The New York Giants entered Monday night’s game with the Seattle Seahawks recognizing its importance. Falling to 1-3 with a tough schedule up ahead would almost guarantee they’d miss the playoffs.
But that realization didn’t result in better play. In fact, the Giants pieced together their worst all-around performance in more than a decade. It was so bad that even Joe Judge had to cringe.
Buy Giants TicketsThe Giants failed in all three phases of the game and barely resembled an NFL team. And for the third time this season, they appeared to quit down the stretch. At the very least, they were unwillingly pushed around by the Seahawks to an embarrassing extent.
Here’s a look at some studs and duds (and studly duds) from the game.
STUD: Kayvon Thibodeaux
Kayvon Thibodeaux desperately needed to play a solid game and he did that on Monday night. He was one of the few bright spots, recording two tackles (two solo, two for a loss), two QB hits, 2.0 sacks, and one pass defensed that nearly went for a pick-6.
DUD: Thomas McGaughey
Thomas McGaughey is a well-respected assistant who has head coaching aspirations. However, his special teams unit is an unmitigated disaster and continues to put the team in precarious positions. Eric Gray muffed a punt and mishandled a kickoff and then Gary Brightwell was flagged for unnecessary roughness — all in the first quarter and a half on Monday night. That doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface of their issues, which have persisted this season and throughout the Week 4 game.
STUD: Wan'Dale Robinson
There were very few players who seemed to play with energy and a little desperation against the Seahawks, but Wan’Dale Robinson was one. He gave every single play 100 percent and hauled in a team-leading five receptions for 40 yards on the night. He also made several impressive downfield blocks.
DUD: Brian Daboll
A year ago, Brian Daboll took over a team in distress and turned them into playoff winners. For his efforts, Daboll was named the AP Coach of the Year. Fast forward to this season and the entire script has been flipped. Daboll’s team is a poorly-coached disaster who struggle in all three phases of the game. They are undisciplined, their grittiness from a season ago is gone and they seem too willing to lie down and take a rear-end whooping.
STUD: Matt Breida
We need at least one other stud so why not Matt Breida? The veteran played hard, gaining 30 yards on 14 carries while adding 48 yards on five receptions. The yards per carry average is low but that’s really the fault of the offensive line.
DUD: Wink Martindale
Wink Martindale dared members of the media to chart missed tackles on Monday night, essentially vowing that the Week 3 issues would be corrected. As it turns out, he had too much faith in his players. The Giants’ defense was once again a complete mess with missed tackles all over the field, often leading to big plays and/or scores. The one saving grace is that the defense limited Seattle’s high-powered offense to just 17 points.
DUD: Daniel Jones
Prime-time Daniel Jones is a thing. He fell to 1-12 under the light with Monday’s loss and didn’t offer much of anything that was redeeming. He missed a wide-open Wan’Dale Robinson in the first half after rushing out of a rare clean pocket, held onto the ball too long at one point, which led to a fumble, and then threw a back-breaking pick-6 in the third quarter after a clear miscommunication with Parris Campbell (also had Darren Waller somewhat open but had no time to go through his full progressions).
STUDLY DUD: Bobby Okereke
Bobby Okereke recorded 10 tackles (six solo, two for a loss) and one pass defensed on the night, which all looks great in the box score. Some of his tackles were impressive and did come in clutch, but he also missed a few. One of those came on a 51-yard catch and run by Seahawks tight end Noah Fant.
Other STUDS:
- LB Azeez Ojulari
- K Graham Gano
Other DUDS:
- TE Darren Waller
- OL Evan Neal
- OL Shane Lemieux
- OL Joshua Ezeudu
- OL Ben Bredeson
- OL Markus McKethan
