The Giants' offense is improving, but its run-first identity seems outdated
Giants running back Saquon Barkley rushes for a two-yard touchdown against the Buccaneers during the fourth quarter at MetLife Stadium on Sunday. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
The Giants got closer to the offensive identity they have been wanting to put forth all season long. In Sunday’s win over the Bucs they ran the ball behind an improved offensive line and used plenty of big personnel — blocking tight ends and a fullback — to help accomplish the feat. Saquon Barkley changed his pace, altered his mesh, and found those “dirty” yards the coaches have been nudging him toward. And Eli Manning? Well, he certainly was accurate, completing an amazing 17 of 18 passes, two of them for short touchdowns, and making smarter reads to get the ball in the hands of the receiving playmakers.
The first series of the game told you everything you needed to know about what they wanted to do: Run, run, run, play-action pass deep.
Pat Shurmur was pleased.
“I think all along we’ve talked about how important it is to get the run game going,” Shurmur said on Monday. “That’s the way I would like to play every game, get ahead and then be able to stick with the run because it has a good effect on the game. At times, the game doesn’t play out that way and you have to go a different direction, but the way it played out Monday night is the way you’d like them all to work. You want to win certainly, but to be able to run the ball consistently.”
It made complete sense at the time Shurmur said it.
A few hours later, though, that philosophy seemed antiquated.
Monday night’s epic battle between the Rams and Chiefs that ended in a 54-51 final and may have been a prelude to a Super Bowl rematch saw the two teams sprinting up and down the field in what tasted like the dawn of a breathless new era in professional football. And it made it feel as if teams with a run-first philosophy — like the Giants — are heading in the wrong direction.
The Giants have had the same basic philosophy for a number of years. Well, for almost a century to be honest. Run the ball, play stout defense, get timely passes and grind out wins. It’s worked to the tune of four Super Bowls and four NFL Championships before that.
It’s also survived a slew of radical ideas that have come and gone in the sport in recent years. The Giants never bought into the wildcat, the pistol, the RPO or the frenzied pace that Chip Kelly brought to the division (and which Shurmur helped adapt for the NFL as the Eagles’ offensive coordinator). Instead, they stuck with their pocket passer and running backs on railroad tracks, and they managed just fine.
This change, though, is different. A lot less temporary and experimental than the others. Part of that is because the NFL’s rules have been bent to serve the offensive passing game, whether it is by protecting quarterbacks or limiting defensive contact. Did you see the ratings for the Monday night game? The league’s owners and rule-makers did, and they’re not going back anytime soon.
Another aspect is that the players at the helms of these sleek rapid-fire passing offenses are, for the most part, young, and will only get better: Patrick Mahomes and Jared Goff and (when he is clicking) Carson Wentz. Drew Brees may be the outlier in that, but the targets he’s hitting are not.
And the final testament to its staying power is that it works. It worked last year when the Super Bowl wound up seeing more offensive yardage than any game in history (more even than Monday’s game). The teams with the top five offenses in the current NFL are a combined 38-13-1 and four of them are in first place in their division (sorry, Bucs). The teams with the top five defenses in the NFL are a combined 23-26-1 and only one of them is in first place (congrats, Bears!). The top five rushing teams? They’re 25-25-1.
The Giants, of course, have neither a great offense nor a great defense. Which is why they have just three wins. But they do have two wins in their last two games, they’ve found a way to score in the red zone in that span, and they are starting to realize the vision that Shurmur and general manager Dave Gettleman had when they assembled this team.
When Gettleman took over he laid out that blueprint.
“At the end of the day,” he said, “it’s the same three things you’ve had to do in ’35 that you’ve got to do now in 2018. You’ve got to run the ball. You’ve got to stop the run. You’ve got to pressure the passer.”
Who would have thought that less than a year later such an idea — and the Giants themselves — would seem so dated.
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.
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