Giants Keep On Winning

When you've had to watch your college team go through the motions and become a complete embarrassment, especially on offense, as we have recently, it makes watching your favorite pro team (if they're good) quite satisfying. Even if they're not world-beaters, or even if they have a mediocre game... they often find ways to still move the ball, capitalize on mistakes by the other team, etc. Good teams do those sorts of things. Even average teams do it sometimes.

I was somehow lucky enough to see the fourth quarter of the Giants-Steelers game yesterday because the Texans game here in Houston had ended and for some reason the NYG-PIT game was running long, so Fox -- in an uncharacteristically intelligent move for broadcast television -- put the rest of this game on.

The Giants had been anemic in the red zone, coming away with just four field goals through 4 minutes into the fourth quarter. Eli wasn't looking sharp and the Steelers defense looked positively stout.

However, the Steelers emergency long snapper, James Harrison, snapped the ball about ten feet over the punters head and out of the end zone for a safety, tying the score and giving the Giants life.

Side note: I love this quote from Harrison after the game:

"I was nervous about snapping for the first time in a game," Harrison said. "But my feeling was that even if I shot it over his head, we still had a chance to stop them."

Isn't that awesome? I'm sure it wasn't said as cavalierly as it appears in print, but that just makes me laugh. You know, he figured, even though it's a close game where points are at a premium, snapping it out of the end zone and blowing our lead -- and then having to kick the ball to the Giants -- would be okay.

Anyway, the Giants took the ball and went down the field, with Eli hitting TE Kevin Boss for the go-ahead TD and, after Ben Roethlisberger (who I'm sorry, is as overrated a QB as there is in football) failed to move the Steelers at all in two more possessions, wound up winning and moving to 6-1.

Quietly moving to 6-1, I might add. On The Sports Reporters Sunday morning, Bob Ryan of the Boston Globe said that if the Giants didn't win this game, people were going to start saying, "See, they did get lucky for three weeks last year."

How do you figure, Bob? That's among the most idiotic things I've heard yet about the Giants. Sure, people don't think they were the best team last year... that's true, and I'm fine with it. But they were 5-1, heading into a tough place to win -- against another 5-1 team! And if they don't win that, then they're.... a fraud? Hard to follow, Bob.

Anyway, yes, here they are -- the Giants, in the widely-agreed toughest division in the NFL, leading with a 6-1 record. And yet nobody seems to think they're real good. And I guess that's fine. Truth is, when I looked at this season, I decided that a 10-6 record was possible and that I'd actually be really happy with that because it should get them into the playoffs where, as they showed, anything can happen. And despite being 6-1, I still think I'd be happy with 10-6. Sure, the New York papers will blast them if they go 4-5 the rest of the way, but with the brutal schedule they have, that wouldn't be so bad.

I'm just totally rambling now, but it's better than focusing on Purdue football.