Defying the Odds... and Logic... and the Natural Order

There's an old saying that goes, "The cream always rises to the top." The theory being that over time, through agitation and tribulation, the best will set itself apart, be distilled by adversity, and ascend above all others. That although counted out or overlooked, in the end greatness will emerge and prevail. Picture the exact opposite and you have the 2007-08 Giants.

Whether through smoke and mirrors or the evil machinations of some meddlesome deity, the New York Giants have somehow stumbled their way into the Super Bowl. Don't ask me how or why: that a team so rarely tested in the regular season and that failed to beat even the most remotely competitive opponent, that came up short against each and every winning team it faced, and then barely survived battles against the league's weakest sisters, is now playing for a championship.

This blog is named "Sports Crank", and let me tell you, the crank is turned up 100% today. Not only has my otherwise unremarkable Monday morning been ruined, but for the next two weeks I'm going to have to shield myself from the unrelenting, unavoidable, mind-numbing hype machine that is the run up to the Super Bowl for a New York team. (Okay, for a Giants team, since the Jets haven't been to a Super Bowl since before it was the Super Bowl.) It's enough to make you want to move out of state. Or at the very least, curl up into a ball and hibernate until President's Day.

In the interest of full disclosure, let me state that I hate those f***ing bastards in blue. The asshole coach. The soulless rube QB. The miscreant tight end. The defensive line, the running backs, the wide receivers, the linebackers, the trainers, the locker room attendants, the announcers, those ugly uniforms and especially those obnoxious, delusional, fairyland-dwelling fans who kept thinking this team was a contender in spite of all the obvious reasons to believe otherwise.

I'm not going to go into why the Cowboys, a superior team, played like some Juco squad all afternoon (and still should have won the game), or how the Packers managed to squander not only a devastating home field advantage but any good will Brett Favre had earned in his latest farewell tour. (If I may digress: Brett, hang it up. You'll never have a better situation than you had on Sunday yet you played like it was 2006 again when everyone was begging for you to retire. It's that time again.) But seriously, who was calling those plays yesterday? Did anyone see Rich Kotite on the Green Bay sidelines? Is this all some awful conspiracy to cause me misery?

Were it not for the fact that my beloved Patriots are playing, too, I'd simply avoid the Super Bowl altogether. Perhaps if nothing else, the Giants' immortalization at the losing end of NFL history will ultimately ease the pain. Then again, nothing about this post-season has made sense yet. Remind me not to hold my breath.

Getting Fat on Turkeys

The Giants have made a case for being the worst team ever to reach 9-4. They've beaten no one this season -- in fact, every win they have has come against a losing team. In stark contrast, as of today only three teams on the Giants' schedule (they played the Cowboys twice) have winning records. They account for all four Giants losses. Is anyone surprised?

Sure, you can only play the teams on your schedule, and this season the NFC happens to be littered with awful clubs. But the Giants catch a break by not having Tampa or Seattle on their slate -- the only other NFC teams with winning records to whom the Giants haven't lost. And they also lucked out in the NFL's annual round-robin by drawing the AFC Least, er, East, where the hapless Jets and hopeless Dolphins provided little resistance. Of course, dates with the Bills and Patriots -- the last two teams on the Giants' schedule with winning records -- still await.

So if form holds, and there's no reason why it shouldn't, the Giants will beat the Redskins but lose to Buffalo and New England. At that point, the Giants will have the distinction of being the worst NFL team ever to finish 10-6... only to suffer another swift and demeaning first-round playoff exit. The only suspense will be if another playoff appearance -- however brief -- is enough for Tom Coughlin to keep his job.

Eli's Biggest Fan

Well, after me, anyway, no one has been harder on Eli Manning than SI’s Peter King. Mr. King didn’t waste any time piling on Eli in this week’s MMQB:

a. This is not the negative New York media speaking. This is the impartial New Jersey media speaking. The more I see Eli Manning, the more I think he'll never be a championship quarterback.

b. I mean, taking a 26-yard sack in the fourth quarter? Ridiculous. And could he please get mad once? Punch the ground, kick the dog, cuss out his linemen, something. You know what the Minnesota game plan for playing Manning was in part? Hit him a couple of times on his first few dropbacks, and the book on him was he'd start throwing off his back foot. Which he did.

Okay, aside from the fact that this is what I’ve been saying for years pretty much verbatim, it’s also absolutely true. Eli is just one of those QB’s who’s good enough to play in the NFL (sorry, Dave Brown) but not good enough to take his team anywhere. Just too many mistakes waiting to be made; too many bad throws waiting to happen. And that Vikings “game plan” ties in exactly to the SI player’s poll that ranked Easy Eli as the 2^nd-most easily intimidated QB in the league. I half expected him to wet his pants at some point.

Unfortunately, there really isn’t anything that the Giants can do. Unlike Dave Brown, who didn’t belong in the NFL, and to a lesser extent, Kerry Collins, whose negatives ultimately outweighed his positives, Eli doesn’t merit an out-and-out ejection. He’s good enough to play in the NFL, but if you look at the current QB landscape in the league, that’s not exactly a ringing endorsement.

I think the lack of consistency we’ve seen from Eli – good game, average game, awful game – is how it’s going to be with him. After 50 games, it’s time to stop talking about development and improvement. For that matter, there hasn’t been any. They showed a stat during last week’s Giants-Lions game comparing Eli’s first 9 games in 2006 vs. 2007: they were virtually identical. And that was before yesterday’s debacle.

You look at almost any starting QB and three years should give you an accurate picture of what you get. Guys like Roethlisberger, Palmer, Peyton, Brady, etc. have what it takes and showed it early on, if not from the start. On the flip side, guys like Carr, Couch, Akili Smith, etc. made it clear before too long that they weren’t up to NFL standards. From what we’ve seen, Eli falls in between these two groups. However, I don’t see him in the Trent Dilfer / Brad Johnson category of guys who also fall between those groups but ultimately won championships despite their shortcomings. Eli just makes too many mistakes and is too easily intimidated to lead his team where it needs to go, even if he had a great running game and defense as compliments.

The silver lining is that Eli's continued struggles will likely spell the end of General Coughlin's reign of error in the Meadowlands. Not so great, though, is the fact that at least one more coach is going to have to suffer the Eli Experiment before he’s through (or at least through with the Giants)…

Just what DOES it take to get fired around here?

Tom Coughlin shouldn't be the coach of the New York Giants. He was a bad hire and has lived up (down?) to my meager expectations for him since. Last year, the Giants collapsed before our eyes and nearly faded away. Somehow they squeaked into the playoffs but the Coughlin-watch lived on. Again, against all logic, the Giants decided to bring back the Colonel for another go-round. Which brings us to the 2007 season.

The Giants have been arguably one of the worst teams in football. Their 0-2 record is certainly emblematic, but their non-existent, sieve-like defense has actually been football's worst. (Coughlin's personal hire to fix the defense, former Eagles coach Steve Spagnuolo, looks like a great move so far.) The offense -- sparkling in Week 1, sputtering in Week 2 -- faces a stern test in Washington this Sunday.

Let's say, for argument's sake, the Giants turn in another miserable performance. Just what does is take to get fired around here? If the Giants go 0-3, it's a safe assumption that they're not making the playoffs, even in the mediocre NFC. The coach, who was nearly fired last year, will take on instant lame duck status. Coughlin won't be coming back -- you know new GM Jerry Reese wants to put his own man in charge -- so why waste time as the life drains from the team for the next 13 weeks? Let Kevin Gilbride run the club (he can't be any worse than Coughlin... okay, he can, but that's not the point) while the Giants conduct a season-long audition of coaches around the NFL and NCAA.

How many times have we seen the Giants drag their feet, delaying the inevitable coaching change until all the best prospects have been scooped up by others? (That's exactly how they ended up with Coughlin in the first place.) Let's be proactive, for once. Being the coach of the New York Giants should be a marquee job in the NFL. Coaches should want to coach there, not turn their noses up in disdain. Show 'em the Giants mean business, that winning actually matters.

Bottom line this Sunday? Go 'Skins...