There is one constant in the NFL – losing brings on change. The Giants are losing down the stretch of the season and change is inevitable, most likely including Osi Umenyiora, finishing up his 10th year with the Giants and almost definitely his last.
Umenyiora, 31, has been around long enough to know, as he says, there’s a “high probability’’ he will be playing for another team in 2013. But as he contemplates what figures to be his last game for the Giants – Sunday against the Eagles – Umenyiora is also wondering how the powers that be will determine who stays and who goes. The Giants are not officially eliminated from the playoffs but they need to win on Sunday and have the Bears and Vikings lose and the Cowboys lose or tie.
“Where are they going to make the changes is the question,’’ Umenyiora said Monday on a conference call. “There’s no individual, there’s no aspect of the team this year that stood out. If you want to talk about the pass rush … well, maybe we didn’t get 50 sacks like we did last year, but was the offense playing well? Was the special teams playing… Like where? There’s nowhere that was up to the standards that we set last year. If they’re going to be making changes, it has to be wholesale changes. Everybody has to leave. There has to be changes for everybody because nobody played above average this year.’’
Clearly, “everybody’’ is not going to leave. It looked as if Umenyiora would be gone following the Super Bowl victory but he and the team agreed on a contract restructuring both sides could live with. The deal included an easily-voidable 2013 season. Unlike 2011, Umenyiora stayed healthy the entire season and, operating in a defensive end rotation behind starters Jason Pierre-Paul and Justin Tuck, had six sacks, only one-half behind Pierre-Paul for the team lead.
“I definitely have some very good years left in me,’’ Umenyiora said. “I haven’t lost any explosion. I haven’t lost any speed. So as a pass rusher that’s what you need and thankfully I’ve been able to maintain that and I’m just happy about that. I’m not happy about the way the season unfolded, but I’m happy about that.’’
His goal, Umenyiora stressed, is to remain with the Giants but he knows that is a long-shot.
“I think most people want to finish out their career with the team that they started and I fall into that category,’’ he said. “I would have loved to have finished my career here, but everybody is not so fortunate. Everybody is not a Michael [Strahan].
“A lot of you were around when I got drafted. If somebody would have told you that when I got drafted, somebody who nobody knew about, that 10 years later I would still be here and had won a couple of Super Bowls and been to Pro Bowls and set records and all of that stuff, you would have laughed, I would have laughed. Everybody in there would have laughed and so I’m just happy with the things that I’ve done here and I’m happy with the things that I’ve accomplished here. I’m happy with the things that this team has done here and if it does, in fact, turn out to be my last game, then it’s been a wonderful, wonderful ride and I’m just going to walk around in New York with my head held high because it’s been a great accomplishment playing for this organization and being able to do some of the things that we accomplished here as a team.’’
As for what he’s looking for moving forward, Umenyiora said he’s looking to be a starter somewhere next season.
“Why wouldn’t I be looking for that?’’ he said. “I’m not a situational pass rusher. I think that’s the word that’s been going around me for years because most people don’t know what they’re talking about. But there’s no football person who’s going to actually sit there and watch tape and not think that I’m a starter in this league and I’m 100 percent sure of that.’’