MasterAwesome

So do you truly think there is no team in the NFL who would have offered even a 5th round pick for Darnold last offseason? I assure you teams would fork up more than a 6th round pick for a talented and young QB coming from a disastrous organization in hopes of a miracle reclamation project. Now we can say with confidence that Darnold is just bad, but there was at least a legitimate question before last season as to whether Darnold's struggles were entirely his fault or if the Jets set him up for failure. Keep in mind that the "value" of a player isn't dictated just by outside teams bidding for said player. It's also established by the team with said player (in this case, the Jets) who is determining the price point in which they are comfortable giving a player up. No matter how incompetent you and I and everyone else believe the Panthers' FO to be, you would be crazy to believe that the 2nd + 4th price point was our initial willy-nilly offer to the Jets without any kind of back-and-forth negotiations. That was certainly an overpay and one of the worst trades in team history, but I guarantee you our initial offer was a hell of a lot less than that. That's just common sense 101 negotiating. Just like how ruthless businessman Tepper who was trying to chew Rock Hill for every penny he could get, probably didn't just go up to Rhule and say "here's my very first offer: 7 years $62 million!". But if you genuinely need definitive reporting to substantiate that, then I guess I'm stumped because I don't have that.

Who is "some of you"? Are you under the impression that I said anything positive about Darnold at all or the trade? And if no other team wanted Darnold, we're still ultimately having to bid against the Jets themselves to give them an offer enticing enough to part from him. Let's say we're theoretically the only team to call the Packers inquiring about Jordan Love. That doesn't mean we can all of a sudden offer a 2039 7th round pick and they'll be like "well.....I guess that is technically the best offer on the table...".

First about Shula - remember that "control variable" thing I mentioned? If we had a different OC in 2014 and largely the same roster (most notably, the QB) and the notable difference was that we hired Shula and then all of a sudden we turned from a mediocre/bad offense to the #1 offense in his first year, then hell yeah I'd give Shula mad props. I can also speak much more confidently and with nuance about the Panthers than I can about the 2013-2018 or w/e Giants, so this is a poor analogy to ask me to compare our own OC to one of a different team. I don't presume to have followed the Giants that closely to be able to be able to attribute X% of the Giants' offensive success to McAdoo vs. other variables. You sure as hell are clueless about the Giants too, considering you baselessly overestimated Coughlin's role in their 2014-2015 offense before I had to refute it with 2 seconds of Google searches. All I can do is evaluate the Giants' roster/coaching staff pre-McAdoo and post-McAdoo and consider the significant role of an offensive coordinator to a team's offensive output and make an educated guess about how much of a factor McAdoo was specifically to their offensive turnaround. Manning was a constant, then you're looking at a receiving corps of Hakeem Nicks/Victor Cruz (one of the best 1-2 WR tandems) in 2013 vs. rookie OBJ/Reuben Randle in 2014. I'd call that a wash. So from a purely analytical sense from someone who hasn't watched every Giants game for the past 10 years, the evidence looks promising in favor of McAdoo. That's literally all I've been saying all along...that McAdoo has a small sample size as an NFL OC and it's relatively encouraging. That's the ridiculously controversial statement that you find to be offensive. I'm not even predicting McAdoo to be a good OC for us. As to the bold - yeah I already did that and you're flat out wrong. In many cases it was opposing teams who were down the whole game only to come back because the Giants went conservative on D (sound familiar?). It must be nice to say whatever you want and force the opposition to do all the research to refute it. I've done enough of that so I'll just say you're wrong about this whole "garbage time" narrative...if you want to prove *me* wrong then feel free to actually do some research and come to me with stats. Here's a simple one - the Giants in 2013 had a 60/40 pass/run ratio. The Giants in 2014 had a 57/43 pass/run ratio. So that makes the whole "SUPER BOWL CHAMP Eli Manning airing it out all game" narrative seem a bit questionable. Were only the 2014 and 2015 Giants in garbage time "airing it out" situations but not the 2013 (7-9) Giants? Why the huge discrepancy in offensive performance? I'm also not talking about "all four years" because YOU explicitly started your statement off referencing McAdoo's "pure OC years".

There was that rumor about the 49ers offering a 1st round pick for Darnold before last year's draft. And you can certainly argue that we foolishly overpaid for Darnold, but you'd have to agree that Darnold in all likelihood would have fetched more than Gardner Minshew did (6th round pick) in which case my point would still be valid. That NFL front offices valued Darnold more than Minshew which clearly does not make him the superior QB.

Fair enough. Yes I think it's bad, but I also think emphasizing "what NFL front offices think of you" over actual NFL production puts you in weird territory that leads to conclusions like Sam Darnold (2nd and 4th round pick trade value) > Gardner Minshew (6th round pick trade value) which I think most people would argue is laughable. And again, if we cut Sam Darnold tomorrow and a team signs him as their back-up QB it isn't gonna make me think any more highly of Darnold than if we cut him tomorrow and nobody picks him up.

Such a weird statement....did you even bother looking any of this up before you formulated this opinion? We're talking about the 2015 Giants who lost 8 of their 10 games by one score? That's the team who racked up a bunch of garbage stats to inflate their offensive performance? Yeah, the team probably sucked cause their defense was ranked 30th/32nd (points/yardage). I'm sure you will explain to me how that was McAdoo's fault though. And are we talking about the same "2-time Super Bowl champion Eli" (lol) who went for: -7766 yards, 44 TDs, 42 INTs, 58.7% completion, 78.3 QB rating in the 2 seasons prior to McAdoo -8842 yards, 65 TDs, 28 INTs, 62.9% completion, 92.9 QB rating in the 2 seasons under OC McAdoo That Super Bowl champion Eli? I would be thrilled if we had 1/10th of this turnaround in QB play with McAdoo.

Which I've never argued otherwise. The disconnect is that I personally draw a meaningful distinction between him as HC vs. him as OC. I certainly will factor in his playcalling as a HC in his overall body of work, but it's not a 1:1 comparison to me. Painting it with a broad brush as simply "4 years of playcalling" without any distinction whatsoever comes off as extremely reductive and disingenuous to me. That's what CRA is doing that I am pushing back on - he's weighing them equally as "HC w/ playcalling duties" = "OC". Literally zero difference between the two. Hell, if anything, he's weighing "HC w/ playcalling duties" more heavily than OC which is super weird. OC's do a hell of a lot more with the offense than just calling plays, and head coaches do a hell of a lot more with the team outside of playcalling. Playcalling is one tiny blip in the overlap of the "OC vs. HC w/ playcalling duties" venn diagram.

I couldn't care less whether you're exited (sic) or not about McAdoo. I'm sticking to factual arguments so I'd appreciate it if you'd do the same and stop appealing to emotion in every response. Every time I try to discuss something with you, you pivot to arguing against something someone else said instead of addressing my own personal statements. I am simply curious as to how you reached your conclusion that he's a bottom 1/3 OC in the NFL. To justify that, you suggested 2 "good" years + 2 "horrible" years = poor overall body of work. I asked you how having a Top 6 offense is characterized as a "good" year and having a bottom 7 offense is characterized as a "horrible" year. Clearly that's a meaningful difference, it's not semantics...I shouldn't have to explain this unless you're being intentional dodgy. "Good" and "horrible" are not both hyperbolic - that's the issue. "Horrible" is hyperbolic and you deliberately chose to characterize it that way because otherwise "2 good years + 2 bad years" sounds much less offensive.

Being passed over for OC roles is a part of the overall evaluation but a relatively minor one IMO. I think it sheds some light on how he is perceived in NFL front offices so it's certainly relevant...but ultimately whether a team hires you or not is completely immaterial to your actual abilities. Ron Rivera getting hired by Washington immediately after we fired him didn't make him a better coach than he would have been otherwise if he hadn't gotten any job offers. He still is what he is and always has been, and should be much more significantly evaluated for his actual body of work rather than evaluated based upon the amount of job opportunities that were available to him. Hell, look who our presumed starting quarterback is. Should Darnold get credit for managing to stick around in the league this long? Or rather should we evaluate him for his actual abysmal performance as a QB? I'm guessing the sentiment will be "no because it's the dumb Panthers who gave him another starting opportunity", in which case how about someone like Carson Wentz, Jared Goff, Jimmy Garoppolo, Teddy Bridgewater etc. who are still bouncing around and clinging onto starting opportunities?

Ok I'll need you to explain your strange arbitrary math once again. 2015 OC McAdoo = 6th ranked offense (top 6) = "good" 2016 HC McAdoo = 26th ranked offense (bottom 7) = "horrible" Your intentionally hyperbolic language is dropping your veil of objectivity. And relax, no one said or even insinuated you're a Coughlin superfan. No need to resort to hysterics.

And what exactly are you doing? You're quite clearly dismissing his 2 good years out of 4 (which incidentally are the two most relevant years when evaluating him as Offensive Coordinator), or at the very least discrediting/casting doubt on those years by throwing out baseless speculation that Tom Coughlin was likely behind his success. Do you have any self-awareness? Here's McAdoo's resume: -2 solid years as OC -2 poor years as HC with playcalling duties When evaluating McAdoo as an OC candidate, I think any rational objective person would assign the overall weight something around 75% for his performance as OC and 25% for his performance as play-calling HC. You seem to be doing the opposite: 75% of the weight assigned to play-calling HC and 25% of the weight assigned to his years as OC. Otherwise I don't know how you take the above resume and conclude that McAdoo is a bottom 1/3 OC in the NFL. If I'm being ULTRA charitable to you, those 2 good years and 2 bad years should logically be a wash and put him around the middle, i.e. an average OC. Please make your equation make sense.

These criticisms give me the same energy as people complaining about rich people taking advantage of tax breaks/loopholes on their personal/corporate income taxes. Is it shady, or at the very least terrible optics? Yeah, but the actual problem is with the economic and political systems in place that allow these things to happen. Guys like Tepper (and every other billionaire) are just an inevitable byproduct of these corrupt systems. People furious at Tepper are misdirecting their anger.

He said "6 of the top 8 pass rushers" in the very same post you quoted. That presumably excludes Joey Bosa and Myles Garrett. So the only one you may have contention with is Nick Bosa.

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/15/sports/football/new-york-giants-hire-ben-mcadoo-a-coughlin-assistant-but-his-own-man.html https://nypost.com/2014/10/07/an-inside-look-at-why-and-how-coughlin-turned-over-the-reins/

You realize even with a healthy OBJ in his first year as HC/OC, his offense was 26th in PPG right? I’m not sure why you even need to go into the “without a healthy OBJ” argument. His offenses didn’t perform well while he was the head coach, with or without OBJ. Which is why I’m glad we didn’t hire him as our head coach.

Let me ask you once again: Given the fact that Coughlin + Gilbride produced the 28th ranked offense in 2013, Coughlin + MacAdoo produced the 13th ranked offense in 2014, and Coughlin + MacAdoo produced the 6th ranked offense in 2015…your logical conclusion is that Coughlin was probably the X factor responsible for their offensive turnaround? If Coughlin is pulling the strings for their offense, you would see consistent results from year to year…not a clear drastic improvement from one OC to the next. It’s funny you bring up the term “variables” - are you familiar with the concept of a control variable? Hint: it’s Coughlin. As for your last paragraph…”the narrative in the Giants overly predictable playcalling only appeared when McAdoo was in over his head trying to be the head coach and offensive playcaller”. It’s actually super simple. If I’m a full-time dishwasher at a busy restaurant and my manager comes up to me and says “hey I’m gonna need you to keep washing the dishes but also wait tables cause we’re understaffed, even though you’ve never waited tables before” - guess what, I’m probably not gonna do such a great job washing dishes OR waiting tables. You should look into something called “Occam’s Razor”.

We talking about the same Tom Coughlin who coached the Giants from 2004 to 2015, right? Why would you invoke Tom Coughlin when I’m drawing a clear comparison in offensive performance from 2013 -> 2014 -> 2015 during which Coughlin was the head coach? Is the implication that Coughlin was not involved while Kevin Gilbride was OC but as soon as McAdoo was brought on, Coughlin was like “move aside, figurehead. I got this”. Otherwise Tom Coughlin + Kevin Gilbride = 28th ranked offense, and Tom Coughlin + Kevin Gilbride = Top 10 offense. Not sure how you get Tom Coughlin as being the main factor out of that. I don’t understand all the mental gymnastics in what should be a pretty straightforward evaluation of Ben MacAdoo’s career as an OC. We hired MacAdoo as our OC, not as our HC with playcalling duties. So the logical approach should be “let’s go back and see how MacAdoo did as OC”. And the sample size is small, but promising. That’s it…it’s very simple.

Sure we can't "totally disregard" it. But I mean you have to see the flaws in comparing *HC w/ playcalling duties Ben McAdoo* to *OC Ben McAdoo* though, right? I think by far the simplest and most rational explanation is that first-time HC Ben McAdoo had way too much on his plate in learning to be a head coach while choosing to maintain playcalling duties. It takes a lot of experience to be a head coach and playcaller without one or both of those roles suffering as a result. McAdoo clearly did not have that experience and it was foolish of him to try and juggle both full-time roles. The alternative is that McAdoo came into a 28th ranked offense, transformed it into the 13th ranked offense in his first year as OC, further solidified it into the 6th ranked offense in his second year as OC, then just somehow forgot how to Offense in his third year with the Giants when he just so happened to coincidentally transition into his role as their head coach. Besides, considering you're a big fan of Joe Brady, then you should be really damn excited for McAdoo's offense if it's being characterized as "too predictable" and "running the same plays over and over" lol.

Why dwell on his team's offensive performance while he was HC though? It's not an apples-to-apples comparison; we want to evaluate McAdoo's performance as an OC since that's the role he's serving here. It's logical to think, as HC, he was much more hands-off with his offense than while he was the OC where that'd be his sole focus. I think a more apt comparison is to look at the Giants' offense before and after he was brought on as OC. In 2013 (the year before McAdoo was brought on as OC), the Giants ranked 28th in yardage and 28th in points. In 2014 in McAdoo's first year as OC, the Giants ranked 10th in yardage and 13th in points. In 2015 in McAdoo's second (and final) year as OC, the Giants ranked 6th in points and 8th in yardage. That's a pretty good track record as OC, although fairly limited. I think we can all agree he was a failure as a HC and if Rhule gets fired and McAdoo takes his place full-time (beyond an interim role), I'm gonna be just as disappointed as most everyone else here.

Well yeah of course. McAdoo as a head coach hire should and would be evaluated completely differently than McAdoo as an OC hire. 99% of the board wanted Ron Rivera fired as our coach but I’m pretty sure that same 99% of the board would have loved seeing Rivera as our DC instead.

Burns is good but he seems to largely be the same guy from his rookie season. I don’t really see him having progressed or developed from season to season. Hoping to see him finally take that leap into elite territory this year.

Davis Mills is being pretty disrespected considering his rookie season compared to his fellow rookies like Lawrence, Wilson, and Fields, who Simms is rating 10+ spots higher despite them performing statistically at Darnold-levels of garbage.

There's no way he'd come within 50 miles of the Giants organization as long as Gettleman was there, but since G-magic is "retired" now, Smitty can have a little fun with them.

The draft room high-fiving is always a hot topic on the Huddle lol. I still cringe thinking about the Huddlers who obsessed for months over the clip of the Bills' 2019 draft room high-fiving after we took Greg Little, so they could take Cody Ford...the guy they moved from Tackle to Guard to Bench over the course of three seasons lol. He's basically their Dennis Daley, except they took him with the 38th overall pick. Better than Greg Little? Sure. Bust of a 2nd round pick? Also yep.

The keyword in your post is "maybe". As in there's a lot of uncertainty around Christensen and the team's vision for him, so it's very premature to have any strong opinions about his career outlook. It's pretty funny to me how the narrative around BC after the end of the season went from: "Brady looked like our second best o-lineman, after Moton. Especially later in the season". to "Man I wish the coaching staff played Brady more so we could see what we really have in him. Maybe we could actually have a capable LT on our hands if he had more playing time" to "Brady is looking like a career back-up and a waste of a 3rd round pick" The sentiment towards Brady went from positive -> uncertain -> negative...and here's the hilarious kicker...all during the OFFSEASON while Brady hasn't even done anything on the field I get that part of our opinion on a player is tied to how the coaching staff (i.e. Rhule) uses or views a player, but we're talking about the same guy who has proven to be incompetent? The same guy who not a single person on these boards trusts to exhibit sound judgment? That's the guy whose decisions are going to affect how we view a player?