expectations. Today’s NFL just doesn’t allow for consistent domination. Isn’t gonna happen.
Oh yeah we have definitely been awesome offensively for the last couple of years and you may be right about me needing to adjust my expectations, but I think we have the capability of playing the house down like the last two games every week no matter who we play. And the point that I was trying to make is that in the past I have found Gilbride guilty of holding the offence back with the slowness and timing of some of his play calls. I think he has held us back at times as much as any defence has and it is good to see, for me anyway, that he may well be doing better at these things.
The other area that I am pleasantly surprised to see is our special teams. They have gone from a complete liability, to an area of strength.
Our kickoff coverage has been outstanding! kicker, punter, coverage teams all very good after 3 games. It also feels like Randle is ready to pop one.
Yikes – I’m the only one posting on a Friday night. I’m gonna go out and try to find a life. Later gents
I think a big part of Reese’s “disciplined philosophy,” referenced by Nosh, is nothing more than good old fashioned patience.
Clearly, he’s done a great job of assembling a team of top notch scouts. And those scouts have, in turn, done a great job of unearthing a lot of top notch talent, often in some of the most unlikely places.
But that’s just a starting point. Acquiring the talent has to be accompanied by an understanding that players all have widely varying timetables for maximizing it. Sometimes it happens right away. And sometimes it can take as long as 2-3 years.
Last night after the game, I referred back to the 2009 draft. That draft had come to be widely reviled by Giants fans as a disaster: Hakeem Nicks in the first followed by a gaggle of stiffs and injury prone busts. Many had taken to calling it the one ugly blemish on Reese’s otherwise stellar draft record.
Then, lo and behold, over the past two games we witnessed the unexpected return of William Beatty, the surprise emergence of Ramses Barden and Andre Brown. In the span of two short weeks, a draft that looked like a huge missed opportunity suddenly looks to have yielded five starters – including one of the best WRs in football and that rarest of commodities, a a legit franchise LT. In other words, a home run.
Of course, 2009 was hardly unique. As fans we tend to get annoyed when players don’t immediately live up to the high hopes we had for them on draft day. Already, grumblings of discontent can be heard linked with names such as Prince, Jernigan, Austin, Brewer, and Wilson. But it’s all good. We fans are largely focused on the present and tend to become impatient with those players who can’t help us win in the here and now.
GMs don’t have that luxury. To some degree or another, they have to allow players a longer gestation time than that favored by the typical fan.
Some GMs are better at doing this than others. The history of the NFL is rife with examples of players who were prematurely released by their original team and went on to flourish elsewhere. Every GM does not have the patience to wait on players who don’t develop as quickly as originally hoped.
Fortunately, that’s not a problem for Reese. Much of it has to do with his trust in the scouting staff he’s built and his trust in the coaching staff to develop them. And while it doesn’t make the process any less frustrating for us fans, I’m sure all of us are glad to have a GM who is far more patient than we are.
LUZZ,
I’m married, so I will post away!
All this talk all day about how to resign all these guys and where’s the money gonna come from.
Can’t believe there wasn’t one suggestion that the money could come in the form of a restructured contract for Eli.
You telling me this guy, who’s had to watch his brother get all the pub his whole life and as a result just competes, won’t look at his meal tickets to another ring(s) and Canton just walk away.
“But he didn’t care about [insert name here] leaving!”
A) [Insert name here] is/was no Cruz or Nicks.
B) In all years before 2012, there was no discussion of Canton. Now there is.
C) Next year will be 2013, his 10th in the league. He will look again to his brother and realize, if he’s on the same schedule, has 5 years left to accumulate as many years as Peyton had before missing an entire year with a bad neck. And he sees all those wobblers Peyton is throwing. He knows his window is closing.
D) He’s a dork. But unlike other dorks, he has more money than he knows what to do with. And now he’s dabbling in a lot more endorsements. Which will keep piling up as his legend grows. He doesn’t need the money (but, as he’s no fool, he’ll take it if they’re giving it to him).
Eli ensures Cruz and Nicks go nowhere.
+1
3 rings guaranteed Hall of Fame
4 immortality
I’m not all sure about this so perhaps someone more knowledgeable on these matters can help to clarify it all. But my understanding is there is only so much restructuring allowed under the CBA.
Again, I’m not sure how it works but I think there are pretty strict limits to the amount of money that teams are permitted to move around. If Eli is open to the idea of restructuring, my hunch is that it would not generate nearly enough savings to pay for the kind of deals that Nicks and Cruz will command.
If I’m incorrect about this, I hope someone who knows more about cap/CBA issues will set the record straight.
I should have been more direct. Eli would accept a pay cut.