New York Giants: A couple of thoughts about the coach and his QB
By A. Mazzolini
For any pro football fan in a couple of days the center of your universe will shift from wherever it is now to Indianapolis, where a week from this Sunday the
and the
will face off in Super Bowl XLVI, in a rematch from four seasons before. If you are watching/listening/reading any of the main stream media outlets you will know of the many side stories that are coming out this match up. In this first (of hopefully many) post about the Giants going to the Super Bowl I am going to touch on a couple of these storylines: the quarterback and the head coach.
First off the head coach, Tom Coughlin, who not many know is a Syracuse alumni, where he played halfback and was a team mate of Larry Csonka and Floyd Little. Of him you can say that he has been fired in the public opinion forums so many times without ever being let go officially from New York. If you are someone who follows the team that calls the Meadowlands home can you recall how many times you thought that just in this season the head man of the team was out the door? Some wanting him out when the season was done, some thinking that he should be gone sooner to give a chance to the team. Now, with one game left, coach Coughlin seems set to stay at the helm of the Giants for a while whatever the outcome is.
For coach Coughlin, who has headed the Giants for eight seasons now (74-54 and 7-3 in the PO’s), he has been been put on the proverbial “hot seat” a lot more than most any other coach in the National Football League for someone who has has one losing season (his first with the squad) and has been to the post season five out of eight years. While I believe that winning his second Super Bowl will put the coach on a new level, the thought I have is this: what will a loss do for a head man who seems to always be on his way out the door?
Now for the quarterback, Eli Manning, who is not just playing against the New England Patriots in the last game of the season, but against a lot of comparisons. The one thing that pops into my mind when thinking of Eli is that he is going to play in the field that his older brother Peyton has called home for such a long time, but might not be doing so next season. I know that all these players are professionals, but you have to wonder just for a second if this is not going to be on Eli’s mind as he steps on the turf in Lucas Oil Stadium. And still thinking about the Eli/Peyton connection, how many of the national analysts are beginning to hint that if the younger of the two brothers wins this Super Bowl he will be in someways a better QB than the older one? While I am not sure if that can be said overall, when it comes to the post season that statement, with a win next Sunday, could be something I agree with.
With the Super Bowl being the game that a lot of non football fans watch having someone like Eli Manning in the spotlight is going to be a good thing, since he has shown that you do not have to be super in the first couple of years of their career to be a star down the line. Manning, who was picked first overall 8 seasons ago, will be going up against a quarterback who was picked in the sixth round and has become the QB most any team would want. Two quarterbacks, coming from two different roads, are now going to face off once again on the biggest stage the pro football has, with both needing this game in their own way, while neither truly need it to certify their talents in their position. In the end Manning is going to play for a lot of things when the Giants face off against the Pats in two Sundays, and while some he will have control whether he can beat them or not, others he will not, and that has to weigh on him as the days count down to Super Bowl XLVI.