These 2 signing have pushed New York Giants backwards

One critical flaw that most NFL leadership makes manifests itself in the football equivalent of “throwing good money after bad”.  And this flaw may continue to bite the New York Giants in the rear end this season.

Before we get into a discussion of the players who will seemingly hamstring the New York Giants for the remainder of the 2018 NFL season, understand that general manager Dave Gettleman and head coach Pat Shurmur are not infallible. Having said that, both gentleman are veteran football guys, and they aren’t expected to make rookie mistakes either.

Now that we’ve gotten that matter out-of-the-way, we must address the idea of bringing in mediocre performers via free agency. In the case of the New York Giants, they brought in mediocre performers to fill key roles this season. Thus far, the results aren’t just mixed, they’re downright lousy.

But show us an NFL staff, and we’ll show you a group of men who think they always hold the keys to the castle. As much as we want to think coaching is objective, it never is. Good coaches remain good coaches because they rarely let subjectivity get in the way of objectivity.

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Even the great New York Giants general manager George Young fell victim to this malady. How many Super Bowls would Big Blue have won if Bill Belichick became their head coach after Bill Parcells?

In some cases, do we see Gettleman and Shurmur leaning to the more subjective than objective in their decisions?

There are several examples to which we can point that offer proof. For example, running back Jonathan Stewart came directly from the Carolina Panthers, Gettleman’s former team. And while Stewart appears to be a poor signing by the GM, it makes no sense to focus on back-ups while Rome is burning.

More importantly, the New York Giants invested money and time into two starters, who at this point seem like absolute busts: guard Patrick Omameh and linebacker Kareem Martin.

Ironically, both players have similar three-year, $15 million contracts, according to Spotrac. In the case of Martin, there is an out-clause after this season that would cost the New York Giants about $2.3 million in 2019 dead cap space.

For Omameh, the out clause comes after two seasons, and costs the Giants only $1.5 million in 2020 dead cap space. But that only means that including bonus, Omameh makes $6.625 million next season. Pricey stuff for the results we’ve seen.

According to Spotrac:

"“Patrick Omameh signed a 3 year, $15,000,000 contract with the New York Giants, including a $4,500,000 signing bonus, $10,050,000 guaranteed, and an average annual salary of $5,000,000. In 2018, Omameh will earn a base salary of $900,000, a signing bonus of $4,500,000 and a workout bonus of $100,000, while carrying a cap hit of $2,500,000 and a dead cap value of $10,100,000.”"

The wisdom of signing both Martin and Omameh to a generous contracts flies in the face of logic, no matter how this situation is sliced and diced.

Keep your guard down

Even with the unsteady presence of Ereck Flowers at right tackle, Omameh has become the unquestioned weak link on the offensive line. According to the football evaluation website, Pro Football Focus, Omameh has garnered a 50.8 grade in two games this season. Last season, he came in with a 62.9 grade on a very good Jacksonville Jaguars team. His signing wasn’t a case of bringing a blue chip player to fill a need.

Omameh replaced incumbent right guard John Jerry this season, almost immediately after signing a free agent contract. In four seasons with Big Blue, Jerry certainly wasn’t proficient, but he wasn’t the liability that Omameh appears to be.

With center Jon Halapio being lost for the season with a broken ankle, right now options are limited, but they do exist. In the short-term, John Greco takes over at center. But the team has both veteran Spencer Pulley and rookie Evan Brown waiting in the wings. According to Pro Football Reference, Pulley started 16 games at center last season for the Los Angeles Chargers.

Pulley was pulled off of the waiver wire at final cuts earlier this month. He’s relatively young (25 years old) with 32 NFL games under his belt. Don’t expect Shurmur to dive into a right guard change immediately. He’ll likely wait until settling on a long-term solution at center, and Pulley seems to be a viable option at both center and guard.

In a perfect world, we can hope that Brown takes hold of the center position, and Pulley can solve the problem at guard. This set-up at least gives Giants fans hope for the future.

No bang for the buck

As bad as the news is at right guard, believe it or not, the news is worse for linebacker Kareem Martin. After two games, Martine receives a 38.7 PFF grade. For those following along, that’s dead last (99th) for edge defenders in the NFL.

In reality, there can’t be any plausible excuse for a player who came from James Bettcher’s previous team – the Arizona Cardinals – through free agency. There’s no acclimation to a new scheme, there’s no misinterpreting of assignment. Is that supposed to be a benefit of free agency?

In fact, this situation may play out worse because it would seem that Martin keeps rookie Lorenzo Carter off the field. For the record, Carter grades out to 64.3 in 45 snaps, per PFF. Meanwhile, Martin has appeared on the field for a total of 108 snaps, so it seems that there are times when both are on the field at the same time. PFF considers Martin to be the left outside linebacker in the base defense, while Carter becomes the left defensive end in the nickel package.

Although the snap count remains a bit skewed, Carter grades out favorably against Martin in all defensive aspects: pass rush (57.5 v. 56.1), run defense (59.0 v. 28.7) and coverage (69.8 v. 68.0). The run defense grade seems especially breathtaking given the fact that it was supposed to be Martin’s strength.

Very simply, Carter may very well be the present and the future on the New York Giants defense.

Overall, these two scenarios highlight the cautionary tale of a competitive rebuild. Look no further than the New York Jets to highlight an impending problem for Big Blue. According to Spotrac, the Jets have over $105 million in available cap space in 2019. This windfall goes along with with their franchise quarterback, Sam Darnold.

Conversely, the Giants have less than $21 million in available cap space. And their quarterback will be 38-years old on January 3rd.  The bed appears to have been made for this season, and hard decisions must be weighed carefully moving forward, or the entire operation threatens to spiral out of control quickly.

For more grades, advanced statistics and more at Pro Football Focus, subscribe to PFF’s EDGE or ELITE subscriptions at ProFootballFocus.com.