The New York Giants Free Agent Signings Will Only Have A Small Impact
In the past few hours, the NFL media and New York Giants fans have proclaimed that the defense is bounded to be much improved with the free agent signings (Janoris Jenkins, Damon Harrison and Olivier Vernon). But in reality, these players will end up having a small impact on the defense unless the Giants decided to alter their offensive philosophy. For the past two years, the New York Giants organization made it a priority to feature Odell Beckham Jr as a focal point of their offense. Due to the fact that when Odell Beckham Jr made his debut for the Giants in October of last year, the Giants were able to finally see what kind of speed he had on the field. They soon realized that provided he had man-to-man against a corner, corners would be unable to keep up with his speed. This time and time again put Eli in a position to throw the ball either over the top of the corner or over the middle of the field, in a position where the defense would have trouble catching up to Odell. Throughout all of last season, the Giants game plan of featuring Odell Beckham Jr as a focal point of their offense is paying off statically but not in terms of win as Odell Beckham Jr continues to blow by corners and catch passes to the tune of 96 catches for 1,450 yards and 13 touchdowns and the Giants offense as a whole is 7th in the NFL in terms of passing yards per game averaging 271.7 yards per game.
The downside to featuring Odell Beckham Jr, as a focal point of their offense is that the Giants have chosen to push their running game and time of possession towards the background, which has led to the defense being on the field more. The Giants offense whole is 19th in the NFL in terms of rushing attempts per game averaging 25.2 rushing attempts per game and 18th in rushing yards per game averaging 100.6 rushing yards per game. On top of that, the Giants are 28th in time of possession averaging 28:20 minutes on the field.
While we all know that the defense has been awful last season, some of the points they’re giving up are due to fatigue from being on the field so much (31:40 minutes). In order for the Giants to be more consistent next year they need to run the ball more than 25.2 times a game, this will allow the defense to have more rest and play better.
