Andrew Thomas must play left tackle for NY Giants from day one

The NY Giants drafted Andrew Thomas to be their left tackle of the future, and as such, he needs to be playing there from day one.

I can’t believe how much I’ve seen and read on the internet from NY Giants’ fans proposing Andrew Thomas start off his career at left tackle, while the ever-struggling Nate Solder holds down right tackle.

Even if this was a playoff-ready team, that argument would still be foolish as Andrew Thomas was so heavily invested in to be the left tackle for the next decade, so he should be learning that specific job from day one to maximize his potential.

Additionally, unless Thomas turns out to be a huge bust (which I put at about a 0% chance), he’s already better than Nate Solder, anyway. Nate Solder was given his chances – along with boatloads of cash – to command the left side of the offensive line and he failed, miserably — time to move on.

As I explained earlier, Solder should be worried about even getting to start at right tackle as he’ll have his hands full in a true competition with Cam Flemming, and even Matt Peart to an extent.

Solder has done enough to hurt this franchise in the last few seasons, the last thing we need him to do now is to stunt the development of one of our most important assets.

This being a rebuilding year only adds fuel to the fire of this argument, as what better time for Thomas to work out struggles – if he even has any – than now.

The NY Giants are planning on seriously competing as the plan progresses in 2021 and beyond (although you never know, they could shock the world this year of course), so how would it make sense to make him switch positions in year two when the team is actually finally in a position to potentially be a playoff team?

Short answer — it wouldn’t.

So how would the NY Giants’ offensive line look?

Right now, no one really knows what the NY Giants’ offensive line will look like outside of a few positions. As discussed above, Andrew Thomas should be locked in as the left tackle and I think Joe Judge, Jason Garrett, and offensive line coach Marc Colombo will be smart enough to realize that.

After that, Will Hernandez is plugged in at left guard, while Kevin Zeitler is set in stone at right guard. The two positions that no one is sure about are center and right tackle, and we’ve discussed that here at length, as well.

For my money, I’d like to see rookie Shane Lemieux get the nod at center should he prove he is capable of making the position switch. Although he played guard in college, the NY Giants drafted him in the fifth round with the full intention to try him out at center first.

Lastly, I’d love to see Nick Gates man the right tackle position. He’s obviously also going to be competing at center, but should he lose that battle due to inexperience, or the team just feels him playing at right tackle gives the line the strongest alignment, then in my mind, that’s the way to go.

We’ll see how it all shakes out, but the first domino that has to fall along the offensive line is Andrew Thomas being penciled in at left tackle.