ESPN Offers Promising Ranking of Giants Franchise's State

Typically when a struggling NFL franchise gets a new head coach, not much is expected in the first season due to the reshaping of the roster to fit in with the new program.

But for the New York Giants, the 2022 season proved wildly successful beyond anyone's expectations as the team not only posted its first winning record (9-7-1) since 2016 but also shocked the NFL world by qualifying for the postseason.

That success has ESPN's Jeremy Fowler bullish on Year 2 of the Daboll era. In his latest article, in which he ranks where every NFL team stands, Fowler has the Giants in the "Headed in the Right Direction" category.

"I wouldn’t say we overachieved," general manager Joe Schoen told reporters at the team's year-end press briefing. "I think (head coach Brian Daboll) did a good job, along with his staff, of like, ‘Focus on the process and not necessarily the results.’ They came in on a weekly basis and focused on the process. They saw the dividends on Sunday.

"I think there were a lot of good football players on our team. I think there were a lot of good teammates. Maybe we weren’t the most talented, but we did have a good team."

Ideally, Schoen would prefer to keep as much of that team together as possible while adding to areas that were lacking. Fowler noted the current average age of the roster is 25.9 years, not that young but not that old. With nine drafts (which will likely grow to 11 once compensatory picks are announced) and $47,863,739 in projected cap space, Schoen has enough resources to help push the Giants roster to the next level.

That is why how the Giants plan to address balancing adding through free agency and re-signing their own--safety Julian Love is another unrestricted-free-agent-to-be the team that would like to have back--is going to be interesting to watch.

The two biggest questions the Giants need to resolve are new deals for quarterback Daniel Jones and running back Saquon Barkley. In an ideal scenario, they'll get Jones done before the March 7 deadline and be able to use the franchise tag on Barkley, thus giving the team the leverage in its hopes of working out a deal between $12-$14 million annually for the running back.

Regardless of how it plays out, don't expect Schoen to deviate from the plan he and the rest of the front office set up during their meetings following the Giants' elimination from the playoffs, which is to focus on their own and supplement accordingly.

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