NFL Week 13 -- Suddenly There Came A Tapping

I need my lucky hat.

 

I was just thinking Giants-Cowboys might be the worst non-Lions Thanksgiving Day game in memory. I remember a dogass Buccaneers team somehow playing the Cowboys in the mid-2000s, but I looked it up and the Cowboys made the playoffs that year w/Parcells. So at least ONE of the teams was OK.

 

The Giants are aware that the top college QBs this year are Black, right?

What are they going to do, draft Ashton Jeanty and then sign Carson Wentz to hand him the ball?

 

I kind of chuckled at that, then I started thinking about when the last time the Giants had a Black quarterback was, and looked through Football Reference, and ... holy shit.
The answer is two. One start from Geno Smith in 2017 and a few games from Tyrod Taylor last season, and that's it.
What's more, not only are those the only Black QBs who have ever started a game for the Giants, but as near as I can tell those two and Anthony Wright (played in three games as a backup in 2007) might be the only Black QBs who have even been on the roster.
I might be missing a couple, but I don't think so. That's absolutely remarkable.

 

As you noted in the W12 thread, the Giants are the Jets in a suit. Woody is the MAGA moron working for Trump but Mara is just as bad.

 

And on top of that...

Eli Manning was terrible in 2017. They benched him, started Geno Smith for one game... and immediately after the game they fired the coach, fired the GM, and gave the starting job back to what was left of Eli Manning for the next two years.

 

Giants have never had a non-interim Black HC either. Hmmmm.

 

Maybe the Giants can trade for Aaron Rodgers. He did say he wanted to stay in New York.

 

You set the standard. Have to keep up.

 

Kind of like the Yankees, whose clientele lines up with their own. NYY didn't integrate until 1955 -- eight years after another team in their city did so.

 

The running joke in NY is that the Yankees, who don't have an official pride night, have a pride night every night when they allow "YMCA" to be played as the grounds crew works the infield in the sixth inning.

 

The late 80s had to be the nadir of the Thanksgiving games. Shame the stupid Terminator time machine hadn't been invented to prevent it.

1987: Lions were 4-11, Cowboys weren't quite in complete suck mode, but headed there at 7-8. Lions host the 4-11 Chiefs in an all-time Thanksgiving crapfest. Cowboys played the Vikings and it must have been a helluva game (that I don't remember) as the Vikings won 44-38 in overtime.
1988: Lions were 4-12, Cowboys were 3-13. Luckily for America, both at least played playoff teams that year. Detroit hosted Minnesota and Dallas hosted the Oilers.
1989: Lions were somehow 7-9, Cowboys were 1-15. At least the Cowboys had the Bounty Bowl with the Eagles. Lions played a 13-10 thriller against the Browns that featured three second-half points and the almighty Bob Gagliano playing QB for Detroit.

Detroit's QBs in those late 80s games were: Chuck Long, Rusty Hilger and Bob Gagliano.

In fact, Detroit's 1979-90 starting QBs on Thanksgiving in order:

1979 - Jeff Komlo!
1980 - Gary Danielson
1981 - Eric Hipple
1982 - Eric Hipple (Giants won 13-6 in another shithouse game I have zero recollection of)
1983 - Eric Hipple
1984 - Gary Danielson
1985 - Eric Hipple (The kid who had his poster in "Mr. Mom" was undoubtedly thrilled)
1986 - Joe Ferguson, age 400
1987 - Chuck Long
1988 - Chuck Long (but Rusty Hilger took most of the snaps)
1989 - Bob Gagliano
1990 - Bob Gagliano (What the fuck? TWO YEARS IN A ROW!)

To quote a one-time SJ legend on Thanksgiving, "Pumpkin pie tastes like the inside of a hobo's butthole", but pumpkin pie is still preferable to that pile of tripe served to us in the Silverdome on Thanksgiving in my youth. (I'll let Danielson slide. He was decent when healthy, which was seemingly never.)

Erik Kramer and other more competent QBs took over starting in 1991, Barry Sanders was appointment TV, Herman Moore was and is underrated, and the 90s were paradise in comparison.