The Shrill cries of anguished Giants fans for Tom Coughlin to dump defensive coordinator Bill Sheridan before the final wild-card playoff push will fall on deaf ears. Coughlin, asked yesterday if he was thinking about making a change now, simply said, “No.”
The fall of the Giants, from a Big Blue Wrecking Crew to a Big Blue Wreck, was epitomized by one enlightening episode that was lost in the volume of inept pass rush and laughable Cover 2 pass coverage against the Eagles in which 11 Giants could have been cast in roles in a Night of The Living Dead sequel.
If you wanted evidence that these Giants are not your father’s Giants, it was right there just before the half on the play where Osi Umenyiora sacked Donovan McNabb and Michael Boley dropped what everyone assumed would have been an interception but should not have assumed it was not a fumble. Because it was ruled a fumble. And yet, the ball sat there at the Eagle 35-yard line, and sat there, and Giant players ignored it. The ball was finally picked up by one of the zebras and moved back 10 yards, to the spot of the fumble, with an explanation of “inadvertent whistle.”
A whistle, it turns out, that no one heard.
If one Giants defensive player had picked the ball up and started running to daylight to the Eagles end zone, we would not be talking about any cover-your-butt “inadvertent whistle” from the zebras.
Coughlin, appalled at the latest blatant example of the lack of awareness that has infected the defense and sabotaged the season, called his defensive players out on it yesterday behind the Big Blue walls.
“The question I presented to our defense — to our team today — you can imagine what it is, you’ve watched us practice . . . no matter where the ball goes, the ball’s on the ground, even if it’s a thrown incomplete pass, we pick it up and run with it,” Coughlin said. “Why didn’t somebody do that?
“If Michael Boley, off of his fingertips — that’s one aspect of it. But if in fact it’s a fumble, someone come in, scoop the ball up, run to the end zone — as you’ve been taught from Day 1 — let the officials bring it back.”
Did he get an explanation from the players when he asked them that?
“I didn’t ask the players for an explanation. I mean when I asked yeah, no, no, there was no response. It was . . .”
Rhetorical?
“Thank you.”
Welcome to Giant Brainlock.
“I thought it was an incomplete pass that I just dropped, and then I come to find out it was just a fumble,” Boley said. “That was a mistake on our part as a defense, not knowing the situation, not knowing if the whistle didn’t blow or not, picking the ball up.”
Boley was asked if someone should have tried to pick up the ball.
“Yeah as a defense, that’s what we do. I mean, we do it every day at practice,” Boley said. “Even if the QB throws an incomplete pass, we go scoop it up like it’s a fumble. And, it’s one of those things that we didn’t do. It’s no excuse for it, we just didn’t do it.”
McNabb promptly hit DeSean Jackson for 44 yards and soon it was 30-17.
“I was unaware of it, come to find out it was a fumble, and you could see the refs looking for us to pick it up,” Terrell Thomas said. “It was just unfortunate that 11 guys had no awareness to pick up the ball. There’s no blame on the coaches, it’s all 11.”
Everybody just assumed it was an incomplete pass. Everybody froze. No wonder the Giants are on thin ice.