Gettleman will take charge of Big Blue’s draft
Dave Gettleman will be handling the Giants’ draft in April himself after firing VP player of operations Marc Ross on Saturday, the Daily News has learned. Ross had been managing the Giants’ drafts since 2008 as Jerry Reese’s right-hand man. But Gettleman will run the draft himself, which includes making the No. 2 pick this spring.
Gettleman also intends to make no other changes to the Giants’ front office structure, The News has learned, other than his firing of Ross. As expected, that keeps assistant GM Kevin Abrams — the team’s primary negotiator of player contracts — in house.
Abrams has served as interim GM since Reese’s firing Dec. 4. He conceivably could be groomed by Gettleman long-term to be his successor, but that’s far on the backburner for a Giants team needing significant overhaul.
Personnel is Gettleman’s greatest strength. He served as the Giants’ pro personnel director for three trips to the Super Bowl in 2000, 2007 and 2011, with Super Bowl wins in the final two. Gettleman, in fact, has contributed to seven different teams that went to the Super Bowl, including three winners.
Gettleman served as a scout for the Buffalo Bills’ 1990 and 1991 teams and for the Denver
Broncos’ 1997 Super Bowl winner, as well as the three Giants teams and the Carolina Panthers’ trip to the championship in 2015. Gettleman served as Carolina’s GM from 2013-16 and was named Sporting News’ NFL Executive of the Year in 2015 after the Panthers finished an NFL-best 15-1 and went to Super Bowl 50.
Cam Newton and Luke Kuechly already were Panthers when he took over but Gettleman continued building a deep and talented roster that featured a fierce defense, with names such as DTs Star Lotulelei and Kawann Short, DE Kony Ealy (now on Jets), linebacker A.J. Klein (now on Saints), WR Kelvin Benjamin (now on Bills), LB Shaq Thompson, WR Devin Funchess and this year RB Christian McCaffrey and WR Curtis Samuel, among others.
FLOWERS WILTS
Giants left tackle Ereck Flowers said Sunday post-game that a report saying Flowers had refused to play in the Giants’ season finale, leading to his deactivation, was “false.”
“I wish I was out there. I wanted to play but I didn’t play, and that’s the end of it,” Flowers, 23, said as one of the first players to leave the locker room. “Yeah (it’s frustrating). I mean, wouldn’t it be for anybody?”
Interim head coach Steve Spagnuolo claimed Flowers had been deactivated because of “a groin” injury “all year long,” but Flowers made no mention of an injury preventing him from suiting up.
The Giants released Bobby Hart, the team’s Week 1 starting right tackle, reportedly for refusing to play. ESPN reported Flowers had joined Hart in checking out for Week 17. Some spin circulated that Hart had been the bad influence on Flowers, which seemed like a way of rationalizing keeping Flowers in the building.
Flowers is a former Giants first-round pick, of course, so that’s why the team released Hart but not Flowers.
Undrafted rookie Chad Wheeler made his first start at his natural left tackle position in place of Flowers and fared impressively to conclude a promising first season for a player who only saw spot opportunities.
“Wherever they need me I’ll play with 100 percent effort,” Wheeler said after helping the Giants run for a season-high 260 yards. “That’s the position I’m most experienced at, but I worked hard in the offseason so I could be able to play wherever they need me to … (The win) was a good building block. Some people had a chance to prove themselves.”
GATHERING MOSS
Giants defensive end Avery Moss said his hip kept him inactive a second straight week, though he wasn’t listed on the Giants’ final injury report coming into the game. Moss, 23, a fifth-round pick out of Youngstown State, saw his playing time gradually decrease to zero with Spagnuolo’s promotion to interim head coach.
Defensive end Romeo Okwara, 22, at least was made active for the first time since spraining his right knee in Week 5 and going on injured reserve after Week 6. Okwara was designated for return from IR prior to Week 16 but was inactive last weekend in Arizona.
Joining Moss and the injured Evan Engram (ribs) on the inactive list were QB Geno Smith, WR Sterling Shepard (neck), linebacker Akeem Ayers, and offensive linemen Damien Mama and Flowers.