JANORIS FANS GIANT FLAMES
Jenkins blows off concerns of Big Blue backers
Janoris Jenkins doesn’t care if Giants fans think he didn’t give a full effort last Sunday. “They question one game? Question the other 36,” Jenkins said Thursday after practice, making up a random number (he’s played 22 regular season games for the Giants and 82 in his NFL career). “Question the other 36 games. Out of 1? Question the other 36 games. Hey, it be like that. Sometimes you ain’t gonna have the best game. Everybody know that. One of out 36 games? I don’t care what they say.”
John Mara and Steve Tisch care what the fans say, though, and if the fans don’t show up Sunday at MetLife Stadium with the Kansas City Chiefs in town, it will mean something and it will be motivated in part by effort — or the lack of effort that Jenkins, for one, showed last Sunday against the 49ers.
But what’s astounding is that all indications are Ben McAdoo and Steve Spagnuolo intend to start Jenkins on Sunday anyway, despite him being the picture of quit in Santa Clara.
And McAdoo cannot do that. He and Spagnuolo already failed by not pulling Jenkins at halftime on Sunday. Now, if McAdoo doesn’t discipline Jenkins with playing time, he will be undercutting the message of accountability that he tried to convey in Wednesday morning’s “brutally honest” film session that laid bare unacceptable player efforts.
There are a lot of Giants playing their hardest, despite the results. They deserve to play over someone who isn’t giving 100 percent. A coach who believes otherwise deserves to lose his team.
Jenkins jokingly conducted Thursday’s interview in front of the lockers of safety Nat Berhe and corner Donte Deayon, with Berhe and Deayon both sitting behind him. Deayon is fighting for a career and was inactive last Sunday with an ankle injury, and Berhe is so far in the doghouse, he wouldn’t play regular defensive snaps if he had incriminating pictures of the entire coaching staff. And yet there Jenkins was, still in the spotlight. It’s not right. Spagnuolo actually tried to sell that Jenkins’ bad play was related to “more technique than anything.” And Jenkins echoed that excuse.
“I went out, it’s football, played it to the best of my ability. It wasn’t like a lack of effort. I just think it was a lack of techniques,” Jenkins said.
Technique? If it was technique then it was The Business Decision Technique.
And if it’s just technique, why on Wednesday did McAdoo show his full team clips of their “lack of desire to finish,” as he calls it, no doubt a reel rife with Jenkins misplays? Was it a “brutally honest” meeting about improving technique?
No, it most certainly was not. Spagnuolo can go take that charade somewhere else.
“OK, Janoris and I talked,” Spagnuolo said Thursday of his meeting with Jenkins. “He obviously agrees he didn’t have his best game, and he realizes that. We had a good talk, really good. He wants to do that. He’s ready to go. I love that guy. He’s all in. He gives everything he’s got. He missed a few tackles. It was more technique than anything, we thought, and we’re looking at it, and I’m sure he’ll be better this week.”
Sorry. No. Jenkins was in the running for team MVP last season and on Sunday did not just play badly; he barely played.
And his insistence that fans watch the rest of film works against him, because the fact that he played so well and so aggressively with swagger and effectiveness last season, his disinterest Sunday stood out that much more.
Also, if it’s technique, that reflects poorly on Spagnuolo, no? That his veteran corner doesn’t know how to tackle?
“No, I think it was a lack of techniques,” Jenkins argued, giving the same answer Spagnuolo had provided minutes earlier. “Like the one when (Niners tight end Garrett Celek) broke the long one, I was really thinking to try to strip the ball. But it turned out the other way around. And the one where the running back (Carlos Hyde) stuck me out, I think my feet got caught up … and I just reached with my left arm.”
Spagnuolo then stunningly asserted that other than those two plays, “I don’t know what other plays you might be talking about. I have a problem with missing tackles but I don’t have a problem with his effort.”
Let’s help the defensive coordinator out.
How about that third-and-5 from the Niners’ 43 in the fourth quarter, with the Giants in man-to-man coverage, when Jenkins didn’t even try to slip underneath with receiver Louis Murphy, who caught the ball easily for eight yards and a first down, before Calvin Munson brought him down? You can see Landon Collins, who was supposed to cover the inside receiver running upfield above the route, turn to Jenkins after the play, wondering what in the world happened.
How about the third and 6 in the third, from the Giants’ 27-yard line, when Kendrick Bourne caught an 8-yard pass for a first on a similar play, with Jenkins in a middle ground of nowhere and Darian Thompson finally stepping up?
How about that FOX analyst Daryl Johnston said Jenkins had “turned away contact” on the non-tackle attempt on Hyde that Spagnuolo attributed to Jenkins getting his feet in front of his hips, costing him balance? Jenkins also didn’t dive on a second-quarter 49ers fumble that linebacker Curtis Grant pounced upon.
Jenkins, who had incurred a Week 9 suspension from McAdoo for skipping an Oct. 30 practice, did offer surprising support of McAdoo when asked if he were motivated to play for his coach’s job.
“Oh man, we with coach,” Jenkins said. “We’re gonna stick with him. Whatever decisions they make, we’re gonna go out each and every day and week and work and prepare and focus.”
Jenkins also was accountable about not playing well, even though he didn’t admit to not trying.
“It’s always tough,” Jenkins said of seeing clips of his bad plays in front of the whole team, “but as a pro you gotta own up to it, you gotta man up to it.”
Still, tough? How do you think it feels to be Jenkins’ teammates dying for playing time, and watching this?