There will be two Giants playing for the NFC in the Pro Bowl after all. Middle Linebacker Antonio Pierce earned a trip to Honolulu after Bears MLB Brian Urlacher canceled his. He joins Tiki Barber as the only Giants representatives. Tight End Jeremy Shockey had been voted in, but will sit out with a nagging ankle injury. While Pierce is there, it is rumored that he will put the full court press on soon to be free agent Lance Briggs. The two were teammates at the University of Arizona and Pierce reportedly has been in touch with the Bears LB about signing with the Giants. Briggs' pricetag will likely be too high for the Giants even if he hits the open market, but I fully expect the Bears to either put the franchise tag on or sign him to an extension.
It's great to see Pierce get a chance to prove he is one of the elite linebackers in the game. He's been the leader of the defense since signing before the 2005 season. Hopefully the Giants can get LaVar Arrington and Michael Strahan healthy next season to relieve some of the burden. If the Briggs rumors carry any weight, it will also be nice to have Pierce on a recruiting mission. His recruitment abilities are well documented by the Arrington signing. With Carlos Emmons most likely to be released and an aging Brandon Short headed for free agency, linebacker could be a pressing need this offseason.
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4 comments:
Mr. Gleason,
With all due respect, sir, the Giants are terrible and will continue to be terrible. Eli Manning? Are you serious? When you hear him speak, he sounds like a five year old. He may look like Peyton's younger brother, but he acts like his son. Although probably not, because Peyton's son might get some of those "good at playing football and making decisions in the pocket" genes that Eli unfortunately doesn't have. I love the G-Men as much as anyone, but we have get be honest with ourselves; they will not win a Super Bowl, or even get out of the wild card round (in a pathetic NFC) with Eli taking the snaps. But don't blame the front office. They have done their job. As bad as things are in G-Men country, I couldn't IMAGINE how bad they would be if we had the misfortune of both drafting Phillip Rivers AND having more cap room. I mean then maybe Briggs WOULD be a possibility.
Keep up the good work Gleason. You are a New York Football Giants trooper at heart, and we all do love and respect that.
I appreciate the feedback, and do myself worry about the future with Eli Manning. However, I'm going to wait to address the team's prospects until after it becomes a bit more clear what the roster will look like next year. Remember, in recent years Trent Dilfer and Brad Johnson have been Super Bowl Champion QBs.
In terms of the slight on the front office, I'm going to have to agree in part. Don't jump on the Rivers bandwagon just yet though, he does have a ton of help around him. We are a bit cap strapped, but that's more a result of having all the main players signed for several more years. It is unfortunate that Accorsi overspent on Manning because of his failure to land Elway in Baltimore and Sinorice Moss because he failed to land big bro Santana a few years ago.
Mr. Gleason,
I appreciate your response. However I would note that Brad Johnson, when playing well, have proven to be a very good NFL quarterback (and not just in a manage the game, don't make mistakes way, but actually a pure pocket passer). And as for Trent Dilfer, he won with arguably the best defense of our life times (including this years Bears).
As for Rivers having more around him, I simply don't see that as being overwhelmingly true. Rivers did have a lot around him. However, going into the season many "experts" thought that Manning had a ton around him as well, and it was not until Manning displayed his incompetence that you stopped hearing about how stacked the Giants offense was.
Further, none of this should really surprise us. The true expert talent evaluaters generally thought Rivers to be the better talent. He just had the unfortunate birth defect of not having "Manning" on the back of his jersey.
Mr./Mrs. Anonymous,
You come up with some very solid points. However, I'd like to possibly refute them. To say Brad Johnson has proven to be a "very good" NFL quarterback is a stretch. If you remember, the Bucs won that Super Bowl with 3 defensive touchdowns. I'm in no way trying to make the 2007 Giants defense comparable to the 2000 Ravens (undoubtedly far superior to this year's Bears unit), but I merely bring up Dilfer to show that the QB is not the be all and end all. Football is a true team sport, not decided by 1 man but rather 11 men. That's why suggesting Peyton wasn't great until he got a ring is absurd.
In terms of Mr. Rivers, by the supporting cast I look deeper than his skill position players but rather also to the 5 men blocking for him. As talented as I think the Giants were offensively prior to the Pettitgout and Toomer injuries, the Chargers were still superior. Let's not overlook the importance of your blindside protection. Rivers got a confidence boost by having Pro Bowl LT Marcus McNeil covering his back, Bob "I headbutt people" Whitfield and an out of position David Diehl held those responsibilities following Pettitgout's injury.
Finally, the grading of prospects is a relative guessing game. I do agree that many "draftniks" projected Rivers higher than Manning, but think about how many had Ryan Leaf over Peyton Manning? Akili Smith over Donovan McNabb? It's a very inexact science, so I wouldn't go solely by that. There's plenty of time left on both of their careers, we shall see what will happen.
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