Getty Daniel Jones #8 of the New York Giants talks with offensive coordinator Jason Garrett before the game against the Kansas City Chiefs.
The New York Giants entered Monday night with an opportunity to put themselves in the mix of the NFC wild-card race while simultaneously slaying the juggernauts of the conference. Instead, they were utterly embarrassed on national television. The Giants were vastly overpowered in all facets of the game, specifically offensively, where they were shut out over the final 30 minutes of play in their 30-10 beatdown at the hands of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
New York’s inept offensive showing, despite having Saquon Barkley, Kenny Golladay and Kadarius Toney all in the lineup, finally pushed the organization and head coach Joe Judge towards a breaking point with offensive coordinator Jason Garrett.
According to Pat Leonard of the New York Daily News, the team has decided to fire Garrett, pulling the plug on the coordinator after 26 games at the helm of New York’s underperforming offense. Senior assistant Freddie Kitchens, who served as the head coach for the Cleveland Browns back in 2019, is expected to man playcalling duties with Garrett gone.
Kitchen’s first taste of action in his new role will come on Sunday, November 28th in a Week 12 divisional showdown with the Philadelphia Eagles — a tall task for Kitchens and the Giants offense, as they’ll look to keep pace with an Eagles offense that has averaged 38 points per game over three of their last four contests.
Judge Gets Blunt on Offense’s Inability to Score
While Big Blue’s (perceived) stars didn’t deliver on Monday night, Judge was adamant about pointing the finger at his coaching staff for their inability to put their players in a position to succeed.
“You can put that down tonight. Got that?” Judge said, via ESPN. “You guys can write that tonight. Players have to execute. That is their job, right? It is our job to teach them. It’s their job to go out and execute, but we’ve got to make sure we put them in position to have success. That has to be consistent, by the way. So, you can go ahead and write that down. I’m not going to debate that.”
11 weeks into the season and the Giants are just one of nine teams who score fewer than 20 points per game offensively. Over Garrett’s complete reign as the team’s OC, the offense averaged just 18.2 points per game.
“We have to do a better job of scoring points,” Judge proclaimed. “I know it sounds pretty obvious and to the point with it. But I’m going to keep it pretty blunt right there. We have to do a better job of putting our players in position to make plays. We have too many good players. We have to put them in better position to capitalize on it. That’s it.”
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The G-Men’s Offensive Woes
The Giants’ offensive struggles go far beyond their ineptitude to cross the goal line. They currently average the 10th fewest total yards in football (322.8 yards per game). They own a bottom-eight rush offense (92.9 yards per game). This, despite the fact that they boast a backfield consisting of a former No. 2 overall pick in Barkley and a player in Devontae Booker who earns an average salary greater than both Jonathan Taylor and James Conner — the league’s top-two leaders in total touchdowns this season.
In the passing game, Daniel Jones’ production has regressed tenfold since leaving the team’s Week 5 loss to the Dallas Cowboys early with a concussion. Over his four games prior to that Dallas bout, Jones averaged 296 yards passing and tossed four touchdowns to just one pick. In his five games since, he’s averaged a mere 188.8 yards through the air and has more interceptions (six) than touchdown passes (five).
We could easily delve into the lackluster output by Kenny Golladay and Evan Engram, or Garrett’s inability to manufacture touches for Kadarius Toney — who is clearly one of football’s most electric athletes. Instead, we’ll just leave you with this tidbit to sum things up: left tackle Andrew Thomas has more receiving touchdowns on the 2021 season than both the Giants’ $72 million receiver and their first-round rookie wideout have combined.