It is easy to proclaim New York a “baseball town” when the Yankees have the best record and the Mets have the second-best record in Major League Baseball. Everyone loves a winner, right?
If we are in agreement on that, can we assume that the converse is true? Everyone dislikes a loser?
That brings us to the Giants. To state they are “losers” sounds harsh. But to acknowledge the franchise has been a losing operation for most of the past decade is indisputable. A listing of the season-by-season records since the last Super Bowl (following the 2011 season) is damning and reveals clear regression: 9-7, 7-9, 6-10, 6-10, 11-5, 3-13, 5-11, 4-12, 6-10, 3-13. It is no wonder in 2022 the Giants will employ their fifth new head coach in a span of 11 years.
Trying to evaluate what comes next can also be a losing proposition. Predict more doom and gloom, and you are, well, a doomsayer. Predict an upswing and you are a pollyanna. The over-under wins total for the Giants, for betting purposes, has been set at 5.5 games. This feels like a fair line of demarcation for the Giants. Given the questions up and down their depth chart, finding a way to go 6-11 in Brian Daboll’s first season seems as if it would qualify as progress. Going 5-12 would not be, no matter the reasons. Climbing to 7-10 or 8-9 would be high-water marks for a team that almost every NFL evaluator views as in a rebuilding mode.
