Giants vs. Commanders Preview: Will Big Blue Get Another Prime Time Statement Win? | Blue Rush

Giants look like they're ready for prime time, wide out night. It's going to be a good time, especially me being that hempsy. And Paul, I'll tell you why I'll only be there until halftime. I'll tell you that after, towards the end at Blue Rush. But let's talk about the trade deadline because all the anticipation leading up into something else that everyone thought that the Giants were going to do and got everybody talking and then boom, nothing, crickets, nothing happened. Did you hear anything on why John Harbaugh, Joe Shane, Don Aponte didn't trade for anyone and what their thought process was at the final moments of the deadline? Um, look, it was not for a lack of trying, you know what I mean? They, they had a lot of feelers out. Um, it was a running back. It was defensive tackle to stop the run. That's what they were interested in. I heard first of all, with the less sexy, um, defensive tackle position. Um, it just, the numbers went, were up too high. You know what I mean? You know, Not many teams have a run stopper in the middle of their defensive line that they're willing to give up. You know what I mean? That is just not, just like a team might say they want a cornerback. No cornerbacks were traded. None. So there aren't a lot of teams or any teams out there that have that have a surplus of certain things. Right. Running back, maybe a tight end, maybe, you know, certain positions. Maybe nobody really has a surplus of run stopping defensive tackles and nobody has a surplus of cornerbacks, which is why, you know, after the Jeffrey Simmons of the world and a few guys look, Dalvin Tomlinson, you know, there were a few guys out there. I thought the Giants were interested in that. Prices were inflated, so that was not going to happen. Okay, now, the sexy position of running back. Look, they wanted Jonathan Taylor, but they did not come off their offer of a second-round pick in 2027 and a fifth-round pick in 2028. They did not sweeten the pot on that offer. That offer was not going to get it done. When you really look at it, though, if the Colts were highly motivated to trade Jonathan Taylor, they would have. They were not. If you look at the guys they traded, right, Quentin Nelson, the receiver, who else? They traded a bunch of guys, right? Yeah. Yeah, you know, they were guys on expiring contracts. They're saying, we're probably not going to re-sign these guys for 2027. Our season's not going the way we want it. We might as well get something for them now. Jonathan Taylor is signed for this year and the next two years. He's a part of their solution, they think. So they were going to be very, very selective on trading him. Jonathan Taylor is very close to the owner. So, you know, he's the face of the franchise. They were going to have to get blown away. The Giants were not going to trade a first round. Pick for him. They were not going to blow the Colts away. So now the one thing we have to remember is that, yes, the Giants did nothing at the trade deadline, right? But they did make a very big trade not long ago. You know, one of the reasons they didn't have a better package to put together, like a fifth round pick next year, is they traded that fifth round pick for J.J. McCarthy, right? Where is the season without J.J. McCarthy? They might have saved their season by what they did a month ago by trading away their fifth round pick, right? So, you know, we have to think of it that way. The trade deadline is the trade deadline. They did nothing at the deadline. But they did something in the trade market not that long ago that kept their season afloat. And look, you look at the Vikings, right? The Vikings traded J.J. McCarthy away because they had no use for him, and he was their third quarterback. So what did they have to do yesterday? They traded a third-round pick to get Kirk Cousins. Because they are in such dire need of a quarterback. So that's not great business if you think of it. They got a fifth-round pick for a quarterback, and they had to trade away a third-round pick, and that quarterback they traded away might be, well, maybe he would not have done much in Minnesota. Maybe he needs to get out of there. He probably did. But the Giants are damn glad that they made that trade when they did. Yeah, and you just look at the domino effect, you know, of the Jackson Dart injury, because had Jackson Dart not gotten hurt, then you would have maybe still had that fifth round pick, and you could have used that for a running back. If the running back situation looked at, you know, as it looks right now in terms of kind of being a rocky road in terms of production, you know, going throughout the course of this start of the season. Now you get a Cam Scanderhuff back. Now we saw Scanderhuff had the luxury of sitting out for a game, team still being able to get a win. Plus, no player is going to openly say it, but you do get the sigh of relief that your backup didn't go out there and run for a buck 16 and a touchdown or two. You get that little sigh of relief toward now. It's like, okay, these are my keys going forward, but I'm the bell cow going forward. Cam Scadaboo in this football game. Uh, uh, uh, Paul, but what can you give us injury-wise from what, obviously, what the team's saying and stuff in that nature, but then from a media standpoint, image standpoint, how big of a game, this Commanders game, primetime, is it for Cam Akers? Oh, it's big. It's big. Look, last week in Philadelphia, it looked like the Giants needed to do anything possible to get a running back, right? Cam Akers was hurt. Tyrone Tracy was hurt. You know, Modo Singletary had 21 rushing attempts and 31 yards, right? So, you know, so it was like, oh my gosh, this is not sustainable. This is awful. It was awful. But It's a one-week thing. Cam almost could have played in Philly. He would have been limited. And they said, no, let's not take the chance, risk an injury. You know, we got a long, long haul here. So he practiced fully. He practiced fully on Tuesday. So he said he's ready to go. Let's see if that hamstring doesn't bother him at all. He said he's not thinking about it. It is a very big game for Cam. Don't forget. He's coming off a huge game in Houston, right? A huge game. Yeah. You know, first career 100-yard rushing game. So he was on, his arrow was pointing up, then he gets hurt, and then he has to sit out and the running game, you know, goes to hell. Cam said some interesting things. He said, you know, we talked to him on Monday about 40 minutes before the official end of the trade deadline, but it was kind of... The handwriting was sort of on the wall that they were not going to get, certainly not Jonathan Taylor. He said, whatever they were thinking about me or not, it doesn't bother me about the trade. And he said, look. It is certainly no secret that John Harbaugh wanted to upgrade at running back. They were interested in Kenneth Walker before the season. They were certainly interested in drafting Jeremiah Love, but they couldn't get him. So this is on John Harbaugh's mind. You know, Cam said, I would be skeptical, too, if my running back was going for 60 yards a game and not really exploding out. And he also made a good point. He said, I'm still getting comfortable. That was. He's only played 13 games in the NFL. He played eight games and he got a devastating ankle injury, dislocated ankle, and he had a tough recovery. Now he's back. He said, I'm still getting comfortable. So, um. He says, when I come out and I'm ready to play football on any given night, I can be one of the most dangerous backs in the league. Simple as that. Well, we'll see about that, but this is a... Prime time opportunity for Cam Scadaboo to kind of announce, we didn't get Jonathan Taylor, but we got me, and that's good enough. And don't forget, Tyrone Tracy will be back in three games. So the rushing attack will not be as feeble as it looked in Philadelphia. And I got to say one more thing. That Greg Dossier. He looked like he's got a little juice to him. I would not be surprised if he gets some carries Thursday night, maybe ahead of camp, maybe ahead of Devin Singletary. He showed me a little something, and I talked to him. He's got a chip on his shoulder. Nothing's ever been handed to him. You know, he had 20 rushing yards and three carries, so I'm off of, you know, giving him the ball four or five times and see what he can do. I think that could help a Cam scatterboot coming back from that hamstring injury. You have, because you're worried sometimes about that player trying to force you too much to have that success. You're trying to, the last time you stepped on the football field, you had a big run or two, you know, your last couple of runs. So you want to get back out there. And it's like the adrenaline's going. I want to get back out there, get that contact. You don't want him to press it too much. But yeah, you. At the end of the day, someone was going to have to be that second back or that third back anyway. So, you know, DeRozan coming in and DeRozan coming in and being able to take carries from him, that could be a good thing per se because that gets you your breath back. That gets you a series or maybe a series and a half off, let alone to you feeling like, all right, I just broke a six to eight yard hard run. I'm gassed. Now you can't break that 30 or 40 one that you need because you feel like you need to be in the game. Brian, I mean, Brian Jenkins, Ahmad Bradshaw, and those guys did a great job balancing that. What were you saying, Paul? One other thing about, we have to remember about Cam, though, you know, don't forget the last time, you know, they played the commanders. He had that terrible fumble, right? You know, they're driving, they're in field goal range in overtime, and he fumbles the ball. And that really. That caused tremendous distrust. John Harbaugh barely didn't play him after that for a game, basically. So, um. He's got a lot. There's a lot going. There's a lot of narratives and storylines around Cam Scardo Thursday night. No question. Thursday night, let's kind of mix in a little bit of the on-the-field stuff because we've talked about the storylines, the big storylines going into it. We'll talk about Malik Nabers in a little bit as well. But a big on-the-field storyline will be trying to stop Jayden Daniels, another Arizona, former Arizona Sun Devil as well. Jayden Daniels was elusive, as elusive as that's the Jayden Daniels you don't want to see. That's the one you don't want to play against. Denard Wilson, Blitz Zero, they got to him a couple of times. They were able to sack him, were able to apply that pressure. I believe the Giants are winning on the sense of the matchups on the perimeter where the corners, the secondary is better than the pass catchers on the commander's side of the football. But Denard Wilson, I want to see what he does, what his counterpunch is going to be this week when it came to going Blitz Zero but still being able to contain Jaden Daniels as much as possible. Your thoughts on that, on how, I guess, important it's going to be for this Giants defense to bottle him up as much as possible on Thursday night. Yeah, I mean, it's been an Achilles heel for the Giants all season, you know, unscripted back runs has really, you know, Joe Milton, that's, you know, one of the few things he did well in the first game, Jaden Daniels had nine carries, 103 yards, two touchdowns, and we know he's a great runner, right? We know it. But John Harbaugh was really, really disgusted after that game that like. Those were not acceptable touchdown runs. You know, those were breakdowns on defense to give him 20, 30-yard touchdown runs. So that was not like, boy, he's a great scrambler. It was like, he's a great scrambler, but we should have stopped him. before he got into the end zone on those runs. So, you know, the commanders had 202 rushing yards in that game. You know, that can't happen. You know, that's one of the reasons the Giants really wanted to get a run stopper, another run stopper. So, do you spy Jaden Daniels? You know, you don't want to do that. It kind of, then you're kind of playing like with a man down on defense. But you may have to think about it on a lot of plays. Now, is that Arvell Reese? I don't know about that. You know, is it Drew Phillips? Maybe it's somebody like that. You know, Arvell, you want Arvell to be Arvell. Yeah, I want Arvell to be Arvell, yes. Yeah. So, so, you know, but, but I, you know, I, I think sometimes we all overreact to him. You got to spy him. You got to spy him. Cause you know, it's like, it's like, it's like in basketball, you got to box it in one of them. Well, that, that, that changes your whole defensive approach. But with this guy who, you know, he doesn't have Terry McLaurin and he does have Stephon Diggs who has five touchdowns, but this is not a, you know, this is not an array of offensive weapons on the field here. So if you can bottle up Jayden Daniels on the ground, You know, he's got, what, seven touchdowns, no interceptions. He's a really good quarterback. You know, he's a really good quarterback. But if you take his legs out from under him, you're going to have a great chance to win. So I think you do have to do special accommodations for him because of what he did to you last time on the ground. Last we called, it's one of three division games left. It's right there in front of this Giants football team. No one saw this. No one saw this part of the script. Shout out to the NFL script makers this year when it came to Giants football. It looks like it could be one of those with a hallmark, corny. Christmas-type movies to where we could all be happy, feel good, drink nutmeg and all that stuff when it comes to Giants football this year. So far, I don't know. We'll see how it goes for the remainder of the season. But this is a big one for the division. The difference in the tonality of what you write Thursday night after this football game from a win versus a loss. Go. Thursday night and then Sunday, okay? It's this week. I call it this week. This is decision week. Nothing gets clinched, right? Nothing gets clinched, right? Nothing. But let's look at it, right? I think, do you agree with me? The Giants buried the Eagles last week. They buried them, right? They buried them. I mean, the Eagles are a selling-off player. So let's take the Eagles out of the equation. They buried the Eagles. They lost seven straight games. If the Giants beat the Commanders, the Giants will be 6-2-1 and the Commanders will be 2-6-1. The Commanders are buried. The Commanders are buried, you know, in the division. Okay, now the only team out there are the Cowboys. If the Giants go to 6-2-1, then they sit back this weekend and they put on their, what is it, garnet and gold? What colors are they? The Cowboys play the 49ers on Sunday in Dallas, right? 49ers might be the best team in the NFC, right? They're one of the three best teams in football right now. They're 7-1. So if the Cowboys win that game, they're 5-5. They've got a spark. They're alive. They're 5-5, and the Giants are 6-2-1 if they win. The Giants still have a nice working margin, but the Cowboys are alive at 5-1 after beating the 49ers. You're alive. You're alive. Right. You just beat the best team in the NFC. If the Cowboys lose, they're favored to lose. They're 4-6. The Giants are 6-2-1. The division's not over, but you are what is above the driver's seat, right? You're not only in the driver's seat. You know, you've got no one in the backseat. You know, you don't have... You're getting driven. You're getting driven. You're getting driven. Yeah, this is... You're in the car service. You know, this is Uber luxury right here. Yeah. So this week... Now, look. The next week, the Giants play the Jaguars, and maybe that's a come-to-Jesus moment for the Giants, and maybe they get their butts kicked. The Jaguars just loaded up on defense. I'm not worried about that. I'm not worried about that. I'm not ready to anoint the Giants after Thursday night as an NFC powerhouse. The division is what matters right now, and if they win this week, they're in great position, and if the Cowboys lose on Sunday, Um, then it's just a countdown. Then it's just a countdown and don't collapse and you're going to win the division. And now you've got bigger, bigger fish to fry, maybe with positioning in the NFC. So you're right, Brandon, this will all happen before Thanksgiving. We've done podcasts Halloween and before Thanksgiving where we're like. Who's getting fired? What defensive coordinator is on the hot seat? What offensive coordinator has to go? So, um, um, Where's Joe Shane and Tim McDonald and Brandon Brown? Where are they this week? Are they at LSU to look at the quarterback? Are they at Oklahoma to look at the quarterback? Are they at Alabama or Notre Dame to look at the quarterback? That's what we're talking about. We don't have to talk about that this year, you know, which is we can actually talk about football and games and things like that. So, yeah, you know, we we got through the darkness, too. And now the light is that the Giants are pretty close to putting a hammerlock on this division, which is really remarkable. Before Thanksgiving, it really is. They've got to finish it, man. They've got to finish it. I mean, and like you said, when you read it off like that and you look at it and you look for me, it's like Rain Man. And I'm like seeing the like the equations and the numbers like as you're reading it out. So you're saying there's a chance. Like, wow. Like, so you're saying that there's a chance. But when it comes to this game, sadly, I'm going to miss the end of the football game. I'll be leaving at halftime to catch a flight from Newark Airport at 12:10 a.m. Friday morning to catch a flight out to Munich. Myself and Prince Amukamara are going to be doing a lot for the Giants when it comes to being over there as the brand ambassadors. Also teaming up with Marcus Kuhn, Big Blue Germany. So we've got everything of my duties front-loaded. You'll see me a lot on camera, on the video board, and then, boom, I'll be gone. So if I just vanish, don't worry. I'm okay. Hopefully I can get out. Yeah, so you'll be on your far east. Yeah, it's supposed to be a rainy night. Hopefully you get out. So what you need for your peace of mind is for the Giants to be winning like 20-3 or something at halftime, you know, so you can kind of just, you know, you can kind of just ease into it. No leader is safe with this team. No leader is safe. No leader is safe. We've seen them up. What, we saw them up two possessions against the Saints and then a fumble, a fumble kickoff and all like that, which is another thing. That special team's part of it. Fumbling the football, giving that football away. Ryan Jones in special teams. You got eyes on you. Eyes are definitely on you right now. So I don't want to end off on that, but that just popped up in my head. But I appreciate everyone watching this Blue Rush preview show for the New York Post Sports. We will see you all next week when I'm back. For Paul Schwartz, I'm Brandon London. Thanks for watching Blue Rush.