The New York Giants were embarrassed by the Philadelphia Eagles, 28-3, at home on Sunday afternoon but what may have been the most embarrassing moment was when cornerback Deonte Banks backed off on tackling Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts.
Hurts took off out of the pocket on the first play of the fourth quarter and zipped up the right sideline. Banks was bearing down on Hurts but appeared to intentionally whiff as Hurts went on to gain more yards before going out of bounds.
Defensive backs coach Jerome Henderson, who publicly called out Banks for a lack of hustle earlier this season, screamed at the young cornerback from the sideline.
Two other times on the same drive, Banks appeared to shy away from engaging on a play.
Head coach Brian Daboll was questioned about Banks’ effort after the game but had little to offer.
“We’ll take a look at all that stuff and whatever we need to address, we’ll address. But, the guys are putting effort into it each and every week. We’re just, unfortunately, not getting the results and it’s a results business,” he told reporters.
When it was suggested that Banks’ actions needed to be addressed at the moment on the sidelines.
“I’m not going to get into the sideline or coaching part of it. But, none of it was good enough today,” Daboll said. “I’ll leave it at that.”
Losing has begun to seep into the psyche of this team. There may be very little Daboll can do at this point to turn things around. But that won’t prevent him from trying.
“No one was happy about the result,” said Daboll. “I think we have a strong group. You need to have a strong group in this league. There’s a lot of ups and downs. Unfortunately, we’ve had more downs. But, our guys will come back. We’ll regroup and we’ll do everything we possibly can do, like we do each week, to be at our best on Monday night.”
The Giants are now 2-5 on the season. If they lose to the Steelers next Monday night in Pittsburgh and drop to 2-6, it will be the seventh time in the past eight years that they will begin the season with two or fewer wins at the halfway mark.
Having players quit in plays certainly doesn’t help — not in results or in optics. Perhaps some discipline is in order.
