A Very Honest Evaluation of Head Coach Pat Shurmur's Giants Tenure

John Mara and Steve Tisch aren’t happy campers these days, not after seeing their shared investment of the Giants franchise fall once again to the bottom of the league.

Mara has mostly kept silent regarding his displeasure, though through some postgame glimpses of him after tough losses in which he looked as though he was on the verge of exploding have given hints into his innermost thoughts.

Tisch, meanwhile, did provide some verbal insight into his thinking earlier this month, promising that he and Mara would need to be “very honest” with each other regarding where this franchise is headed.

As part of that process, it wouldn’t be out of the question if head coach Pat Shurmur, whose seat is blazing hot these days, to get his say before the co-owners meet to reach a final decision.

There’s no doubt that Daniel Jones’ name will come up in such discussions if they take place. But the notion that Jones’ development is an argument to keep Shurmur is irrelevant in my mind. First, Shurmur isn’t the only quarterback whisperer out there.

Second, Jones came to the Giants with a solid foundation of the position after having trained under the watchful eye of David Cutcliffe at Duke.

Third, Jones seems very coachable, and during one press conference, Shurmur let it be known that the rookie’s development has been by a committee consisting of the head coach, Shula, and offensive assistant Ryan Roeder.

If Shurmur tries to use this argument, it could work against him as if a change is to be made, the sooner, the better. Look no further than Eli Manning and how, after Kevin Gilbride retired from the Giants, Manning was never really the same quarterback again.

But there are some other arguments he could make to keep his job. Here are just a few.

In-Game Management Decisions

If there is one area right off the bat, Shurmur will have a hard time defending, it’s his in-game management blunders, which seem to happen weekly.

We can point to numerous game mismanagements—poor clock management, questionable challenges, and so forth. That’s all right there on film for the world to see.

I have written and spoken about this before and will say it again: Between trying to call the plays, coach up a rookie quarterback and balance the entire team on game-day, Shurmur has much too much on his plate.

An offensive play-caller always has to be several steps ahead of where the game is. So when critical decisions need to be made or if there is an opportunity for Shurmur to lean into the headset to overrule defensive coordinator James Bettcher, Shurmur frequently misses the boat and disaster strikes.

This transgression by itself isn’t enough reason to fire Shurmur, but it’s certainly one that can be a catalyst for a non-negotiable change with ownership.

If he is retained and wants to continue to be personally involved in the grooming of Daniel Jones, he will have to hand over the play-calling duties to an offensive coordinator, be it Mike Shula or someone else of his choosing,

If he refuses because he can’t coach that way, then the decision becomes a no-brainer as he's not completely honest with himself. But if Shurmur truly wants to be an NFL head coach, it’s time for him to realize that at this point in his career, he needs to understand and accept that he can’t do it all.

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His Head Coaching Record

This factor is also on paper, and while the great Bill Parcells once said, “You are what your record says you are,” sometimes there are other contributing factors that sway a person’s record.

People will point to Shurmur’s record as a head coach in Cleveland and how he should never have been hired. By that logic, Super Bowl winners Bill Belichick, who flopped in Cleveland only to find success in New England, and Mike Shanahan, who went nowhere as head coach of Oakland before finding success with Denver.

When Shurmur was hired, Giants ownership was able to look past his record mainly because in Cleveland, Shurmur didn’t have an off-season in his first year thanks to the lockout. He was also part of an organization that underwent an ownership change, two factors that created significant unrest in his tenure.

So what about the present and Shurmur’s record with the Giants, which with one game left in his second year stands at an unimpressive 9-22 despite him having had two off-seasons and a more stable ownership situation?

In his first season, Shurmur came on board later than usual thanks to the Vikings, his previous employer, advancing deep into the postseason.

By the time Shurmur’s hiring was official, most teams that had head coaching changes had already completed their staffs and had game plans in place regarding how they were going to attack scouting coverage for the college all-star games.

Shurmur and his staff had to fly by the seat of their pants.

Combine that with the significant roster upheaval that continued into the regular season, made for the perfect storm for Shurmur’s struggles and a 1-7 start—struggles that began to dissipate in the second half of the year when things settled down enough to where the Giants finished 4-4 over the last eight games.

Coming into the 2019 season, the expectation was that the Giants would build on that progress, but the record so far hasn’t indicated that.

Why?

Once again, there were massive changes made to the roster. The biggest was a significant infusion of youth on one side of the ball (defense) which, if you combine with questionable coaching that emerged as a primary culprit for the team’s struggles, the onus shifted to the offense and its rookie quarterback.

So what happened? Eli Manning, who plays the most important position on offense, was benched in favor of rookie Daniel Jones and if you don’t think that created significant tweaks in how the offense was constructed, then guess again.

Meanwhile, the Giants did not have all their primary skill position players available in any given week, which was another factor.

And about that rebuilt offensive line, which looked promising the first two weeks with Manning at the helm? How much of its regression was a result of Jones’ tendency to hold the ball a little longer? How much did injuries play a factor—and yes, there were injuries. How much of that was coaching?

These are all factors that team ownership will likely consider when they evaluate Shurmur, who has 64 games under his belt as a head coach.

Shurmur’s Giants Haven’t Beaten Anyone Good

No, they haven’t, but in retrospect, given the upheaval of the roster, and all the youth, especially at quarterback, how many people out there were realistically expecting the Giants to beat playoff-bound teams this year?

When I look at the 2019 Giants, I see a situation similar to that of an expansion team in that its roster's foundation had to be built.

The drawback to rebuilding from scratch—a word that Gettleman and Shurmur have tried to avoid using given the negative connotations it carries—is that one must often endure growing pains.

If you look back at the losses this season, they were blown out by two or more scores by teams that are either have clinched or are on the verge of being playoff-bound—the Patriots, Vikings, Bills, Packers, Cowboys, and Eagles.

In reality, those are teams that this rebuilt Giants team was a very longshot to beat.

Okay so what about the other teams? Given the massive turnover of the roster, the realistic expectation for this team coming into this season was for them to beat the teams they were realistically supposed to beat and use that as progress.

Did they accomplish that? Not entirely—they should have beaten the Lions, Cardinals, Jets, and Bears. But the good news is that all of those losses were by seven points or less, which means the Giants were at least competitive in those games. A play here, a play there, and perhaps some better strategies and adjustments in-game, and maybe those games turn out different.

Here’s the good news. The once bare cupboard drained of talent due to poor draft classes now has a few options for whoever is coaching this team next year and beyond. The team’s salary cap situation has also been cleaned up for 2020 and beyond, which means that core talent like Saquon Barkley, Daniel Jones, and yes, even Evan Engram, should be able to fit comfortably under the team’s future salary cap.

It also means that if the Giants need to spend on, say a pass rusher, this off-season, they’ll be competitive in the market whereas in past years, given all their needs, they had to pick their poison, so to speak, regarding what they addressed and what they left to chance.

It’s All About Results

When I go back and look at the circumstances and evidence that’s on the record, the bottom line is no one has a perfect environment in which to function and that we have to learn to deal with adversity.

Shurmur’s tenure as Giants head coach hasn’t been perfect or smooth sailing—not at all. But experienced managers find ways to improvise, and in looking at Shurmur’s Giants tenure, it’s fair to question how well he adjusted to issues that were in his control, such as the composition of his coaching staff and who calls the plays on offense.

These are things that Shurmur can do a much better job with, which is why if I had to take a guess right now as to whether he is retained, I think there is a better chance of that happening than most people realize.

I keep going back to what Mara said about this team needing to show progress. Mara never quantified how many wins he'd consider “progress,” but at the same time, he never elaborated on what he considered progress.

This is an organization that craves stability. If you compare the overall picture to that of what it had under Ben McAdoo, the difference is night and day in that Shurmur hasn’t lost the locker room in the way McAdoo did, and his players do play hard for him.

With that said, if Shurmur is retained, there will need to be some significant changes made.

The first and most obvious is that the defensive coaching staff needs to be addressed. The defense has not only been slow to develop, but the continued miscommunications between veterans and rookies alike is also a damning statement.

A potential return to a 4-3 base defense might be a better fit for the talent the Giants have—defensive tackle Leonard Williams might finally flourish if he becomes a true 3-tech in a 4-3 and gets to work alongside Dexter Lawrence.

If the Giants can re-sign Markus Golden to pair him with Ryan Connelly in the middle and a rotation of Lorenzo Carter and Oshane Ximines, then maybe their linebacker situation doesn’t look as scary as it currently does. The Giants would then need to identify two solid defensive ends for the 4-3.

The other change that has to be made is Shurmur must hand over the play calling to an offensive coordinator.

There is no way, given his history, that Shurmur should be permitted to retain the play-calling duties as enough evidence has mounted that he cannot handle play-calling and making critical in-game management decisions.

We’ll find out soon enough what Mara and Tisch think about this whole situation. Where McAdoo’s dismissal became a slam dunk after he proved without a shadow of a doubt that he was in over his head, there is a slight chance that ownership might not feel the same way about Shurmur.