Today is a pretty big game. Not that every game isn’t when you play a 16 game schedule, but today’s game is big in a few different ways.
First off the Giants are on top of the NFC East and can remain there with a win today over Seattle. With Washington and Philly playing each other, the Redskins will either be 4-1 or 3-2 at the end of the day and the Eagles 3-2 or 2-3. With the Cowboys playing the Bengals you can pencil that it as a W for Dallas and they will move to 4-1 on the season. If the Giants can go 5-0 with the Redskins and Eagles beating up on each other, that will put them in pretty good position for the rest of the season. As I always like to mention, that magic number for a playoff spot is 10 wins and right now the Giants have to go 7-6 the rest of the way to get to it. A win today would mean just .500 football the rest of the way gets them in.
The Giants never play good after the bye week. Ever. Aside from winning after the bye week in 2006, you have to go all the way back to the Super Bowl team in 2000 for the last Giants team to win after the bye week.
With the absence of Plaxico Burress today, the G-Men will need Amani Toomer and Steve Smith to step it up and for Domenik Hixon to be at his best. The Giants need to prove that there is more to their passing game than just Plaxico and with the Seattle run defense being one of the best in the league, expect Eli Manning to be getting a good amount of throws in.
Besides the Redskins (who weren’t even close to what they are now when the Giants played them), the Giants have been able to pound on the Rams and Bengals. Now Seattle might be 1-2, but they are just getting their real wide receivers back today and that makes this team a whole new club. This is a team that has been a playoff team year in and year out for a while now and under Mike Holmgren, you can never expect an easy game. Not to mention the last time these teams met, the Giants were absolutely blown out (even if it was two years ago).
The Giants defense will need to be all over Matt Hasselback today now that his receives are healthy and the secondary needs to make sure they don’t get beat for the big play since it is likely that Seattle will be testing some of their wide receivers down field. It is obvious that right now the Giants are the better football team, but this is the exact type of game that the New York Giants lose and anyone who has watched them regularly will tell you the same.
However, I still believe the Giants will put out the win today. This is a game that will show the league they are not just going to pound on the weakest teams of the league. This is a game that a good football team wins and finds a way to win. And the Giants are a good football team.
Giants 31, Seawhawks 13.