How New York Giants Can Realistically Address Top Draft Needs

Who's a fit for the Giants at their biggest position needs? Here are a few thoughts.

Author:
Michael Lee
Publish date:
Apr 25, 2023 1:00 PM EDT

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The 2023 NFL Draft is almost here, and in short order, we’ll know who the newest New York Giants will be.

This promises to be a vitally important draft for the Giants and their young regime. In the words of general manager Joe Schoen, there’s a talent gap between the Giants and the top teams in the NFL. We can recognize that the Giants had a (very) good season and exceeded expectations in 2022. Still, they also have a lot of work to do if they want to replicate that success and be consistently competitive in 2023 and beyond.

Schoen, and the rest of the Giants’ brain trust, have been much more active and aggressive in 2023’s free agency period than in 2022. They’ve had much more cap freedom after getting out of the Cap Hell in which Dave Gettleman’s 2020 and 2021 spending sprees left them. The front office and coaching staff are also settled in and have a much better grasp of the roster and their combined vision for the team.

However, most of the Giants' acquisitions in the free agency period were on short-term deals, except Bobby Okereke’s 4-year $40 million deal. Teams always say they want to build through the draft, and the Giants’ long-term core will need to be built through it.

So with that in mind, let’s look at the Giants’ top needs and how (and when) they might address them.

Safety

The Giants have a definite need for safety after the departure of Julian Love in free agency. Love was the glue that held the back end of the Giants’ defense together in 2022. Not only was his ability to play a huge variety of roles vital for Wink Martindale’s scheme, but his availability helped the Giants weather the losses of Adoree Jackson and Xavier McKinney to injury.

The Giants did sign cornerback-turned-safety Bobby McCain in free agency to fill the void left by Love. Taken together with Xavier McKinney, Dane Belton, and Jason Pinnock, the Giants might not need to invest heavily in the safety position.

However, we could see them take a long look at Alabama’s Brian Branch. Branch filled a similar role as Love, playing all over Nick Saban’s defense and doing pretty much everything well. Branch was a primary slot defender for Alabama but also played as a box safety and as a free safety. He would be a direct upgrade for McCain and would be able to step in and reinforce the Giants’ secondary immediately.

If the Giants wait to address the safety position, they could look at Ji’Ayir Brown from Penn State. Brown isn’t nearly the athlete that Branch is and would likely be limited to playing in the box or a deep quarter at the NFL level. However, he is incredibly instinctive – he often showed the kind of processing speed we normally like to see from middle linebackers – and was a frequent blitzer for Penn State’s defense.

As much as Wink Martindale likes to blitz, Brown might have already caught his attention as a potential Big Nickel safety.

Interior Offensive Line

The Giants have questions – or outright holes – at both guard positions and center.

Between Shane Lemieux, Ben Bredeson, Mark Glowinski, Joshua Ezeudu, J.C. Hassenauer, Jack Anderson, Wyatt Davis, Marcus McKethan, and Solomon Kindley, the Giants certainly have plenty of bodies to man the interior offensive line and create competition. But the question of how many of those players we’d want to see starting remains to be answered.

Most of the interior linemen on the Giants’ roster are natural guards, and they could probably be acceptable answers for the guard positions. However, Hassenauer is their only natural center, and he’s largely spent his career on practice squads.

Minnesota’s John Michael Schmitz is the top center in the draft and could be in consideration for the Giants at 25th overall. Schmitz is a rock-solid center that might not be flashy but does just about everything well.

He’s one of the most technically sound players in the draft and can execute pretty much any scheme or technique you ask of him. The Giants need a reliable pass protector who can set protections in the middle of their line and a center who can execute a diverse running scheme. Schmitz would give them all of that.

All that said, Schoen might not want to spend a first-round pick on an interior offensive lineman. After all, it isn’t a “cornerstone” position with the same kind of athletic premium as offensive tackle or cornerback.

If that’s the case, the Giants could look at a pair of prospects on the draft's second day.

Michigan’s Olusegun Oluwatimi was both the Rimington Award and Outland Trophy winners. In other words, he was voted the best center and best interior lineman in college football last year. Oluwatimi is technically sound, athletic enough, and has an innate understanding of leverage and angles. He isn’t physically dominant, but he knows how to win through positioning and technique. He also has great awareness to pick up delayed blitzes, stunts, or twists.

The other is Arkansas center, Ricky Stromberg. Stromberg isn’t quite as technically polished as Schmitz or Oluwatimi. He's far from “raw,” but he makes up for it with a pronounced nasty streak. Stromberg is a very good run blocker who can execute zone or man-gap blocking schemes, is a reliable pass protector, and has an intriguing blend of leverage and length to maximize his play strength.

Edge Defender

The Giants have a potentially dynamic duo of edge defenders in Kayvon Thibodeaux and Azeez Ojulari. They are a menace to opposing quarterbacks when both are on the field. Thibodeaux, in particular, showed a knack for delivering big plays in big moments.

But EDGE makes the list of needs because of how often the two weren’t on the field together. Ojulari struggled with injuries in 2022, calling to mind concerns that dropped him out of the first round in the 2021 draft. The Giants also lack depth on the edge outside of Thibodeaux and Ojulari.

The best defenses can send waves of pass rushers after quarterbacks, keeping them all fresh for when it matters the most. However, there’s a significant drop-off in the Giants’ pass rush after their starters.

The Giants must also upgrade their perimeter run defense after being continually gashed in 2022. They’ve done a lot of work to beef up their defensive line, but they lack great run-defending edge players outside of Thibodeaux and Jihad Ward.

While a player like Georgia’s Nolan Smith or Iowa’s Lukas Van Ness would certainly bolster the Giants’ defense, it’s unlikely either falls to them. The Giants could, however, look at Auburn’s Derick Hall in the second round.

While Hall isn’t as flexible and fluid as some other edge defenders in this draft class, he’s an explosive and powerful downhill rusher and has the play strength to hold up on the edge.

Tennessee’s Byron Young also stands out as a potential sleeper in this draft class. Young is an older prospect at 25, but he is a truly freakish athlete, running a 4.40 second 40-yard (1.54-second 10-yard split), with a 38-inch vertical and 11-foot broad jump at 250 pounds.

Young is either bigger, faster, or more explosive than Hasaan Reddick, Micah Parsons, or Khalil Mack. He’s still developing despite his age, but he could be a legitimate weapon in the hands of Wink Martindale and Andre Patterson.

Wide Receiver

No position has gotten more attention for the Giants than wide receiver. The feeling here is that the Giants’ receivers were severely underrated in 2022, largely because they had little name recognition at large. But “underrated” doesn’t mean the receiving corps didn’t need an upgrade.

The good news is that Isaiah Hodgins and Darius Slayton will be back in 2022, and Wan’Dale Robinson will return from his torn ACL. But the Giants still need a true “number one” receiver to make sure the rest get the best match-ups.

Schoen has said that he doesn’t care about a receiver’s body type as long as they can get open. And that certainly matches up with what we saw from Mike Kafka’s offensive scheming a year ago.

The Giants had two distinct eras of offense in 2022. The first was an RPO offense that thrived off of single-player post-snap reads. The second was a modern take on a classic West Coast “quick game” offense that used route concepts to scheme separation for receivers and quick, easy reads for the quarterback. In both cases, precise route running and the ability to uncover quickly were vital.

The Giants would likely love to get their hands on Ohio State’s Jaxon Smith-Njigba, who’s widely regarded as the top receiver in the draft. However, Smith-Njigba seems unlikely to fall to 25th overall after an impressive Pro Day showed that he has recovered from the hamstring injuries that sunk his 2022 season.

Boston College receiver Zay Flowers is another potential first-round option. While Flowers is undersized at 5-foot-9, he’s densely built at 182 pounds and is a quick, twitchy athlete.

He still needs to work on honing his craft as a route runner, but he already shows a basic understanding of how to use his routes as a weapon. Flowers also can play inside and out, allowing him to be moved around the offensive formation.

If the Giants don’t go for a receiver in the first round, the second round looks promising. In particular, North Carolina receiver Josh Downs could be a real sleeper for the Giants. He, too, is undersized at 5-foot 8¾ inches, 171 pounds, but he plays much bigger than he’s listed.

Downs has a solid catch radius thanks to a 38 ½ inch vertical, and he is actually the best-contested catch receiver in this draft class, hauling in 13 of 18 contested catches. He is also one of the best and smartest route runners in the draft. Downs is not only a precise, detailed, and nuanced route runner, but he’s also a chess player who sets defenders up and wins with psychology.

Cornerback

The cornerback position is probably the most thoroughly talented position group in the 2023 draft class. And as it so happens, the cornerback is also the Giants’ most pressing need.

The Giants made do with a rotating cast of corners last year, but they need long-term answers at slot and on the outside. They could also need a long-term replacement for Adoree' Jackson, who is in the final year of his contract, and at the very least, a reliable starter opposite of the injury-prone veteran.

Considering the positional value of the cornerback position and the pressing need, this is where the Giants should be looking in the first round.

The Giants likely won’t have a shot at the top corners in the draft, and players like Deonte Banks and Joey Porter Jr. could also be out of their reach.

That brings two of the more intriguing prospects in the draft into the conversation. The first is Mississippi State cornerback Emmanuel Forbes.

Forbes is a whip-thin corner, weighing 166 pounds at the Combine and roughly 170 pounds at his pro day. And while that’s sure to cause a lot of concerns regarding his ability to stay healthy and hold up in coverage against bigger receivers, it wasn’t much of an issue on tape.

On the other hand, Forbes is an elite athlete with great speed, agility, and explosiveness, not to mention incredibly quick feet and fluid hips. He’s also easily the best ballhawk in the draft. The Giants struggled to generate interceptions in 2022, but Forbes had 20 pass breakups, 14 interceptions, and six pick-sixes in 35 career games.

The other potential option for the Giants is Kansas State corner Julius Brents. Brents is an incredibly long corner at 6-foot-3 with 34-inch arms, a 40-inch vertical, and elite agility scores.

He does show some hip tightness on tape and has less-than-ideal long speed. However, Brents plays the catch point very well and can match up with bigger outside receivers, and is pretty disruptive in his own right.

The Giants were reportedly very interested in Sauce Gardner a year ago. They could be interested in an even longer corner this year, and he could very well be in consideration for 25th overall.