LA’s Stars Shine Cross Country, Giants Routed by Rams 38-11

In a special halftime ceremony commemorating the 10-year anniversary of the organization’s fourth Super Bowl championship, former head coach Tom Coughlin, surrounding by members of the 2011 team including two-time Super Bowl MVP Eli Manning, issued a stern word of advice to the fans at MetLife as boos rained on the present team minutes prior. 

“It’s a long season”, Coughlin said, reminding Giants faithful of the trials of the 2011 season. “Seventeen weeks when we played, eighteen weeks now. Becoming a winning team takes a process.” 

The legendary Giants coach was absolutely correct, yet it’s hard to imagine a single Giants fan not already knowing that message prior to the first individual entering the stadium on Sunday. If not then, perhaps even earlier than that. 

On Sunday, the New York Giants opened their Week 6 matchup, a cross-country matchup with the Los Angeles Rams, with a 14 play, 73-yard drive that was halted and finished with a Graham Gano 27-yard kick to give themselves a 3-0 early lead. They held the west coast visitors scoreless through the first quarter, but then it was total Californian dominance for the remainder of the afternoon. 

Returning from a concussion diagnosis he landed in Week 5, Daniel Jones threw three interceptions, fumbled the ball once, and the Rams responded with four touchdowns of their own in the second quarter to give Los Angeles (5-1) a 38-11 rout of the Giants. The Giants fell to 1-5 on the season for the fifth straight year, further shining the light on the distance the franchise has separated itself from the glory days ten years ago. 

Matthew Stafford had another Hollywood-worthy performance on New York soil, completing 22 of his 28 passes for 251 yards and four touchdowns, including two to his trusty, standout receiver Cooper Kupp. The first-year signal caller for the Rams has found himself a home in golden coast, thriving in Sean McVay’s system to the tune of almost 2,000 yards and 16 through six weeks that has his team battling atop the NFC West. 

Stafford’s other two touchdowns went to wide receiver Robert Woods in the second quarter and running back Darrell Henderson Jr. 33 seconds before halftime. Henderson also found the endzone on a 2-yard rush for his second touchdown of the game. 

On the flipside, Jones finished his abysmal performance with 29 completions on 51 attempts for 242 yards and zero thrown touchdowns to go along with his four turnovers. The third-year quarterback spent the entire week in the league’s concussion protocol after he couldn’t walk off the field on his own power following a helmet-to-helmet hit at the goalline with Dallas linebacker Jabrill Cox last Sunday. 

On Friday, the Giants announced that Jones had passed all the tests and was approved to return for the game against the Rams. Jones seemed physically sound when he took the field, but in competition he couldn’t find a groove against a top-rated Rams defense that pressured his offensive line from the first snap. 

“You got to give credit to the Rams,” said head coach Joe Judge at the postgame press conference. “They did a great job executing and finishing the game.”

“Every week, there’s positives to build off of and to make sure we go ahead and magnify those to the team. Obviously, there’s a lot of things we have to fix and we have to do better in order to have success.”

Following their 73-yard opening drive–their longest possession of the entire first half–the Giants seemingly had no answers for a star-studded Rams offense and their notorious defensive front led by All-Pro defensive end Aaron Donald. The Giants had just one other drive go 10 or more plays and for more than 20 yards in the first half, and three of their drives ended with zero or negative yardage. 

In addition, the Giants struggled to move the sticks and extend their drives to even approach the endzone, going 4-15 on third downs including a failed conversion on 3rd and 7 from the Rams’ 8-yard line that led to Gano’s kick for the Giants’ only lead of the game. 

“Yeah, I think we got behind the sticks in a lot of situations and didn’t execute,” said Jones. “We had a good plan and we just didn’t execute it. Obviously, the turnovers were a big deal and that set us back.”

Where the Giants offense couldn’t sniff the endzone, the Rams offense made splash after splash. 

At the 10:28 mark of the second quarter, Stafford finally got the Rams on the board with a 15-yard pass to Robert Woods for the team’s first touchdown and 7-3 lead. 

On the ensuing Giants drive, Daniel Jones fumbled the football on a strip sack by Ogbonnia Okoronkwo, giving Los Angeles the ball at his team’s 12-yard line. Four plays later, Cooper Kupp cashed in the second Rams’ score to make it 14-3. 

Five minutes after Woods’ touchdown, Jones handed another favor to the Rams offense, having his pass intercepted by safety Taylor Rapp at the Giants’ 27-yard line. Rapp, who would pick Jones a second time in the second half, returned the ball  to the 14-yard line, before Darrell Henderson rushed into the endzone again making it 21-3 Rams. 

Add one more touchdown to Henderson on a 25-yard pass from Stafford, and the Giants stared into a 28-3 hole at halftime. 

For another week, the lack of performance in the first half had the fans at MetLife Stadium booing audibly in discontent, just minutes before one of their championship teams was set to take the field to be honored. Sure, greeting their Giants heroes of 2011 put a brief smile on their faces and caused cheers to roar, but not even that could hide the reality of the present franchise and what was to come in the second half. 

The Rams would tack on a field goal by kicker Matt Gay and a no-look touchdown pass to Cooper Kupp in the fourth quarter to extend their lead to 38-3, causing Sean McVay to empty his reserves and give the starters a well deserved rest. 

The Giants only scoring response the rest of the way, was a 4-yard touchdown rush by fullback Elijah Penny that cut the still ugly deficit to 38-11, following a successful 2-point conversion by tight end Kyle Rudolph. 

Giants’ defensive end Leonard Williams was one player in the locker room who didn’t take kindly to the booing, but his reaction has many calling it a tone-deaf answer. 

“[The boos] do bother me, honestly,” Williams said. “Obviously, we’re in our own home stadium. I don’t want to be hearing boos from my own fans.”

“I understand that they have a right to be upset as well because they’re coming to see us put good football on the field. We haven’t been winning up to date. But at the same time, I don’t know. I don’t like that.”

Williams may feel that way, but his defense really has no leg to stand on in this discussion. The Giants’ defense was ranked near the top-10 last season, and some could argue the front office built it even stronger by adding quality veteran talent in the secondary.

Through six games this season, they’ve crawled along the bottom of the rankings, particularly in the categories of total yards given up, passing defense, and rushing defense. The Giants defense has allowed a total of 2408 offensive yards, with an average of 6 yards per play and 8 yards per passing play. They’ve allowed twice as many touchdowns as that scored by the offense, 14 of those coming from the air with a secondary that was supposed to be improved with names like Adoree Jackson, Logan Ryan, and James Bradberry. 

The Giants entire locker room has to really look themselves in the mirror, ask themselves what’s not working for themselves, and fix it in order to find at least some success the rest of the season. Doing so won’t be any easier, as the injury bug reared its head for another week. 

Receiver Sterling Shepard returned to the field after missing a few games with a hamstring injury, but fellow receiver Kadarius Toney exited in the first quarter with an ankle injury he sustained while cutting on a route. Joe Judge didn’t have a full update on Toney’s condition after the game. 

Still, Judge returned to his toughness mentality and “coming back to work” messaging in discussing how the team is responding and will stay motivated. 

“We’re coming back and we’re going to work. We’ve got things we’ve got to improve on. When we come back on Wednesday, it’s time to get going to work. Get your bodies right, get your minds right. We’re not going to be licking our wounds around here. There’s a lot of ball left to be played.”

“There’s a lot of ball left to be played. We’re in Week 6, so to turn around and start tapping out now – I don’t know what kind of mentality other people have, I don’t quit things, these players don’t quit things”

What is unfortunate for Judge is his audience’s weariness to hearing those messages. In New York, coach speak only goes so far when a team is consistently losing games, with a league worst record of 19-51 since the 2017 season. The Giants haven’t spent a week above the .500 mark since that same time, and this season are 0-3 at home while being outscored there 82-38. 

Yes, there are injuries, but the issues and deficiencies extend far beyond just missing the pieces in the skilled players group. The offensive line plays like they’re in shackles, Jones still has his turnover issues at times, and the defense is severely underperforming compared to the amount of salary the Giants front office spent on it. 

Judge said that immediate answers to the team’s struggles won’t appear miraculously to fix the holes in the Giants’ failing submarine, and he’s correct. The only assets the Giants can work with are the coaches and players in their current locker room, as scary as that thought may seem to the fan perusing the depth charts. 

What’s left to be seen is if ownership allots enough time for Judge and his staff to fix the sinking submarine, or if they call in the reinforcements to do the job. 

Judge doesn’t carry the quitters mentality, nor do his players so he says, but he and his locker room have to feel a little uneasy about whether they’ll finish this 2021 journey together after another embarrassing display on Sunday.

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