NFL Draft: Joe Schoen hopes Evan Neal pick finally will solve Giants' O-line woes
Alabama offensive tackle Evan Neal stands with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell after being picked by the New York Giants with the seventh pick of the NFL football draft Thursday, April 28, 2022, in Las Vegas. Credit: AP/Jae C. Hong
Was Joe Schoen able to do in one offseason what has befuddled at least two Giants general managers, four head coaches, and countless position coaches for more than a decade? Was he able to fix the offensive line?
The first-year helmsman of the organization wouldn’t go so far as to say that, but given the additions made in free agency and the selection of tackle Evan Neal with the seventh overall pick on Thursday night he was able to at least say: “I hope so.”
Noting that the players haven’t even been in pads yet this offseason, Schoen added: “I feel like we’ve upgraded it from when I got here and we had only four or five offensive linemen on the roster… We could potentially be operating from a position of strength at that position.”
It’s well documented that it has been a position of misery for most of the past 10 years or so. The Giants dumped plenty of resources into it. Justin Pugh, Ereck Flowers and Weston Richburg were first-and second-round picks who were supposed to be the cornerstones for the next generation of linemen to follow the Super Bowl-winning groups that included Chris Snee, David Diehl, Shaun O’Hara, Richie Seubert and Kareem McKenzee. That didn’t work out. The Giants then tried to buy their way to competence by making Nate Solder and Patrick Omameh very wealthy men, but that tact went south as well.
Now, perhaps, with 2020 first-round pick Andrew Thomas at left tackle and Neal at right tackle, the Giants feel they could legitimately be onto something.
“He’s long and it takes a guy a long route to get (around him) to the quarterback,” Brian Daboll said of Neal. “A big, massive man. I have a lot of people down in Alabama who I trust who have a lot of confidence in him and a lot of good things to say about him to go along with (offensive line coach) Bobby Johnson and (assistant offensive line coach) Tony Sparano Jr., guys who have looked at him. We thought very highly of him.”
They liked him as a person, too. Daboll said there is a type of person the Giants want to build their program with.
“He fit that to a T,” he said.
And he goes along with the rest of the moves made this offseason.
“We added some veteran guys we like (in free agency), Jamil Douglas, (Max) Garcia, (Jon) Feliciano, (Mark) Glowinski, (Graham) Gano,” Schoen said. “We’re happy with those guys. Adding Evan Neal it’s an interesting group and there is some interior depth.”
Schoen even mentioned the possibility of Matt Peart coming back form his torn ACL late in the 2021 season.
Thomas and Neal, though, will be the foundational pieces moving forward. Neal said they’ve never met and he could only speak for himself and what he’ll be bringing to the Giants.
“They’re going to get a guy that is going to come in every day and work his hardest to be the best that he can be and just ultimately help the organization win,” he said.
A generation of offensive linemen have come in saying the same thing without doing so.
If this time is different, Schoen will be known as the general manager who solved the enigma that has plagued the organization before even putting a team on the field in a game.
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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