N.Y Giants ~ Defensive Blues Color Game One

From the desk of:  DO IT FOR THE DUKE



NEW YORK GIANTS FOOTBALL:  Redskins Expose Big Blue Holes In Defense.  Secondary Shows Old Form.


Ya know, for a Defensive minded kind of guy, I've spent an extraordinarily long time these last two seasons talking about Offense and the Running Game.  That's because Kevin Gilbride drives me freakin' crazy.


But please; let's talk Defense.


The Redskins' ground game went through us like a weed-whacker through spaghetti and Rex Grossman picked apart the Secondary like a fruit basket.  Jason Pierre Paul wasn't going to stop the Skins by himself.  Nice game by him, by the way.  But otherwise, Washington went through us like we were wet toilet paper.


That's our present condition; not necessarily our state of affairs.  Now that off-season talk and speculation have turned into real games, it's time to play through problems also.  As you well know, we have an epidemic of injuries on this side of the ball.  We just have to get through it.  There was no Justin Tuck; no Osi Umenyiora; Jonathan Goff; or Prince Amukamara.  How much did not having them available alter the defensive plan?  In a logical sense; a lot.  But in the NFL, you never know for sure until the game is over.


If Osi and Tuck play, does the Secondary have as a bad a day as they did?  Answer; - Probably!  They are all familiar with the smell of getting toasted.  We've seen this act from Aaron Ross; Antrel Rolle; Corey Webster; Kenny Phillips; and Deon Grant before.  The book has been out on these guys for some time now.  Be aggressive against them and they will give up huge plays.  Prince Amukamara was supposed to improve our depth.  But he's out.  Kenny Phillips is the only player with any real hopes for major improvement in his play.  The rest of the cast is comprised of seasoned vets.  What you see is what you get with them.  And many times last season, they've made us look away.


If Jerry Reese had spent any time (at all) trying to find some linebackers, perhaps many things change about this Defense.  Then we'd be able to escape this over-reliance on the D-Line getting sacks. 


The Secondary problems will be the more visible problems on TV.  That unit will look the worst doing what they do.  But football fans know full well, our lack of linebackers; our soft white under belly for some time now; is going to kill us.




Mike.BTB