PLEASE TAKE NOTE, JOHN!
Dear Mr. Mara: Fix this Giant mess once & for all
Dear John: What a mess, huh? You helped create it and you are the only one who can fix it. Steve Tisch is a great guy, but his passion is making movies in Hollywood. He’s won an Oscar for Forrest Gump and a couple of Super Bowl rings when Eli beat Belichick and Brady and that’s all I’ve got to say about that. Ben McAdoo and Jerry Reese must go. But you surely know this by now. The antiReese/McAdoo sentiment is so high that you risk alienating so many members of Big Blue Nation if you bring either back. Ben’s in over his head and Jerry brought back the same five offensive line starters. You must decide on a new direction. It’s a good thing you guys are playing far away in Oakland on Sunday rather in MetLife Stadium. I’ve seen it get ugly around here and right now Big Blue Nation needs a week to calm down after McAdoo’s clumsy attempt at dismantling Eli’s legacy.
If you couldn’t be there Monday or Tuesday to sit with Eli and make sure McAdoo delivered the right message after a franchise-altering decision, then Eli’s status change could have waited another day or another week. Not surprisingly, McAdoo screwed it up with a Little League plan. This has become a train wreck. You have been entrusted by your father Wellington as the caretaker of the Giants, a New York treasure. You have won two Super Bowls since your father passed away in 2005. But this season has been horrific. The brand has been damaged. The negative vibe started when you signed off on the return of Josh Brown after he had been arrested for domestic violence in 2015. Then after a good season, he was given a two-year contract with a raise despite the Giants knowing he tried to barge into his ex-wife’s hotel room at the Pro Bowl.
The Giants have always been a family. Once A Giant, Always A Giant.
Treat them well, treat them with respect. What about Eli?
The emotional support of Manning, particularly from former teammates and fans, has been overwhelming and accentuates the Giants dysfunction.
I know your plan was for Eli to continue to start and at the appropriate time in the game play Geno Smith and Davis Webb. Of course, Eli would keep playing if victory was within reach. Otherwise, put the young guys in. Made sense. You do need to find out if either Smith or much more likely Webb can be the future in order to decide whether to invest the top three draft pick on Sam Darnold or Josh Rosen. Instead, McAdoo told Eli he would start the first half and Smith would start the second half in Oakland. Of course, Eli rejected it, deciding to take his ball and go home.
Even so, McAdoo should have told him, “Eli, you’re still my guy. This season sucks. You will start and if you’re struggling or we are behind, I’m going to evaluate the other guys. It may even help you physically next year because the offensive line can’t protect you. Don’t take it personally. You’re going to be 37 in a few weeks and as much as we want you to play a few more years, we have to protect ourselves for the future and protect you now.”
You even acknowledged bedside manner is not Ben’s strength. You owed it to Eli to be there. I think you regret that now. This is not just a quarterback change. This is a franchise shift. This is Eli Manning. He and Phil Simms are the greatest quarterbacks in Giants history
and Eli was disrespected and demoted by a coach who probably won’t be here after Jan. 1.
Also, how can you miscalculate what the fan reaction would be? Even in tough times, you know the fans will always love Eli for the two rings. Do you really want to hear the ESPN folks this week calling the Giants a “clown show?”
The Giants fans are passionate and loyal. They always have been. But now they can express their disgust daily on social media or by calling talk radio. Back in the day, fans could only vent on Sundays. And boy, did they ever. Remember 1978, two weeks after The Fumble, when some creative and disgruntled fans brought a toilet bowl to the Giants Stadium parking lot, made a campfire and tossed their tickets into a burning commode? That was fun.
Then the next week when a plane did a flyover with a banner, “15 Yrs of Lousy Football. We’ve Had Enough” during a game against the Cardinals?
Who can forget when fans hung Wellington in effigy from the upper deck? You haven’t. That was nasty.
I know you don’t want any toilets, airplanes or anything hanging from the upper deck for the next game at MetLife against the Cowboys. You still have all three home division games. So far, just a few “Big Blue Shame On You” billboards in North Jersey. That’s pretty tame. It could get worse.
Those were leans years from 1964-80. No playoffs, not one, in 17 seasons. A lot has changed. The Giants have been to five Super Bowls, winning four, and things looked to be on the upswing after missing the playoffs four straight years following the last title in 2011. Ben, your rookie coach, and Reese, energized by all the salary cap space and your checkbook, spent $200 million to fix the defense, covering up for Jerry’s ghastly draft mistakes. They pieced together an 11-5 season.
By the way, is Jerry in the witness protection program or something? He is the most unaccountable sports executive in the country. He speaks to the media, the conduit to Big Blue Nation, only once during the season. George Young and Ernie Accorsi were available every day. Always returned phone calls. I don’t even bother calling Reese anymore. Either he doesn’t call back or he has public relations call to say he’s not talking.
Okay, so what to do now that the team is 2-9 on the way to 2-14?
You may want to fire McAdoo next week if/when the Giants lose to the Raiders. Even your grandfather Tim, the founder of the franchise and bookmaker, would place a few dollars on Derek Carr over Geno this weekend.
I wrote one of these letters to Odell Beckham Jr., right before he reported to training camp in July and six months after he called “road trip,” and decided to celebrate spring break in Miami, even if it was January and the Giants had a playoff game in seven days. I implored him to grow up. Lot of good that did, right? He was soon celebrating a touchdown in Philly by lifting up his right leg in the end zone and making believe he was peeing like a dog. Classy. Ben wasn’t even pissed off. I think he said he needed to look at the tape before commenting. It was up to you to publicly and privately reprimand Beckham.
I know the Giants crave stability but Reese and McAdoo have dragged the program down. Reese did help put together two Super Bowl titles but that didn’t protect Tom Coughlin or Manning forever. Why should Reese be able to hide? McAdoo seemed like a good idea at the time but he needs to go back to Aaron Rodgers. And Manning needs to reunite with Coughlin in Jacksonville or go win a Super Bowl in Denver like his big brother.
It’s time for you to start over. It worked for your father in 1979 when he hired Young, who hired Ray Perkins who hired Bill Parcells who won two titles. Young handed off to Accorsi, who traded for Eli, and then passed the baton to Reese, who won two titles. Change is hard. Change is good. What a mess. See you in the Black Hole. Gary Myers