This appears just the kind of late regular season spot where a team like the New York Giants can visit someone in search of a playoff spot and upset them in front of their home fans. The game in question this week takes place at Caesars Superdome in New Orleans where the Saints will look to keep pace or take a lead over the two teams they are tied with for the lead in the NFC South Division, the Atlanta Falcons and Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
The Giants were a surprise playoff team last year and paid for that unexpected success in 2022 with a disastrous start to their current campaign. They lost to the Dallas Cowboys at home in their opener, 40-0, and captured only one win before beating the Washington Commanders in a late October matchup.
In New York, fans of the two home teams were wondering which of their franchises was the worst in football and which one was second worst in the league. Both had quarterback problems, the Jets had lost their savior on his first series of downs when Aaron Rodgers suffered an Achilles tear. The Giants had paid their signal caller, Daniel Jones, franchise quarterback money based pretty much solely on last year's work.
Jones was off to a horrible start and the Jets were proving one more time that Zach Wilson was a draft day mistake when they made him the second overall pick two years ago. And the Giants appeared to have paid the price of a Mercedes only to find a used Ford in their driveway.
When the Giants and Jets met a couple days before Halloween, fans of both teams thought the game might be spooky … and it was. Both teams looked like the struggling franchises they were and one had to win, it turned out to be the Jets, 13-10.
The next week, the Giants opened November with a road game against a Las Vegas franchise that had just fired their head coach and general manager and benched their starting quarterback. Still, the Raiders were able to slam the Giants like they were roadkill, 30-6, and the man that won coach of the year honors last season, Brian Daboll, now had New York fans calling for his head.
One might have thought this was rock bottom for the Giants, but it wasn’t. In the Raiders defeat the Giants also lost their quarterback to a season ending Achilles injury and had to turn to an untested rookie the following Sunday when they met the Cowboys in Dallas. Tommy Devito looked totally overmatched by the game and the Giants lost for a second time to Mike McCarthy’s Cowboys.
New York was hoping for a result better than their 40-0 opening day loss to Dallas. Didn’t happen, unless you consider cutting the losing margin to 32 points an improvement. The Cowboys gundowned the Giants, 49-17.
That has to be rock bottom?
Right?
Right.
The following week they got a win over the Washington Commanders and followed that triumph with victories on both sides of their bye week against the New England Patriots and last Monday night’s spear to the Green Bay Packers playoff hopes, 24-22.
That undrafted quarterback that replaced Jones is now touted as a cult figure in New York after engineering three straight wins. The calls for Daboll’s head have subsided and the Giants are rolling into New Orleans with hopes of a fourth straight win.
So, is this a perfect spot for a Giants victory to douse the playoff hopes of another team?
No.
What? I thought it was.
Upset wins by bad teams occur when least expected, the Giants are no longer at rock bottom, but rather riding the crest of three straight wins. This serves two primary reasons that favor the home team in the Big Easy this week. First, New Orleans is taking the Giants more seriously in their preparation based on New York’s recent success, and second, the point spread is sliced to a more manageable number to beat.
Qoxhi Picks: New Orleans Saints (-6) over New York Giants