The New York Football Giants had one of their most successful seasons in recent years this past fall, with the organization finally making it back to the playoffs for the first time since 2016.
The Giants under new leadership in Brian Daboll showed the league that they are a team that is ready to compete and most importantly win football games.
New General Manager Joe Scheon has created an energy in the building that every coach, player, and staff member wants to be a part of. The respect and pride to stay I work or I play or I coach for the New York Giants is back in the Meadowlands.
With this new found attitude and recent success, comes higher expectations from everyone inside and outside of the organization. The Giants are no longer out of contention, but rather in the thick of it when it comes to competing for the Lombardi.
With season two for the Scheon-Daboll regime on the horizon, let's break down five weaknesses for the Giants this upcoming season.
Strength of Schedule
It’s no secret that the Giants had one of the easiest schedules in 2022, but unfortunately the same can’t be said about Big Blues upcoming 2023 schedule.
The Giants have one of the hardest strength of schedules in the entire league, with it being ranked the third/fourth toughest by several different sport outlets (T-4th Sports Illustrated, T-3rd Sporting News, T-4th CBS and T-3rd NFL Research).
The over/under for the success of the Giants is posted at 8.5 by DraftKings. With them facing top tier talent like the Bills, 49ers and all of the NFC East, Giants fans can only hope to go above .500 on the year.
OUR 2023 SCHEDULE 🔥 pic.twitter.com/SAXGDpppmq
— New York Giants (@Giants) May 12, 2023
Evan Neal
The Giants 2022 seventh overall pick was supposed to be the new face of the offensive line. With his big frame and collegiate dominance, Big Blue thought they finally found their guy for the right side of the line.
However, as we know Neal had an awful rookie year filled with injury and overall bad performance. The hope of him being 100% pro ready his first year was quickly dissolved as the season went on.
Neal played 738 offensive snaps and recorded seven penalties (T-27th in NFL) and allowed seven sacks (T-7th in NFL) in the regular season. A very poor statline that led to him getting a 44.1 overall player grade by PFF.
Before Giants fans and everyone else writes Neal off it is important to compare his rookie year to someone like Andrew Thomas who also had a rough first year but over the seasons has developed into one of the best offensive lineman in the league.
In 2020 Thomas played 978 offensive snaps and recorded three penalties (T-39 in NFL) and allowed ten sacks (1st in NFL) in the regular season. His statline earned him an overall player grade of 62.4 by PFF. Although Thomas didn’t record as many penalties as Neal did, Thomas had allowed way more sacks.
To show Thomas’ improvement in just one year, in 2021 Thomas played 800 offensive snaps, recorded five penalties (T-34th in NFL) and allowed only two sacks (T-57th in NFL) in the regular season. His statline earned him an overall player grade of 78.9 by PFF. Even though Thomas’ penalties went up a bit, his sacks allowed dropped dramatically.
To show Thomas’ growth even more, in 2022 Thomas played 1,049 offensive snaps and recorded two penalties (T-76th in NFL) and allowed only three sacks (T-49th) during the regular season. His statline earned him an overall player grade of 89.1 by PFF. An overall huge improvement from year one to year three.
Now Neal is a very athletic and smart player, he just might need more time to develop like Thomas did. However, if Neal doesn’t take a leap in his development after his rookie year like Thomas, the right side of the offensive line will be considered swiss cheese for opposing defensive linemen.
Something that Quarterback Daniel Jones, Offensive Coordinator Mike Kafka and Head Coach Brian Daboll can not afford to have if they plan on having offensive success this season.
Evan Neal is in good hands 👏👏 #NYGiants pic.twitter.com/YJ4StSdl5N
— Fireside Giants (@FiresideGiants) June 6, 2023
Jamie Gillan
When it comes to punting you hope that your team is scoring every possession that way you don’t have to do it. However, this isn’t the case for most teams in the NFL. So when it does come time for your team to punt, you hope that you have someone who can execute and get the opposing team inside the 20-yard line.
Unfortunately for the Giants, the Scottish Hammer wasn’t as good at getting the job done as his nickname would make you think. In 2022, Jamie Gillan recorded 74 punts (9th in NFL) in the regular season with only 26 (14th in NFL) of them being inside the 20-yard line (35.13% - 21st in NFL).
Gillan also recorded nine touchbacks (T-2nd in NFL), one blocked punt (T3rd in NFL), an average of 46.8 yards per punt (18th in the NFL) and 40.2 net yards per punt (25th in NFL).
When looking at his numbers compared to other punters in the league Gillan wouldn’t even be in the top fifteen and maybe not even in the top twenty. Gillan is super inconsistent and hasn’t shown that he has the leg to give the Giants good defensive field position.
Against what some expected, the Giants signed Gillan to a two year deal worth up to $5 million back in March. Clearly Big Blue sees some potential or skill in him that the rest of the league and fans aren’t, otherwise they wouldn’t have resigned him.
Hopefully Gillan can show improvement in his distance and consistency in 2023, because if he doesn’t the Giants are going to be giving opponents a much shorter field to work with and will have to be back in the market for a new punter.
Injuries
During the 2022 season every week would have a new name on the injury report for New York. It just seemed like as soon as one player would be getting healthy and ready to return another player would go down.
It was a victorious cycle for the Giants that many players couldn’t seem to escape. It was like if you were injured once no matter how severely you were going to be injured again for the same thing or for something new.
As the 2023 season approaches, some of those injuries from last season are still lingering. Players like Sterling Shepard (ACL), Wan’Dale Robinson (ACL) and A’Shawn Robinson (Meniscus) are all still healing and dealing with repercussions from their past injuries. All three players are still questionable to make a return during week one for Big Blue.
Unfortunately for the Giants the injuries are already starting up again, with the newest victim being David Sills V (Back/rib). Thankfully for Sills his injury that occurred in late May is not that serious and was seen participating in OTAs on June 13th. But who and when will be next?
As the Giants get closer and closer to season the organization really needs to ask themselves how can they stay healthy? How can they limit injuries? And how many people are going to suffer the same injury?
If the Giants can’t get a hold of the injury bug this year it is going to be a real achilles heel for the team week in and week out. A healthy Giants team means a more layered Giants team which means a more dangerous Giants team.
In addition to the '23 draft class, this team is getting the following players back from injuries:
Ojulari
Beavers
Ezeudu
Collin Johnson
Lemeiux
McKethan
Davidson
Wan'Dale
Aaron Robinson
Shep
Elerson SmithEveryone can't make the 53... #BeltGuy #NYGiants pic.twitter.com/jqqxihv7XS
— Belt Guy (@ThisIsNotZain) June 6, 2023
No True No. One receiver
The wide receiver room for the Giants hasn’t had a “number one” guy on paper since OBJ was a part of the team. After OBJ’s departure from New York, there have been some guys who have stepped up and been main targets for Eli Manning and Daniel Jones, but no one has really solidified the title as the Giants best receiver.
In 2022 the Giants really struggled with this, heading into the season with no number one guy and just having players rotate at that position. Which wasn’t terrible, but certainly not ideal, especially when multiple players started going down with injury.
The depth to the wide receiver group slowly started to deplete and with that went Daniel Jones’ favorite target in Sterling Shepard. Not long after went the Giants new draft pick Wan’Dale Robinson. Because of all the injuries, at some points of the season the Giants were working with practice squad guys just to fill spots on the roster.
Once the Giants picked up Isiah Hodgins off claims mid season, he became the go to guy. But his addition wasn’t enough and still didn’t solve the Giants main man problem.
In the offseason this year the Giants understood that they had a talent depth problem at the receiver position, so they went out and got guys with experience and speed.
The Giants added Parris Campbell from the Colts who recorded 623 yards and three touchdowns off of 63 receptions. A solid statline considering the offense and team he was a part of.
Big Blue also added Jalin Hyatt from the draft, a guy who in his senior year at Tennessee recorded 67 catches for 1,267 yards and 15 touchdowns. An incredible statline considering he played against SEC opponents.
These two additions will definitely be a tremendous boost in the depth for the Giants receiver group, however neither are going to be “the guy” in New York, at least not this year. The Giants either need to develop one of their players into being “the guy” or need to get a player who is known to be “the guy”.
Isaiah Hodgins seems to be Daniel Jones’ guy heading into this season, after the success the two shared during last year's run. However, will Hodgins be labeled as the Giants' guy?
If the Giants don’t solidify one player or bring on a true number one receiver then the Giants will struggle this season when a play needs to be made and they don’t have a player they can count on and turn to.
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