Luck o’ the Big Blue

REALLY??? You have got to be kidding me! The Giants are getting the second half of this season handed to them on a silver platter. First, they’ve got three home games after a bye week. That is very unusual for an NFL schedule. That’s a solid month of home cooking. On its own, that alone would be considered fortunate. But it doesn’t stop there. The Raiders who were looking somewhat like a professional football team are coming apart and now look ripe for the picking. The icing on the cake, however, has to be the injury to Aaron Rogers. Granted, Big Blue has had success against the Packers in years past, no one wants

to see Green Bay come to town. Especially when you’re a team that needs wins.
I’m planning on being a bitter Jets fan in a few months when this season comes to a close. For the past few weeks I have been saying that I expect both of New York’s teams to finish 7-9. I’ve also stated that 7-9 could win the NFC East. I was ok with that. But now I’m starting to think the Jets could finish 8-8 or possibly…maybe…9-7. If the Jets finish the season with a better record than Big Blue and miss the playoffs while the G-Men raise a Division Championship trophy, I will be pissed.
It is astonishing how much falls into Big Blue’s lap. The one time they start 0-6, their whole division is stinking up the league right there with them. Certainly, this season is far from over. The Giants have to show up. They have to want it. They have to believe in themselves. But at the end of the day, the stars have aligned themselves in the Giants favor. It ain’t over till it’s over, but you get the sense that the red carpet leading to the playoffs is being rolled out at Metlife Giants Stadium. Now the Giants have to take advantage of a very fortuitous opportunity.

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Not for nothing, the Jets are also 2 games out of first in their division. The Jets have twice as many wins as the G-Men and if the playoffs were tomorrow, the Jets would be going as a Wildcard. But you’d think it was the other way around if you were to talk to a lot of fans. Big Blue won its second game in a row yesterday and playoff talk is already starting. It’s not even a whisper at this point. It’s really a matter of perspective. Despite one of the worst starts in franchise history, the NFC

East has been so weak that the Giants were never really out of it. No one else in the division was winning either.
There’s a Big Blue twinkle in Tom Coughlin’s eye. It’s starting to feel like Christmas Eve 2011 when they surprised the Jets and rolled on to the Super Bowl. Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying a 2-6 team is going anywhere but the golf course, I’m just saying they believe in themselves once again. Back in 2011, they were pretty much done, but beating the Jets woke up their locker room and they went on to surprise everyone but their own fans. They are a very long way from that, but it’s not impossible. Highly improbable, but not impossible.
The good news and the bad news is that the Giants are now on their bye week. I think they’d be better off keeping their momentum with another game, but they’ve got a week to recoup from a rough start. It will do more good than harm, but they probably wished it was out of the way sooner. More good news for the Giants is that after the bye, they’ve got three home games in a row. That’s pretty lucky for any team – not having to be on the road for a month should be huge. After the bye, they’re home against the Raiders. Oakland is nothing to sneeze at

this year, but a rested Big Blue should handle them without any trouble. After that are the Packers. Good luck with that. A week later, they host the Cowboys.
I think the worst is over as far as schedule is concerned, but they really didn’t bank enough wins. Out of their final 8 games, there are 3 probable losses – Green Bay, Seattle, and, Detroit. You saw what they did to Dallas on Sunday, so the Lions are a credible threat, especially at home. Seattle plays that new wave football that clashes with Coughlin’s more traditional approach. They’re fast. Real fast. That game could go either way, but the Seahawks have been on a roll all season (6-1). The NFC East is so bad this season that 7-9 could possibly be enough to win the division this year. As bad as 2-6 looks they’re the only team with a win streak in their division. Hey, ya never know…

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The only thing the Eagles have gotten really good at is beating the Giants. Since 2008, the Eagles are 8-2 against the G-Men. The Giants haven’t faced a strong opponent in nearly a month. Since then, they’ve beaten up on some lackluster opponents, the dregs from the NFC South. The good news is that the Giants have won the games they were supposed to win and whether you win by 2 or by 34, it still counts as one in the win column.

Speaking of winning by 34, the Giants/Bucs game should’ve looked more like the 49ers/Jets game than

some post season slugfest. The Giants are the defending World Champions and the Buccaneers are a scrubby team in a rebuilding phase. If anything, the Bucs and the Panthers may have given the Giants a false hope or a false sense of their capabilities. The Bucs led the G-Men to believe that they could crawl out of any hole and put points on the board whenever they really needed to. The Panthers led the Giants to believe that they could win a game with field goals. I could almost hear Coughlin preaching his mantra from last year – “Finish!” – as drive after drive stalled out around the 30 yard line and Big Blue made a fantasy points king out of Lawrence Tynes.

I’m wondering if the Browns will have the same effect. Next week, the Giants host Cleveland in what shapes up to be a rebound game. The Giants will most likely win that game and could walk out of there thinking that they’ve made the necessary repairs to their game plan. The following week at Candlestick will be the real test of that. The Giants won’t catch another break until week 10 when they travel to Cincinnati. Until then, the Giants will face the 49ers, the Skins, the Cowboys and the Steelers. I don’t feel confident picking the Giants in any of those games.

The fact that the Giants are 0-2 in their division is really bad news. That kind of record usually means missing the playoffs completely or sneaking in as a wildcard. It means that your fate is in someone else’s hands and you’ve got to rely on other teams losing to make the playoffs – you know, like the Jets usually do. Granted, the Giants have won on the road in the post season before, it’s not the way the defending champs should be going about it. The Vince Lombardi Trophy is in “Giants” Stadium and prospective challengers should have to come here to get it if they think they can take it.

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