New York Giants: Breaking Down the Devonta Freeman Signing
After Saquon Barkley tore his ACL on Sunday against the Bears, the New York Giants signed former Falcon, Devonta Freeman.
Coming off a season where he missed three games and saw his play fall off quite a bit from his rookie season, Saquon Barkley hoped to improve in his third year with the New York Giants. Unfortunately for Barkley and the G-Men, the star-running back tore his ACL in week two, and will now be forced to miss the remainder of the season.
With that, the Giants turned around and signed former Falcon, Devonta Freeman. Freeman was once thought to be the future star running back in Atlanta, but after an injury that forced him to miss all but two games in 2018, and then seeing his play fall off in 2019, Freeman was cut by the Falcons as they signed Todd Gurley.
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With that, Gurley went unsigned through the offseason, and now will be tasked with replacing one of the best running backs in the NFL, Saquon Barkley. The good news for the Giants is, he’s put up massive numbers before, and there’s no reason he can’t do it again.
Freeman has rushed for over 1,000 yards twice in his career, in 2015 and 2016, he also rushed for 11 touchdowns both years. However, the last time we saw Freeman on the field was in 2019 when he rushed for only 656 yards and two touchdowns in 14 starts.
In 2019 Freeman averaged just over 13 carries per game for a little north of 46 yards per game. With the Giants, you should expect to see him get around 15-20 carries per game, hopefully for more than 46 yards.
In the first game of the season this year, Saquon Barkley had 15 carries against a strong Pittsburgh defense, which goes to show you the Giants are going to try and make their run game an integral part of their offense. The question is; how will this work with Devonta Freeman?