John Mara's presence at John Harbaugh's presser shows he's still a Giant in the NFL

The murmurs of kibitzing filled the Giants’ fieldhouse shortly before noon on Tuesday as the large crowd milled about, gathered for the introduction of the new coach. Most were tickled by the hire and giddy with anticipation to hear what he would have to say. Then, just before the appointed time at which the event was to kick off, a reverent hush fell over the audience, the conversations they had been engaged in still echoing against the championship banners, and everyone turned to take a look at the most important person in the organization.

King John had entered the room.

Only it wasn’t John Harbaugh.

It was John Mara, the team’s president and CEO, the eldest son and a grandson of two Hall of Famers. Undergoing treatments for a cancer which he disclosed publicly in the spring, Mara had maintained his role within the organization but there had been very few public sightings of him. He was largely absent from training camp last summer and did not attend road games this fall and winter. Other than a few brief appearances on the field before some home games and the two times he was given a game ball after the team had wins over the Eagles and Cowboys, he had been mostly relegated to the background.

Now here he was, clearly struggling with his physical limitations and escorted by family members who helped not only steady him but also served as a buffer to the many who normally would have rushed up to greet him. But he carried the same gravitas and dignity he has always embodied. He sat and oversaw the celebration. The main activity of the day took place on the stage behind the microphone and everyone listened to what Harbaugh had to say, but the real star of the show was right there in the front row and it was hard to take one’s eyes off him.

He wasn’t looked on with pity. It was a sense of awe, not aww.

One of the NFL’s last true lions roared that day, and he didn’t even have to open his mouth or say a word.

Mara may have been limited in some of the duties required to assess, woo and eventually land Harbaugh — it was his brother Chris who took on the task of traveling to Maryland to meet with Harbaugh early in the process — but he undoubtedly was still the driving force of the operation.

“My emotions were: Let’s get it done because John was really high on Harbaugh,” Chris Mara said. “I knew that’s who he wanted. We cast a wide net on the whole coaching search and he was number one on it.”

In the end, it was John Mara who sealed the deal, not only with a handshake agreement with Harbaugh last Wednesday evening but over the weekend when he agreed to the organizational changes Harbaugh wanted in his contract before signing on Saturday.

Harbaugh had a lot of the leverage in those negotiations. This was always more about him choosing the Giants than the Giants choosing him. It was clear that Harbaugh’s respect for Mara ran deep having interacted with him as members of the league’s competition committee over the years.

“Nobody knows more about this league,” Harbaugh said of him.

So when it came down to closing this one out, the Giants were confident.

Said general manager Joe Schoen with the same smile Joe Torre used to have when calling in Mariano Rivera: “[Harbaugh] was in our building, and we’ve got John Mara.”

Done deal.

But Mara was there for the beginning, too.

“We hit the ground running,” Schoen said of the grueling first week of interviews in which the Giants interviewed Mike Kafka, Kevin Stefanski, Raheem Morris and Antonio Pierce in person. “John was great. He was involved. He asked really good questions. It was awesome.”

Added Harbaugh: “John Mara is running football operations here, and I'm glad he is.”

This hiring did allow Chris Mara to take on a much larger role. He’s been involved in hirings in the past, is a vocal member of the family’s ownership stake and has held a number of significant titles with the organization over the years even though most outside the building simply see him as “John’s brother.” This time he had to do more and he was ready.

“It came pretty natural,” Chris Mara said of his piece in the endeavor. “I’m just helping [John] any way I can. He is here every day pretty much and we talk all the time and no one has a better idea about the league than him. I have learned a lot from it and kind of taken the reins when he is not able to.”

That responsibility will likely keep expanding as John Mara continues his fight. And there are other voices from ownership that carry significant weight, too. The Tisches, with Steve as the patriarch of that side of the organization, were instrumental in this hiring. Members of the Koch family who bought a 10% equity share of the franchise for $1 billion in the fall were at Tuesday’s event as well, receiving public thank-yous from both Schoen and Harbaugh.

It’s hard to believe the Giants would have been in a position to invest this kind of money into this coach and his desired changes — not to mention the capital improvements to the facility that are underway, including a new locker room, cafeteria and training room — without their backing. As one franchise insider put it: Given the money NFL teams make it would have been doable without the Kochs, but it certainly makes it easier.

If Tuesday demonstrated anything, though, it’s that the Giants are still very much John’s team.

And he can still roar when he needs to.