Giant Turnaround?

With an entirely new coaching staff, front office, and revamped offensive and defensive lines, the New York Giants have cleaned house more than any other team in the NFC East this offseason.

On the third of a four-part series previewing the NFC East for the Inside the Birds podcast, Greg Cosell joins hosts Adam Caplan and Geoff Mosher to break down the Giants.

The Giants hope first-round pick Kayvon Thibodeaux adds juice to their pass rush

Daniel Jones

Greg Cosell: “Daniel Jones is a big kid that throws it well and has enough mobility. We know that he can run. I always felt like I couldn’t get a great feel for Daniel Jones, so I went back and looked a couple of weeks ago, and I kind of liked what I saw. I know that the numbers weren’t great, but I’m just looking at the player…I would say at his core, he’s a pocket quarterback who’s at his best when playing with timing and rhythm. I watched all of his third-down dropbacks and I thought that he was really efficient in the pocket and decisive with his reads. For the new coaching staff, that’s probably pretty exciting for them.”

Brian Daboll/Mike Kafka

Cosell: “I think [the offense] will be a really intriguing mix of quick game throws and intermediate and vertical throws. One thing we know about Kafka coming in from Andy Reid is we know Andy Reid has always been really good with route design and route concepts, and a lot of them are at the intermediate and vertical levels…Daniel Jones has the ability to make those kinds of throws. Now I thought Brian Daboll, with what he did with [Josh] Allen, was an intriguing mix of downfield throws and this year, maybe as a function of their O-line, they went a lot more with quick game stuff. And I thought they did a good job with that as well.”

Offensive Line

Cosell: “In the pass game, it all starts with protection. In an ideal world, they are not going to have to do what they did last year a lot on third down, when they were forced to use both tight ends and running backs to chip on the outside last year to compensate and camouflage for their O-line struggles on pass protection…Andrew Thomas clearly improved. I think they feel very comfortable at left tackle now and obviously they drafted Evan Neal and he’ll play right tackle, which he did in his second to last year at Alabama.”

Wan’dale Robinson

Cosell: “You can move him all over. Robinson’s small, but if you do a lot of motion, that kind of negates that issue. Size is not as big of a concern in today’s NFL as it was years ago…He’s got great quickness. He’s not a true burner but he does have vertical ability. His run-after-the-catch vision and agility is really good. He can make defenders miss. He’s one of those versatile guys and [Kadarius] Toney is the same way, so they have two of those guys. They’re tough to defend.”

Saquon Barkley

Cosell: “Barkley was always super explosive, but I never quite saw him as a true sustainer despite his size and the fact that his body would tell you he could be a physical grind it out guy. I don’t think that he was that kind of runner. I’m very curious to see what he is now. It’s not a question, of course he’s the number one back, the question to me is utilization and deployment.”

Don ‘Wink’ Martindale

Cosell: “I spent a lot of time this offseason talking to some coaches. One question I decided to ask a lot of offensive coaches was to give me the three defensive coordinators you have the toughest time with. Martindale’s name always came up and it’s because of what he does with his fronts and his pressures. Think of it this way: There’s five offensive linemen. Most offensive coaches would like to send five receivers out, but when there’s seven guys on the line of scrimmage on the defensive side of the ball and you know all seven aren’t going to come but you don’t know who is and who isn’t, you have to be in a position to account for people. It forces you from a protection standpoint to keep people in.”

Kayvon Thibodeaux

Cosell: “To me, Thibodeaux is not a true edge rusher. I don’t think he can flatten his rush path the way you’d ultimately like in an edge rusher. But now you’re getting into scheme. Now, you can be in a situation where he can be a factor. He did also line up inside in college and I think you’ll see that. I think you’ll see him line up all across the front on third down in particular. They do see him as a pass rusher. I’m very anxious to see how that plays out.”

Xavier McKinney

Cosell: “The player who I think is going to thrive in Wink Martindale’s defense is Xavier McKinney, because McKinney is a multi-positional, multi-dimensional player and had a very good year last year…He can play on the back end, he can play in the box, he can play in the slot, he can match up man-to-man to wide receivers and tight ends, he can blitz, he can do pretty much anything you want him to do.”

– Benjamin Paul is a staff writer for InsideTheBirds.com

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