Mac says he will let ’em play
BEN McAdoo channeled his inner Herm Edwards Wednesday, saying he will play to win the game on Sunday even though the contest against Washington means nothing.
His reasoning had nothing to do with momentum. It wasn’t about staving off rust. It was, basically, just because.
“We’re going to play our players and go win the ball game,” Ben McAdoo said. “That’s what we do for a living. We only have 53 players on our roster. It’s tough to go through a game if you rest your starters. We think we have 53 starters. Everyone plays a role on the team and you go in, you have an opportunity to play this week, we have to win the game this week.”
The Giants are the No. 5 seed win, lose or tie on Sunday and will play a road playoff game the following weekend. But, based on McAdoo’s word, Big Blue won’t be taking the opportunity to rest some of its stars for the contest a week later that actually matters.
However, the Giants head coach did leave the door open to sitting Eli Manning at some point Sunday. After McAdoo said his team would play to win, he was asked if Manning would play the whole game.
“Eli’s going to play the game, yes,” McAdoo said.
But what about the whole game?
“Eli’s going to play the ball game, yes,” the coach responded.
So McAdoo’s dodging could mean Manning comes out at some point on Sunday. But there are plenty of other players who are perhaps banged up but still healthy enough to play if needed to. Crucial players like Janoris Jenkins, who missed last week with a back injury, might benefit from a week off. Jenkins’ status is up in the air, but McAdoo said he won’t err on the side of caution just because of the lack of playoff consequences.
“This is pro football. We get paid to coach and paid to play,” McAdoo said. “That’s what we do; it’s what we do for a living. Another game on the schedule, it’s a division game, it’s an important game.”
While the age-old debate over whether teams should start or rest their stars in a meaningless regular season game has never quite been settled, McAdoo’s logic appears to ignore the bigger picture. He gave a flat-out “no” when asked if his team needed to win to create momentum heading into the playoffs after last week’s loss to the Eagles.
But McAdoo’s job and the Giants’ job is not to win Week 17 against Washington. It’s to win the Super Bowl. And it seems short-sighted, at least publicly, to not weigh the effect of playing full throttle against Washington. There is this, though: The players like it. “We are putting the pedal to the metal,” Landon Collins said. “We are playing it like a playoff game, treating it like a playoff game and coming out and firing on all cylinders. That is our mindset and we are trying to get the W.”