Tom Rock: Why Giants fans still should be optimistic about their team's outlook

There already have been a few times this season when the Giants have come off the field bubbling with joy and saying something to the effect of: We wouldn’t have won that game last year.

The victories over the Cowboys and Titans stand out among those. And of course the win over the Eagles. Heck, the game in Philadelphia is one they wouldn’t have won in the last 13 years — or at least they hadn’t.

The idea behind the sentiment was that things have changed for the better.

But then came Thursday night, and all of a sudden, instead of partying like it’s 2026, Giants fans went right back to weeping like it’s 2025. The team wore its throwback white uniforms but apparently didn’t throwback far enough.

That was the most discouraging part of the 24-21 loss to the Commanders. Not that it happened, but that it was so intimately familiar to those of us who have witnessed the recent past.

The lead that couldn’t be held, the inability to get a first down to run out the clock, the costly mistakes in execution and decision-making, the late lapses on defense and the calls that went against them.

In that last category, count the spot on the momentarily successful fourth-quarter sneak that was challenged and overturned, a bogus pass interference flag on the Commanders’ game-winning drive and a strange reversal of what initially was called a hit to the helmet of Theo Johnson that quickly was rescinded.

Ultimately, that deflated feeling of having a winnable contest slip away was back, too.

This one even had some embarrassing memes to go along with it. Cam Skattebo stuck in his three-point stance on a critical third-and-1 sneak? Jameis Winston woofing his cadence to try to draw the defense offside?

Who let the dogs out, indeed.

And now the schedule gets exponentially more challenging with five playoff-level teams in the next six games. Who knows where the Giants will be in the standings when they face their next division opponent, the Cowboys in Dallas on Jan. 3. It’s a game that could decide the NFC East champion.

But fear not. We are here today to remind you of what the Giants told us throughout the first two months of this season: that things actually are different and that any similarity on Thursday night to outcomes of the past is pure coincidence and Pavlovian flinching.

These aren’t last year’s Giants. Or the ones from any of the years in the past decade.

So on this Sunday without game action, here are a few reasons to be optimistic, in no particular order:

John Harbaugh did not forget how to coach. You might not agree with the calls he and his staff made in the fourth quarter of the most recent game, and in some cases, neither do I. But he wasn’t making them because he was lost in the moment or getting brain cramps. They were thought-out decisions that just didn’t work.

That’s the way it goes in the NFL. Coaches push buttons and become geniuses if the players execute them properly and unemployed if they don’t. Sound reasoning is all we can really ask, and Harbaugh tends to provide that more often than not.

J.J. McCarthy is much better than anyone could have hoped, and he’s improving still. He’s made only 13 career starts in the NFL and just three since he arrived here in a whirlwind trade after Week 3. There is plenty to improve on, but also a lot to be impressed by.

Those fastballs he spun to Isaiah Likely and Malachi Fields on Thursday night were some of the best throws by a Giants quarterback in years. He gave Malik Nabers a decent chance to fight for and come down with the long pass that ultimately ended Thursday night’s game. And don’t forget that toss he made last Sunday in which he put the football in the perfect spot for Nabers to make a catch in the end zone that wound up falling incomplete.

Speaking of Likely and Fields, those two have been super-productive and mostly efficient as receivers.

We’re still not convinced that Skattebo is a 1A running back. He’s probably more of a 1B or a 2A. He does bring passion and fire and energy to the team, though. And when he doesn’t have to be the every-down guy and can split some reps with Tyrone Tracy Jr. coming back off injured reserve, it should make the running game better.

If the Giants had won on Thursday, we’d be talking about Ar’Darius Washington as their breakout defensive star right now. He not only had an interception but came up and made at least two tackles behind the chains that prevented the Commanders from converting first downs. Pretty good for a guy who was third on the depth chart not too long ago.

And finally, who’s to say the Cowboys are going to take advantage of any of the Giants’ shortcomings? They’re far from a complete, fine-tuned bunch. They play the ferocious 49ers on Sunday. They have the Seahawks, Rams and Jaguars on their remaining schedule, too.

None of this is any guarantee that things will work out for the Giants. They are not a perfect team, but, as Harbaugh said, it’s not a perfect league.

They fumble far too often. They commit too many penalties in the secondary (some of them phantom and earned on reputation but penalties nonetheless). Their rookie kicker can’t be counted on and Harbaugh remains loyal to him — or at least his place on the roster even while coaching around his shortcomings in game situations.

These Giants are flawed. They are baffling. They are frustrating. They are in a far worse spot at this moment than they would have been if they had won that winnable game on Thursday.

But one thing they very much are not is last year’s team.

By Tom Rock

tom.rock@newsday.com@TomRock_Newsday

Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.