KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Of course they can. Of course the Giants can. Of course they can beat the Chiefs.
It is more than the reality that in the NFL, “any given Sunday” can give us any given upset.
It is the clenched-fist desperation and determination the 0-3 Giants bring with them into Arrowhead Stadium on Sunday, severely wounded in body and soul, bloodied and beaten up in the aftermath of a day that will live in infamy, nevertheless true believers that a champion’s heart still beats inside them, that those with championship fiber did not have it ripped out of them once and for all by Panthers.
Eli Manning doesn’t have David Tyree with him Sunday, and he doesn’t have Chris Snee or David Baas trying to keep him in one piece against a sack-happy defense.
But he does have Victor Cruz and Hakeem Nicks, and he does have a pair of Super Bowl rings and MVP trophies, and he is the better quarterback, and he does know how to be a road warrior.
And there is only one head coach with two Super rings on the sidelines, and it is his head coach.
That’s as good a place to start believing as any.
After a week of looking themselves in the mirror, a week when so many of them should have been given back their paychecks, can the real Giants please stand up?
Of course they can.
“I think they’re gonna see a team playing with a lot of energy, a team playing with a lot more passion than they’ve seen in the past and a team that’s not ready to just lay down and call the season quits just after three games,” Cruz said. “I think they’re gonna see a completely different Giants club.”
The real Giants will stand up this Sunday?
“Absolutely,” Cruz said.
It is time for any Giants to stop resting on their Super Bowl XLII and XLVI laurels and stop making a mockery of their mission to be the first host team of a Super Bowl, the first New York-New Jersey Super Bowl, at that stadium they can see when they drive their SUVs to work.
“It just feels like Giants teams have never been this way,” Cruz said. “They’ve always been responding to challenges, responding to what teams have thrown at us, and that wasn’t the case this past Sunday, so we gotta change that.”
The 3-0 Chiefs are good. They are not the Len Dawson Chiefs. And the 0-3 Giants — one game out of first place in a wretched division, by the way — are not the Ray Handley Giants.
Take the points and bet on Giants Pride.
“That’s something that’s imbedded in this team and this culture around this facility, is Giants Pride,” rookie right tackle Justin Pugh said. “I think after last week, we’re gonna see a completely new team this Sunday.”
Pugh mentioned the Giants Pride sign that hangs on the wall by the door of the locker room on game day.
“Everyone hits that before they leave the locker room,” Pugh said. “It’s at MetLife, then we bring it on the road with us too.”
They will hit it harder this week. It would help if someone, anyone, would make a spark play. A sack or two by Jason Pierre-Paul now that he says he has knocked the rust off his back. An Elite And Erect Eli Manning, so Nicks doesn’t have to throw the ball to himself. An offensive line that isn’t a turnstile for Justin Houston and Tamba Hali. An explosive David Wilson. A defense that seals the edge from Jamaal Charles. A coaching staff that makes the right in-game adjustments. A team, filled with players who rally around each other.
“Being energetic on the sideline, excited about every play, offense up cheering the defense on, defense up cheering the offense on, things like that,” Cruz said.
No medals for trying.
“We expect whoever’s out there, whoever’s playing, whatever the circumstances, for us to go out there and succeed,” Manning said.
On Friday, Coughlin showed his Giants a quote texted to him by their inspirational forever captain, Col. Greg Gadson, who lost 70 pints of blood and both his legs above the knee because of a roadside bomb in Baghdad. It went something like this:
“If you’re down and you’re hurt, you sit for a while, you may bleed a little bit, but then you get up and you fight again.”
The Giants fight again.