The New York Giants don’t have a great recent history with taking tackles in the top 10, and current first round pick Andrew Thomas is worrying fans for one big reason – there’s a real chance that he turns out to be the second coming of Ereck Flowers.
Taking Flowers in the top 10 was one of the bigger Giants draft mistakes in recent memory, if not the biggest. He picked up a reputation for being a turnstile for opposing defenses, and it wouldn’t be a stretch to say that many Giants fans were left traumatized from watching Flowers block for Eli Manning. To make matters worse, other teams were able to get nominally more production out of Flowers after he left the team, making the coaching staff on the Giants look worse for failing to do the same.
So it’s not surprising that Andrew Thomas has worried fans plenty with his start to the season. At first, the struggles were pretty reasonable. The Giants faced some tough defenses, such as the Steelers in the opener. But Thomas hasn’t picked up the performances even when playing against lesser ranked defenses.
Still, the coaching staff is sticking with Thomas for now. Granted, they don’t have many options. The team is in a bad enough spot without the head coach trashing the top draft pick in the media.
Joe Judge stands by Andrew Thomas
When Joe Judge spoke about Thomas on Friday, he was positive about his future outlook.
“Andrew’s a good guy to build with. We have a lot of plans long-term with Andrew. He’s the kind of guy we want to work with, both physically and his personality off the field. We have a lot of confidence in Andrew. We’re going to keep working with him and developing him going forward. I fully expect Andrew to have a very productive, long career in this league. We enjoy him being a Giant,” Judge said.
It’s perhaps the ‘correct’ answer in this case. The one that avoids controversy. With that being said, answers like this are going to be harder to justify if Thomas doesn’t step his game up. After all, Giants fans are pretty familiar with Ereck Flowers. They know just what it looks like when a highly picked tackle pans out as a bust.