G-Men 'very hungry 'for a Super season
S OME teams talk Super Bowl-or-Bust and it is little more than lip service. The Giants mean it, and they didn’t need to see Odell Beckham Jr. on the field at OTAs with Brandon Marshall, Sterling Shepard and No. 1 pick tight end Evan Engram either. The season can’t come soon enough for them.
“I think we all realize the amount of talent we have on this team. There’s no excuse for us not to go all the way,” second-year free safety Andrew Adams told The Post. “This team’s very hungry, and very eager to kick off the season.” General manager Jerry Reese fortified the defense for the 2016 season and turned his attention to the offense for the 2017 season. Eli Manning’s championship window is now. How hungry is this team? “Very, very, very hungry,” defensive captain Jonathan Casillas said. “Very hungry. And I say that because we have that sour taste in our mouth from those boys in the Midwest [Green Bay].” There is only one way for the Giants to wash that taste out of their mouths. There is only one goal in East Rutherford. “That’s the goal every year,” Casillas said. But it’s like a realistic goal and attainable goal now for the 2017 Giants. Casillas wouldn’t even let me finish the sentence. “It’s like Super Bowl-orbust, that’s what you were about to say?” Casillas said, and laughed. “I think the standard’s been that. Such great tradition here. Four [wins in] Super Bowls, if I’m not mis- taken, in the history of the New York Giants.”
Here he somehow resisted mentioning the Jets.
“And it ain’t like it’s been like ... 50 years ago,” Casillas said. “It’s happened from ’86 on. So since I’ve been alive, we have four.”
Only the Patriots, with five, have won more Super Bowls in that time.
Manning should be a 36-yearold kid in a candy store with more nuclear weapons than he has ever had in his arsenal. The offense was too predictable last season. Ben McAdoo has the luxury of playing mad scientist. Engram can be a faster Jeremy Shockey down the seam.
“He’s definitely going to be a weapon for us,” Adams said. “He’s making plays left and right out here during OTAs, so I expect big things out of him.”
Marshall is another towering new target for Manning.
“Definitely another huge weapon,” Adams said. “We can just throw the ball up and he’ll go get it. He’s also a great route-runner so third down, he could possibly be a target, possession receiver. He brings a lot of things to the table. Having Odell out there, Shep, Brandon Marshall, Engram ... it’s gonna light up scoreboards.”
The threat of an explosive passing game should open up the embattled running game with a better-conditioned Ereck Flowers at left tackle and a progressing Paul Perkins in the backfield providing hope.
“It’s about time for everything to start clicking,” Shane Vereen said.
The defense, with rising star safety Landon Collins, has its sights set on greatness. Defensive tackle Jonathan Hankins is the only key starter who will not return.
“Coach [Steve Spagnuolo] always harps on going from good to great,” Adams said. “We want to be No. 1, and that’s what we’re working toward every day.”
For Casillas, it is easy to spot the hunger, from young and old alike.
“Just a sense of purpose,” he said. “Guys like myself and DRC [Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie], Keenan Robinson, studying like it’s our first year here and trying to learn and be better than we were the day before. I see that every day with everybody here.”
It’s a good time to be a New York Giant, isn’t it?
“Definitely, definitely, it’s a great time to be a New York Giant,” Adams told The Post. “Big things are comin’ this year.”