While the New York Giants fell to the Pittsburgh Steelers in a week one 26-16, there are plenty of positives to extract from the contest. Of course, whenever a team loses, there are more negatives to work off of, but the Giants put themselves in a good spot to only improve moving forward. Competing against one of the best teams in the NFL, the Steelers represented a strong challenge for an extremely young Big Blue squad. Composed of 13 new starters and new coaches across-the-board, the Giants were always the underdog’s entering the contest, and Vegas agreed.
Consider this, Will Hernandez, who was only drafted two years ago, is the longest-tenured Giant on the offensive line. The Giants don’t have any players who signed a second contract on defense, with the only player on offense being Sterling Shepard.
Nonetheless, despite their youth agenda and inexperience with one another, head coach Joe Judge believes they can take a major step forward against the Chicago Bears on Sunday.
New York Giants beat reporter Dan Salomone stated that in Joe Judge’s experience, teams make the biggest jump from week 1 to week 2.
Joe Judge says the good teams – and he’s been a part of a few – make a big jump from Week 1 to 2. The New York Giants will try to do that Sunday as they look for their first win against the Chicago Bears, who rallied from a 17-point fourth-quarter deficit to beat the Detroit Lions in their season opener.
The major issues for the Giants in the week one loss of the Steelers were the offensive line and CB2 position. These were two units that were expected to struggle early on, due to a lack of chemistry and overall talent. Utilizing Corey Ballentine and Isaac Yiadom at CB2 was tumultuous, but the offensive front was OK in pass protection. Their primary struggles came in the run game, as star running back Saquon Barkley only picked up six-yards on the ground over 15 attempts.
Let’s hope the Giants can provide a bit more room to run for Barkley in week two against a team that allowed 138 rushing yards in their opener.