The Giants stink, and that's the plane truth
Empty seats are seen in the first half of a game between the Giants and the New Orleans Saints at MetLife Stadium on Sunday. Credit: Jim McIsaac
They played an NFL game at MetLife Stadium on Sunday. Interesting things happened, down to the final seconds. Unheralded players tried hard, and some excelled.
The Giants lost, obviously, this time 14-11 to the mediocre Saints.
But really, the story was how little any of it mattered.
For decades, the minimum standard for the Giants, usually attributed to the late co-owner Wellington Mara, was playing meaningful games in December.
And here it was the first home Sunday of the month, on a reasonably nice weather day at 1 p.m., and tens of thousands of folks opted not to bother showing up.
A couple of hours before kickoff, many tickets could be had on the resale market for less than $10.
By the time the Saints’ Bryan Bresee blocked Graham Gano’s would-be tying field goal in the final seconds, most of the fans who did attend were long gone.
That was a statement in itself, of course, but the day’s loudest, most memorable statement was made eloquently long before kickoff.
Someone flew a plane near the stadium trailed by a banner that read, “MR MARA ENOUGH — PLZ FIX THIS DUMPSTER FIRE.”
This time the Mr. Mara was John, the team president, not his father, Wellington.
But as every Giants fan of a certain age immediately recalled, the banner echoed a similar one in 1978, at a low point in team history.
That time the message that flew over Giants Stadium was “15 YEARS OF LOUSY FOOTBALL . . . WE’VE HAD ENOUGH.”
By the time the next season started, George Young had been installed as general manager. The Giants eventually went on to win four Super Bowls and return to excellence.
Now this. They are 2-11 overall and 0-7 at home and have lost eight games in a row entering next week’s seemingly hopeless task against the Ravens at MetLife.
Of course, there is a potential upside to this in that the Giants and Raiders are tied for the worst record in the league, so in theory this pain could pay off in a franchise-changing talent at or near the top of the 2025 draft.
But that always is a crapshoot. Will Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders be a generational talent or a sideshow? Who knows?
In the meantime, the embarrassment is overwhelming, made worse by the fact that this is the Giants’ 100th season, which was supposed to be a yearlong celebration.
Understandably, the Giants were in no mood to delve into the plane thing after their latest devastating loss.
“I’d say, look, we’ve won two games,” coach Brian Daboll said. “So I’m not happy, either.”
Was he embarrassed by the incident? “I’m just disappointed that we lost this game,” he said.
Brian Burns declined to comment, as did Malik Nabers, other than to note that he did not pay for the plane. (Now that would have been quite a story!)
Quarterback Drew Lock said he did not see the banner but added, “That’s going to pretty far lengths to try and take a message.”
What does he think about it as a player?
“In one ear, out the other,” Lock said. “Not going to affect me tonight. Not going to affect me tomorrow. Got to come in. It’s not going to affect any of us. Got to come back to work.
“We’ve got another game Sunday against a really good football team, and if we’re worrying about that, they’ll come in and get after us.”
Few expected the Giants to be a good team this season, but no one expected it to get quite this bad. If they lose out and finish 2-15, they will rewrite the franchise record book for futility.
It is difficult to believe how bad things have gotten for a franchise that in the early 2010s was viewed as a model of stability under Mara, coach Tom Coughlin and quarterback Eli Manning.
Coughlin and Manning can’t be blamed for this mess, but Mara increasingly is taking heat from fans, as he should be. Super Bowl XLVI was a long time ago.
At least there was one happy Giants fan in the building: Saints interim coach Darren Rizzi grew up a fan of the team in northern New Jersey and had dozens of friends and relatives in the house for his big moment.
Rizzi was 8 when the original 1978 banner flew, on Dec. 10 during a game the Giants actually won against the Cardinals, 17-0.
On Sunday, they could not even match that minimal standard.
Two more meaningless December home games to go.
It’s not too late to get your tickets for the Week 17 game against the Colts. As of Sunday night, there were plenty available for less than $10.
Neil Best first worked at Newsday in 1982, returned in 1985 after a detour to Alaska and has been here since, specializing in high schools, college basketball, the NFL and most recently sports media and business.