No one treated the rest of the NFL better than Giants former GM Dave Gettleman. Often at his team’ own expense, he routinely did everything he could to make other teams feel good about every deal they ever made with him. His cordiality only lasted 4 years, but what a wonderful 4 years it was!
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Getting Started
After getting his start with the Buffalo Bills and then a long run as the Director of Player Personnel with the Giants, David Gettleman was hired to run the Carolina Panthers. A 15-1 season in 2016 that ended with a Super Bowl loss wasn’t enough to give him any job security though as he was fired the next season. That also happened to be the year the Giants parted way with long time GM Jerry Reese after he and coach Ben McAdoo bungled the benching of Eli Manning. On December 28, 2017, the Giants were all too happy to bring their boy home. So was everyone else.
2018
Gettleman came out hot, hiring former failure of an Eagles Offensive Coordinator Pat Shurmur to be the head coach, giving Nate Solder the largest contract ever (at the time) for an offensive lineman despite him never making even a Pro Bowl in his career, and trading long time standout Jason Pierre-Paul to the Bucs for a 3rd round pick (right before he notched 12.5 sacks for the Bucs). Nothing was better though than what he did in the 2018 NFL Draft, taking a running back 2nd overall. The Giants desperately needing a QB to finally come in and replace Eli Manning but they passed on Sam Darnold, Josh Allen, and Lamar Jackson just to take Saquon Barkley. Hey, I love Saquon, but it is a huge no-no to take a RB in the top 10 and there wasn’t an Eagles fan around who wasn’t laughing about this.
Gettleman wasn’t done though. He then took CB Sam Beal in the supplemental draft, meaning the Giants had to forfeit their 3rd round pick the following year. This ended up being the 7th pick in the round and just a few slots before Washington took Terry McLaurin. The Giants finished 5-11, good for last in the NFC East. Gettleman is a giver.
2019
The always selfless Gettleman started the new season off with a bang. After telling fans unequivocally that he would not trade fan favorite WR Odell Beckham, Gettleman called up the Cleveland Browns and shipped Odell and Olivier Vernon out of town for Jabrill Peppers, Kevin Zeitler, a 1st round pick, and a 3rd. Honestly, considering they picked Dexter Lawrence, this turned into a pretty good trade even if people were apoplectic at the time. Maybe it’s because they replaced Odell with Golden Tate on a 4/$37.5m deal who was then promptly suspended for the first 4 games of the season for PEDs. DG was just getting warmed up.
In his defense, this was one of the worst QB drafts possible with Kyler Murray going first overall. Still, Daniel Jones being selected at 6th overall was baffling to most analysists who had him as a second rounder and possibly the 5th best QB in the class. The Giants can’t pass up a 6’5″ white stiff though. At least they passed on Josh Hines-Allen who went next and perennial All Pro guard Chris Lindstrom who could have fixed their long standing protection problems.
During the season, despite being pretty terrible at 2-6, the Giants swung a trade with the Jets to bring in Leonard Williams for future 3rd and 5th round picks. It didn’t help. The Giants finished 4-12, fired Pat Shurmur, and Eli Manning mercifully finally retired.
2020
I forgot to mention one thing about DG’s bang up 2019. During the draft, he traded #37, #132, and #142 to the Seattle Seahawks for the 30th pick to select CB Deandre Baker out of Georgia. I bring it up now because in the offseason Baker was arrested for robbing guests of his own party at gunpoint. The Giants released him. Things would only get worse from here.
After a sterling run as a special teams coach with the Patriots, the Giants got their man, Joe Judge, to be the new head coach. He was comically unprepared. The team started out 0-5, lost Saquon Barkley for the season, and Daniel Jones regressed badly. Still, the team inexplicably won a few games and were 5-10 going into the final game of the season and somehow hanging on to playoff hopes in a truly awful division. All they needed was to win and for their arch nemeses in Philadelphia to beat Washington. The Eagles did not oblige and purposely benched Jalen Hurts for the second half of the game. Giants fans were amazingly butthurt over not making the dance at an abysmal 6-10 and Judge cried.
In the end, all that final game did was drop the Giants down to the 11th pick in the draft instead of 10th (or possibly better). I wonder if that will come to anything?
January 2, 2017: The Last Day of Giants Happiness
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2021
Truly one of the most humiliating seasons of all time was dreadful from beginning to end. In the offseason, the Giants wasted a 4/$72m contract on Detroit Lions WR Kenny Golladay who was still injured from the previous season. He would never fully recover and finish his Giants career with 43 total catches for 600 yards and 1 TD. He was out of the NFL by 2023. That was a move that didn’t work, but even worse from a GM standpoint was a 3/$39m deal for CB Adoree Jackson. The Titans tried to trade him for nothing, found no buyers, and released him. Gettleman swooped him and gave him a raise! He could have had him for $10m and no additional guarantee. Nope, he got $24m guaranteed instead. Oh, Dave!
The best though was during the NFL Draft in which the NFC East was represented at #s 10, 11, and 12 with the G-Men in the middle. Since trading Odell and whiffing on Golden Tate, the Giants were in desperate need of a WR. Thankfully, this class had plenty. Ja’Marr Chase went 5th to the Bengals and Jaylen Waddle next to the Dolphins who had traded up moving the Eagles down to 12. Thankfully for DG, no one ahead of him needed a WR, especially not the Cowboys at #10. Heisman Trophy winner DeVonta Smith was going to New York. That is, he would have until the Cowboys swapped #10 for #12 and Philadelphia was on the clock. Smith went to the Eagles and the Giants completely panicked at #11, trading down with the Bears. Gettleman was able to pick up a 2022 first in the deal, but then picked up future failure Kadarius Toney at #20.1
The season miserably slogged along with the Giants at 4-12 entering the last game of the season, the infamous Fan Appreciation Night. For the 65th and final game of Gettleman’s tenure, cheap ownership was offering single free medium fountain Pepsis to their season ticket holders. Also that game, coach Joe Judge seemed to be having a mental breakdown, calling back to back QB sneaks on 2nd and third down before punting deep in his own territory. After the game he went on a long and humorous rant to the press about how he should be the coach of the team. He was promptly fired and Gettleman retired before facing the axe too.
His final record with the Giants was 19-46 with zero playoff appearances, two awful coaching hires, and some of the worst free agent decisions you could ever imagine. We were all sad to see Gettleman the gentleman go in the end.
- Personally, I love that Toney was ejected from his best game with the Giants for punching his defender ↩︎
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