Category: Giants

Giants v. Texans: QB Daniel Jones throws multiple interceptions

Watch #Giants Daniel Jones throws two interception in match v. #Texans

New York Giants Daniel Jones had a tough preseason match against the Texans, the quarterback just signed a new contract with the team this year, battling injury after injury during his fight to remain as QB for the Giants.

Jones has faced a lot of negativity regarding his performance and there was talk the Giants would draft a new rookie quarterback to possibly replace him after last seasons consistency issues and his health-related availability.

Texans safety Jalen Pitre intercepted this throw by Jones in last night’s match, it appears Jones practically threw the ball right to Pitre just outside the end zone, easily allowing Houston to score.

Unfortunately for Jones this wasn’t his only big gaffe in this game, minutes later in the same quarter he threw a second interception, aiming for a teammate under heavy blocking by the Texans cornerback Derek Stingley Jr. on the sidelines way downfield.

Jones able to get things back on track somewhat as the game progressed but the result was still a 28-10 loss to the Texans. He will definitely have to put in some more reps if he is going to be a regular season starter.

Veteran DB Jalen Mills released by Giants

Veteran cornerback Jalen Mills was released by the New York Giants this week after spending his duration with the team on the non-football injury list due to a calf strain and being unavailable to participate in the entire Giants training camp.

Veteran cornerback Jalen Mills was released by the New York Giants this week after spending his duration with the team on the non-football injury list due to a calf strain and being unavailable to participate in the entire Giants training camp.

Mills, who played for the New England Patriots in 2023, and was just signed by the Giants this year, never took the field for his most recent team. His contract guaranteed $300,000, a sum the Giants seem fine parting with since it freed up room to sign safeties Raheem Layne and Jonathan Sutherland.

ESPN’s Adam Schefter broke the news on Jalen Mills this morning on Twitter.

Jalen Mills will likely see a bid soon now that he is a free agent, reports indicate he has recovered from his injury at the time of being released and the Super Bowl Champion with valuable postseason experience has put up a consistent number of tackles in previous seasons for the Philadephia Eagles and New England Patriots.

Tight end Darren Waller retires after one season with Giants

Darren Waller is retiring after eight NFL seasons

The Darren Waller experience with the New York Giants lasted one fruitless season.

The tight end has decided to retire after eight NFL campaigns, the last with Big Blue.

Waller played in 12 games for the Giants, making 52 catches for 552 yards and one touchdown pass.

His first two seasons were with the Baltimore Ravens. He had 12 catches with the AFC North team.

Waller joined the Raiders and made six catches in 2018 before blossoming over 2019 and ’20.

In those two years, he had 197 catches for more than 2,300 yards.

His stats dropped in the final two seasons with the Raiders prior to joining the Giants.

Waller has been in the news this offseason for his divorce from WNBA star Kelsey Plum.

The Xs and Os with Greg Cosell: The making of the modern NFL safety

Greg Cosell and Doug Farrar explore the making of the modern NFL safety, and discuss some of the best safeties in the game today.

In the 2023 NFL season, there were as many great safeties playing most of their snaps in the deep third as there were great safeties playing over 300 snaps each in the box, in the slot, and in the deep third.

More is being asked of safeties than ever before. Now, it’s not about whether you’re best in the box or as a pure free safety. Now, it’s likely that your team will require you to play multiple positions at a plus level just to get and stay on the field. Collegiate defenses are preparing these players for this reality, and when the NFL hits, all one can do is to expand those skills as much as possible.

In this week’s “Xs and Os with Greg Cosell and Doug Farrar,” Greg (of NFL Films and ESPN’s NFL Matchup) and Doug (of Touchdown Wire and the USA Sports Media Group) explore what makes a modern safety, what positions and schemes matter most, and some of the best to do it all these days.

Greg and Doug also attempt to have a rational, nuanced discussion about Trevor Lawrence’s play on the field, as impossible as that may seem these days.

You can watch this week’s “Xs and Os” right here, and like and subscribe on YouTube:

You can also listen and subscribe to the “Xs and Os” podcast on Spotify…

…and on Apple Podcasts.

NFL tight end Darren Waller drops peculiar music video about divorce from Kelsey Plum

Giants TE Darren Waller releases a song about his divorce and it is strange, to say the least

No one seems to know if tight end Darren Waller will continue his football career with the New York Giants, or anyone else.

What seems certain is Waller’s marriage to WNBA star Kelsey Plum won’t be ongoing as they have filed for divorce.

Waller doesn’t seem to be taking the news too well as evidenced by the music video he dropped on Thursday.

It’s different and, um, difficult to enjoy.

Twitter reacted unkindly to the song.

The last word:

New York Giants’ most underrated player: LB Bobby Okereke

In his first season with the Giants, Bobby Okereke turned himself into one of the NFL’s best linebackers.

The Colts selected Okereke in the third round of the 2019 draft out of Stanford, and their defense benefited from his expertise as Okereke got more and more playing time. Still, what Okereke did in his first season with the Giants after signing a four-year, $40 million contract with $21.8 million guaranteed was a bit unexpected.

In Wink Martindale’s defense (now run by Shane Bowen), Okereke simply became one of the NFL’s most efficient and effective linebackers. He had three sacks, 20 total pressures, 105 solo tackles, and 56 stops. In coverage, Okereke allowed 35 catches on 46 targets for 301 yards, 276 yards after the catch, two touchdowns, two interceptions, five pass breakups, and an opponent passer rating of 89.1.

Okereke became a true tone-setter with the Giants, and that should continue even with a new defensive coordinator.

New York Giants’ best draft sleeper pick: Tyrone Tracy Jr., RB, Purdue

Tyrone Tracy, a former receiver turned dynamic running back. could make a big difference in the Giants’ offense.

With Saquon Barkley out of the picture, the Giants had a pre-draft running back rotation of Devin Singletary, 2023 fifth-round pick Eric Gray, and a bunch of “meh” after that. Which means that anyone coming in from the draft would have an opportunity beyond the preseason.

Enter Purdue running back Tyrone Tracy Jr., who at 5′ 11⅛” and 209 pounds, totaled 714 yards, eight touchdowns, 46 forced missed tackles, 14 carries of 15 or more yards, and 36 first downs on just 114 carries. That put Tracy with a yards per carry average of 6.3 — another arbiter of his big-play potential and ability to run with power. Tracy can also catch the ball. In fact, before he was a running back at Purdue, he was a receiver at Iowa, and he actually made big plays in that garbage fire of an offense. Not bad for a guy who was there with the 166th overall pick in the fifth round.

“He’s a former receiver. In terms of yards per carry, he’s been pretty good,” head coach Brian Daboll said of his newest running back. “He’s an athlete who has played receiver and then played running back and has some good production. We’ll throw him in the mix. Whether that’s in the kickoff return game or whether that’s at running back or the receiving part of it, we’ve got to do a good job of getting him in here and seeing where he’s at and then trying to fit him into the things that he can do well.”

2024 NFL Schedule: League announces slate of five international games

The NFL has announced its five international games for the 2024 season, and here they all are.

The NFL is planning five different games for the 2024 regular season in its international slate, and the league announced all five on Wednesday morning. The entire schedule will be announced at 8:00 p.m. ET Wednesday evening.

This season’s slate of International Games will begin in São Paulo, Brazil on Friday night of Week 1 of the regular season. The Green Bay Packers will take on the Philadelphia Eagles on Friday, Sept. 6 at 8:15 PM ET.

The Minnesota Vikings will kick off the league’s return to Europe on Sunday, Oct. 6, as they play the New York Jets at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium — the only purpose-built NFL stadium outside of the U.S.

The following Sunday, Oct. 13, also at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, the Chicago Bears will play the Jacksonville Jaguars.

The London focus then shifts to Wembley Stadium as the Jaguars take on the New England Patriots on Sunday, Oct. 20.  This is the second time Jacksonville will play back-to-back games in the U.K., marking the team’s 12th and 13th regular season games in London.

The Carolina Panthers will play the New York Giants in Munich at Allianz Arena — Home of FC Bayern Munich on Sunday, Nov. 10 as part of the NFL’s commitment to playing regular season games in Germany.

“We are delighted to announce these exciting matchups across London and Munich, in addition to the historic first game in São Paulo, Brazil, to complete the 2024 International Games slate,” said NFL Executive Vice President, Club Business, Major Events & International Peter O’Reilly. “As the league and its 32 teams continue to prioritize international growth, we look forward to building on the incredible fan experiences seen in Europe while taking the game to new fans in South America.”

Ex-Giant Pete Hall, 85, sentenced to five years in prison

An 85-year-old former New York Giant Pete Hall has been sentenced to five years in prison

Clyde Hall played in 1961 for the New York Giants after a college football career at Marquette.

Hall, who had two receptions for 22 yards in his NFL career, is now 85. He turned that age on Feb. 28.

Hall was sentenced to five years in prison Monday for trying to sell fentanyl-laced drugs to an undercover cop in 2021.

Per the New York Post:

Clyde “Peter” Hall, 85, was sentenced to a minimum of five years in prison Monday by Manhattan Federal Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil after he took a plea deal last year admitting to slinging the drugs while he was out on “compassionate release” in a financial fraud case.

Hall has spent much of his post-football career in trouble with the law. Per his Wikipedia page:

He was arrested in 2010 for investment fraud after stealing more than four million dollars from investors, and his wife was arrested along with him for the scheme. He spent over a decade defrauding people. Hall had defrauded investors with fake letters from big banks, stole $80,000 from an ex-wife, and filed phony bankruptcy claims. For this crime, he was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

He was also arrested in the past for wire fraud and other offenses. Hall was released from prison into home confinement due to the pandemic, and while in home confinement he arranged for a cocaine deal with undercover agents and was arrested once again in his apartment in April 2021.

The buyer was an informant working with the Drug Enforcement Administration, prosecutors have said.

His attorney, Jason Goldman, offered a strange sentiment after the plea deal for Hall, who has been locked up since his arrest.

“The Court today saw Mr. Hall for who he truly is, an 85-year-old man who deserves to spend his final years surrounded by family, not prison walls,” Goldman said. “We are grateful that the absolute minimum sentence was handed down.”

 

The Xs and Os with Greg Cosell: Wrapping up NFL free agency for 2024

2024 NFL free agency is just about in the books, so it’s time for Greg Cosell and Doug Farrar to analyze the biggest transactions in the second wave.

Now that most of NFL free agency for the 2024 league year is in the bag — though there are a few helpful players still on the open market — it’s time for Greg Cosell of NFL Films and ESPN’s NFL Matchup, and Doug Farrar of Touchdown Wire, to recap the biggest and most important moves in the second wave of this free agency phase. Greg and Doug covered the first day of free agency last week in the Xs and Os; here’s the conclusion.

Among the discussion points:

  • What does Brian Burns bring to a Giants defensive line that already has Kayvon Thibodeaux and Dexter Lawrence?
  • Can Justin Fields become the best version of himself in the Steelers’ offense?
  • Conversely, can Kenny Pickett turn his career around with the Eagles?
  • How can Calvin Ridley use his true X-Iso skill set to ramp up the Titans’ offense?
  • Can the Texans’ addition of Danielle Hunter, along with Will Anderson Jr. and Denico Autry, make Houston’s defensive line a Super Bowl-level group?
  • What can Hollywood Brown do for the Chiefs?
  • Tyron Smith is a future Hall of Famer, but what will he be able to do for the Jets’ offensive line in the short term?
  • Chase Young has been an inconsistent pass-rusher throughout his NFL career; can he turn it around with the Saints?
  • The Lions made important additions to their defensive line and their secondary; can all that put them over the top?
  • The Falcons already have a ton of weapons for new quarterback Kirk Cousins. How will the addition of receiver Rondale Moore affect what looks like one of like the NFL’s most explosive offenses (in theory, at least)?

You can watch this week’s “Xs and Os” right here:

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You can also listen and subscribe to the “Xs and Os” podcast on Spotify…

…and on Apple Podcasts.