More than ever, Week 1 of an NFL season has become a fairyland of overreaction. Win the game? Visions of 14-3 and 15-2 can dance through your imagination. Lose? “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, are we ever going to win another game? Can we even win three or four? When is the draft again?”
Happens every year. Usually it’s stupid. The Chiefs lost their first game of the year last year. They decided to go all out. The Jets won their first game last year. Football forensic teams are still trying to figure out how that happened. Week one is football’s foolish time, when players finally get to actually play after the folly of the preseason.
There is no need to jump to conclusions or jump off a bridge.
Normally.
For the second season in a row, the Giants have now unleashed such an enormous stink bomb in their first game – like last year in front of 81,908 disbelieving eyes – that I feel like I would be lying to you, dear reader, if I told you not overreact, not panic, not and you suddenly wonder if you are still reading the same old script.
Was it that bad?
That’s how bad it was. The Vikings were tied 28-28 and the Giants were tied 6-6, and the final 40 minutes of the game felt much like it did a year ago: 40-0 to the Cowboys. The Cowboys won 12 games, though. These Vikings – assuming we don’t get carried away by the overreaction – will have a hard time winning even half that many games. The Giants made that a lot easier for us on Sunday afternoon, though.
“Disappointing game,” said Giants head coach Brian Daboll. “There’s a lot to sort out. We’ll make corrections and get better.”
That sounds like a wonderful plan until you realize what exactly happened. And so we should start with this, in italics and all capitals so you don’t think it’s a joke: THEY WERE FILLETTED AND BROUGHT TO SCHOOL BY SAM DARNOLD.
Yes, Sam Darnold. Darnold was great, completing his first 10 passes, completing 19 of 24, two touchdowns and a ball deflected at the line of scrimmage. Apparently someone forgot to let the ghosts into the building, which was a shame because the defensive line (one sack all day) and the secondary (just as porous as they say) could have used the help.
“They didn’t surprise us,” said Brian Burns (four tackles, zero sacks in his debut for the Giants).
“We knew what they were going to do and they did it,” said Kayvon Thibodeaux, who had four fewer tackles than Burns.
All of this was just an explanation, but if the quiet duo was hoping to mitigate the misfortune everyone was witnessing, it just raises the following question:
You knew what was coming and you Despite it Have you taken part in a boat race?
We have now written 479 words in this column and have not yet mentioned the word “Daniel Jones,” which should give you another idea of how brutal the day was overall, because Jones was –
(I’m looking for a touch of kindness here, because Jones was coming off a season-ending knee injury, so it was expected that he would be rustier than a ’57 Chevy left out in the rain. I’m looking for a soothing adjective. I’m looking, I’m looking, I’m looking…)
— terrible. Jones was terrible. Partly because of his erosion and partly because he had not yet readjusted to the shocking speed of the game.
But honestly, the day mostly looked like the Jones’ greatest hits we’ve seen over the past five years: inaccurate throws, sure, but a troubling mix of bad and disastrous decisions. That starts with the pick-six that Minnesota’s Andrew Van Ginkel brought home 10 yards for the win with over 19 minutes left to play, which ended the exciting part of the afternoon’s program.
“That wasn’t good enough,” Jones said. “We didn’t get in the end zone. I have to play better and give ourselves a chance to make plays.”
Sure, he’ll get a chance next week in Washington, but beyond that, nobody can say. If Daboll benched everyone responsible for this disastrous mess, we might see Dexter Lawrence, Malik Nabers, and 20 new players against the Commanders. Sometimes you have to take a few pinches of salt after Week 1.
And sometimes truth serum is much more appropriate.
