Andrew Thomas inks rookie deal with NY Giants

After the NY Giants started their week off by receiving terrible news, Monday has ended on a positive note as Andrew Thomas officially inked his rookie contract.

Finally, some good news for the NY Giants!

Although it’s extremely rare for a rookie to holdout these days due to the contract amounts being slotted to where the player is picked – aka there isn’t much to argue about – getting rookies in camp on time is pivotal in a wild offseason like this.

To be fair, Andrew Thomas specifically was never going to be a holdout risk anyway and had already reported to camp without signing a contract in a show of good faith earlier in the week.

Daniel Jones has to be smiling ear to ear as Andrew ‘The Mountain’ Thomas is now signed on to protect his blindside for at minimum the next four years. Selecting a quarterback and a left tackle in the top six in back-to-back years is smart drafting from a positional value and salary cap standpoint, and should they do their jobs they will be the two most vital parts of this arduous rebuild.

https://twitter.com/allforgod_55/status/1287876044528054273

The NY Giants have decent depth at most positions and a fair amount of talent, but the franchise lacks game-breakers and true difference makers. Make no mistake about it, even if they aren’t touching the football, offensive lineman can be game-breakers and Andrew Thomas should be just that for Big Blue.

Just think back to even last year where the NY Giants were a poor team overall and add a solid left tackle to that equation; you probably add two wins, as poor offensive line play is what held the Giants back the most in 2019.

If Daniel Jones was able to throw for a near NFL rookie record 24 touchdowns in just 12 games behind that porous unit, just imagine what he’ll do in the future with Andrew Thomas leading the way and offensive line coach Marc Colombo pushing all the right buttons.

My primary draft target for the NY Giants from day one, I give Dave Gettleman a ton of credit for not wavering from the tape and feeding into the noise of the ‘mock draft experts’ who, for the most part, slid Thomas outside of the top ten for seemingly no reason at all.

Was his 40 time spectacular? No, but let me know the next time you see an offensive tackle running 40 yards in a straight line down the field.

Until then, I’ll take a guy like Andrew Thomas who allowed less than a pressure per game in the SEC 24/7/365.

What will the NY Giants end up paying Andrew Thomas?

As earlier stated, the amount rookies will end up earning is already slotted based on where they were drafted, so there was never anything to negotiate there.

According to Ian Rapoport of the NFL Network, Thomas will haul in $32M over his four-year fully-guaranteed (gulp: DeAndre Baker) contract, with $21M paid upfront as a signing bonus.

Via Twitter:

Unlike his former Georgia Bulldog teammate, DeAndre Baker, the NY Giants should have nothing to worry about in the character department so shelling out $21M upfront is not fret over when it comes to the rock-solid Andrew Thomas.

If there ever is any kind of rookie holdout these days, it’s usually over “offset language”, which in a nutshell describes what would happen and which team would pay what should said prospect be cut a few years into their rookie deal; we shouldn’t have anything to worry about with Thomas in that regard, either, as he’s got a crazy high floor and he doesn’t seem to carry that sort of loser’s mindset, anyway.

It’s been a crazy week in the NY Giants organization, but as we move forward and away from the DeAndre Baker and Aldrick Rosas situations, we can begin to focus our attention on the young talent that this team possesses.

Andrew Thomas is at the forefront of that, as it looks like we have a 5-10 year rock-solid starting left tackle on our hands to pair with a blue-chip quarterback and runningback.

This offense should be fun to watch this year.