The Patriots have been throwing around contracts like they’re Mardi Gras beads. The Jets spent big money on the receiver and edge rusher they so desperately needed. The Super Bowl champion Bucs found a ton of cap room to re-sign most of their team, apparently under Tom Brady’s pillow. Even the Rams, Titans, Bengals, and so many others found a way to sign players to expensive deals.
And the Giants ... what, backup running back Devontae Booker and fullback Cullen Gillaspia wasn’t exciting enough?
If you were expecting the Giants to join the wild spending party, you probably should have lowered your expectations from the start. They didn’t have the salary cap space to be big spenders, and they still don’t after clearing $8 million by re-signing Leonard Williams to a long-term deal. They certainly can create more by cutting the pay of tackle Nate Solder and maybe restructuring the contracts of cornerback James Bradberry, linebacker Blake Martinez, or receiver Sterling Shepard. And they still might in the next day or two.
But this was always the Giants’ plan going in: See if they could sign one expensive free agent, if the market dragged the right player’s price down enough. They looked into linebacker Leonard Floyd before he re-signed with the Rams for four years and $64 million, according to a source. They’ve checked in on receiver Kenny Golladay, a source said, in case he has to lower his price in what has been a bad market for receivers.
But their more likely plan has always been to shop the bargain bin for important role players or take some inexpensive shots on low-risk, high-reward players. They’ll also check out the second wave of free agency where prices of decent players are always low.
That’s exactly what they’re doing, by the way. And when it comes to free agency, that’s not a terrible approach.
Or did everyone forget the lessons of the Eagles’ famous “Dream Team” back in 2011. Or how about the 2016 Giants who went on an uncharacteristic free-agent spending spree. They signed a slew of players like defensive end Olivier Vernon (five years, $85 million, $52.5 million guaranteed), cornerback Janoris Jenkins (five years, $62.5 million, $28.8 million guaranteed), and defensive tackle Damon Harrison (five years, $46.25 million, $24 million guaranteed). And for one glorious year they even got a playoff berth out of it.
After that, the contracts weighed the franchise down like an anchor, especially as their production dropped and the attitudes of some of them helped split the locker room in two. Within two years, the Giants had fired their GM and their coach and couldn’t wait to unload the deals so they could rebuild again.
Was it worth it for one humiliating playoff loss?
It has been proven over and over again that the best way to build a team in the NFL is through the draft, using free agency to selectively plug holes here and there – the way the Giants did a year ago with expensive, but reasonable deals for key players like Bradberry and Martinez. This year, ideally, they would’ve liked to add a few more, but the pandemic took about $30 million off the projected salary cap -- $30 million the Giants always figured they’d have to spend.
So without that, they wait. And that’s OK. Last year they waited almost until the season started before signing safety Logan Ryan and that worked out pretty well. There are still plenty of good players available, while available cap space around is shrinking. Pretty soon a lot of good players are going to be eager to take one-year, prove-it deals.
And in the mean time, the Giants filled some holes. You might not care that they gave defensive tackle Austin Johnson a one-year, $3 million deal, but he was a good player last year and they need depth at that spot after losing Dalvin Tomlinson. Booker’s deal only took up $2.5 million in cap space, which isn’t far from what they would’ve had to pay Wayne Gallman or Dion Lewis to back up Saquon Barkley – a critical job, by the way, with Barkley trying to come back from a torn ACL.
Then there’s the one-year deal they gave receiver John Ross. They guaranteed only $1 million to a speedy, 25-year-old who was once the ninth overall pick in the 2017 draft. It’s the perfect low-risk move to see if he can benefit from a change of scenery. If he stays healthy, they could win big. If not, they’ve lost nothing.
Why not take a chance like that?
No, none of these signings figure to put the Giants on the back pages of the New York tabloids. But you know what will? Wins. That’s what matters. And there are countless examples of champions of the offseason ending up as also-rans in their division. Those teams also eventually usually pay dearly for their mistakes.
So don’t panic that the Giants have “done nothing” yet. They were never going to do much in the early days of the market. Let the other cap-strapped teams cut players and back-load deals to sign players because they’re in a desperate win-now mode. The Giants are still building, one small step at a time, trying not to kill their cap situations in the future when they might be ready to buy that one missing piece.
Maybe they won’t get it right in the end. Maybe they’ll have another losing season and Dave Gettleman will be fired and who knows what other changes will occur? But if that happens, it’ll be because they didn’t pick the right players. It won’t be because they didn’t overspend.
