Tom Coughlin said he is not worried about the morale of his team, because everyone around the Giants is being very open and honest about the reasons why they are 0-2.
That may be fine for now, but soon enough, if the Giants keep losing Coughlin might be powerless to do anything about a deterioration in the morale of the fans and, more importantly, the owners.
Nothing but the stench of two rotten defeats hovers over the Giants, because nothing substantial ever gets decided two games into a long season. Still, anyone who has seen how egregiously the Giants have butchered the basics of defense and been blown out of two games must realize this is no normal waiting game when it comes to cashing out on a year gone bad.
“I think our mindset is we got to win,” said Eli Manning, who has qui eted much of the noise about his development with his performances thus far. “We got to get a win. We got to get a win soon.”
Asked how that could be achieved, Manning tried to provide a voice of reason but got his words tangled a bit.
“We don’t have to make dramastic changes in what were doing,” he said.
There probably isn’t anything dramatic or drastic for the Giants to consider as they lick their wounds and try to regroup in time for Sunday’s game against the Redskins in Washington. The odds say the Giants are, if not cooked, certainly on a high simmer. Since 1990, 139 teams have started off 0-2 and only 18 of them came back to make the playoffs. That’s 12.9 percent.
That’s not good.
“Obviously we have to win a game,” said Coughlin, operating on the high-wire of a mere one-year contract extension. “Some of what we’re going through is maybe a confidence thing. You have to earn it. You have to earn that confidence.”
Manning has been a bright spot, and other than a few red zone foibles in the 35-13 loss to the Packers, the offense has shown signs of turning into a productive unit. On defense, however, the Giants are on pace for an historically dismal season, having already allowed the most points in the first two games for the franchise in 41 years – with no visible signs of hope.
With 80 points and 846 total yards allowed, the Giants actually aren’t at the bottom of the NFL in defense – they’re 29th out of 32 – but they are 32nd, dead last, in passing yards allowed, third-down efficiency and points allowed.
“We just got to get off the field on third down, it’s as simple as that,” safety Gibril Wilson said. “We ain’t splitting the atom or anything like that. It’s just getting off the field on third down, period.
“I feel like were inches away from turning this around. Our guys have got a lot of confidence and pride in their defense. We know, we look each other in the mirror every day and we know we’re not getting it done and it all comes back to us.”
The spokesman for the defense and one of the team captains, linebacker Antonio Pierce, ducked out of the locker room immediately after the game without speaking to the media and was a no-show again yesterday, which is not a good sign. Pierce is usually the most analytical and level-headed commentator and his absence indicates either he has nothing constructive to say or no answers to provide.
Pierce, though, did call in for his paid radio spot later in the afternoon.
If this sinking feeling sounds familiar, that’s because the early stages of last season contained the same sort of defensive angst. The Giants started 1-2 and the defense gave up 92 points. It took a bye week respite and some subtle changes to turn the season around with dramatic defensive improvement and five consecutive victories until injuries ravaged the roster.
“We’ll use whatever we can possibly use to help,” said Coughlin, grasping for any positive motivation he can find.