New York Giants find their defensive leader with Blake Martinez

What the Giants get

As they say, sometimes the best ability is availability. Martinez is as durable as they come in this brutal game, starting all 16 regular-season games for three consecutive years in Green Bay. He was on the field for at least 93 percent of his team’s defensive snaps during that span.

Known as a tackling machine, Martinez ranked second in the entire league in total tackles the past two seasons after tying with Preston Brown and Joe Schobert for most in the NFL in 2017. He averaged 147.6 tackles per season between 2017 and 2019. Last year he had 97 solo and 155 combination tackles.

There is something to be said for making contact. Even if he didn’t always wrap up his opponent, Martinez could still put a big hit on the ball carrier. A good part of that had to do with positioning and setting up the defense for success.

Martinez will prove to be an instant upgrade over Ogletree and improve the New York Giants defense overall. Aside from actually getting to the ball, missing tackles was somewhat of a specialty for the Giants defensive unit last year. An inability to take down a rusher was one of the main contributing factors to the New York Giants D ranking 20th in rushing yards allowed per game and yielding the fourth most rushing touchdowns last year.