Mara: We can win with Eli
PHOENIX — John Mara believes Eli Manning still can win, wants the Giants to win in 2019 while building for the future, and doesn’t want to force a quarterback in the first round of April’s draft if the value isn’t there.
The Giants co-owner would like to get a quarterback if the club has conviction on a player, but there is a real possibility that GM Dave Gettleman could steer clear of a QB two years in a row with a top six draft pick. Seriously.
Manning is 38-years-old and the Giants have won eight of their last 33 games.
“Yes, I do (believe Manning still can win), if we surround him with the right people,” Mara said during a Sunday evening interview alongside co-owner Steve Tisch at the Arizona Biltmore. “I think we started to do that on the offensive line. We obviously need a number of additional pieces to do that. We have 12 picks in this draft, thankfully, so hopefully we’ll be able to do that. But yes I do believe we can win with him if we continue to surround him with the right people.”
Mara believes so strongly in Manning’s ability that he grew furious at the suggestion that only the co-owner’s sentimentality was keeping Manning’s Giants career alive.
“I’ve read that, and I have to tell you, that really gets under my skin because that is absolutely nonsense,” Mara said. “Do I feel a certain amount of sentimentality toward Eli? Of course, I do. Would I ever let that get in the way of making a football decision? Absolutely not! And I cannot believe that some of you write that.
“We’d never tell a coach or a general manager, ‘We got to keep this guy because we love him,’ and because he’s done so much for the franchise,” Mara added. “Make a football decision based on whether you think he can play or not. And if you think he can and you have a conviction and the coach has a conviction, that’s fine. I’m never going to interfere with that based on my sentiment toward a player.”
Mara confirmed, though, that the Giants are simultaneously trying to rebuild and win, an awkward and dangerous walk of the tightrope for a franchise that has missed the playoffs six of the last seven years.
“I understand what you guys see as a conflict: ‘are they rebuilding or are they trying to win now?’ You’re trying to do both,” Mara said. “You’re trying to build the team and still remain as competitive as possible. We obviously have a lot of holes to fill. We think we have the draft capital to at least start to address that. And whenever you’re building a team, you’ve got to have the right combination of veterans and young players.”
What the Giants do at quarterback, though, will continue to define this franchise’s direction. And Mara couched his desire for a quarterback with the need to pick the best players available.
“I think that would be a great scenario if it happened (if we drafted a QB to sit behind Manning), but I don’t want us to force a situation where if the value for the quarterbacks this year is not there, then don’t take one,” Mara said. “If it’s there, yeah, take one, it’d be a great situation to have somebody in place to sit behind Eli for some period of time, see how he prepares for each game, see what a professional he is. A young quarterback can only get better doing that.”
But Mara made clear that the evaluation process is far from complete on this year’s QB class.
“I would like to come out of this draft with a quarterback, but here’s the thing: show me what the grades are, what’s the value there,” Mara said. “If the top quarterbacks are graded toward the bottom of the first round or even the second round, I’m not gonna insist that we take one at No. 6 or even at No. 17. Show me what the value is.
“That’s always been our philosophy on that,” Mara added. “So the worst thing you can do is try to force the issue and then you end up with a quarterback that isn’t worth taking at the particular spot. So would we love to have a quarterback coming out of this draft? Yes, but only if we have a conviction about him.”
Mara and Tisch then were asked, if they don’t take a QB in 2019, if there is a chance Manning could be back in 2020. “We’ll take it one year at a time,” Mara said. “At this stage of his career, you take it one year at a time.
And Tisch added: “I think we’ve got to get through ‘19 first.”