The New York Giants have a problem that’s beginning to boil over, and their attempts to control the narrative have failed.
After months of denying that tension exists inside 1925 Giants Drive, it’s now apparent that the environment, as some staffers have suggested, has become toxic.
On Black Monday, the Giants fired special teams coordinator Thomas McGaughey.
Whether or not that termination was justified — and many believe it was — an end to that relationship was inevitably coming. Although he toed the company line publicly, McGaughey was unhappy behind the scenes, put off by head coach Brian Daboll’s routine eruptions.
“(McGaughey) was also not especially happy. He kind of wanted out,” ESPN’s Jordan Raanan reported on the latest Breaking Big Blue podcast.
Immediately following the termination of McGaughey, Daboll informed defensive assistants Drew and Kevin Wilkins, that they too were fired.
The belief was that Drew Wilkins, the right-hand man of defensive coordinator Wink Martindale, may have been the one leaking frustrations to the media.
Raanan isn’t so sure.
“I still have not found a single person who said a bad thing about Drew Wilkins,” Raanan said. “I know a lot of people think he’s the one out there — the Wilkins brothers — spilling all the beans to people. I really don’t think that’s true. I don’t think they talk to anybody.”
After the Wilkins brothers were fired, it set off a chain reaction inside the building. Martindale unloaded on Daboll in an expletive-filled rant and then stormed out.
Initially, it was reported that Martindale would resign, but he thought better of that. The Giants would control where he could work in 2024, so instead the two sides came to an agreement and “mutually parted ways.”
With two unhappy coordinators and two unhappy assistants gone, the problem was solved for the Giants, right?
Wrong.
Offensive coordinator Mike Kafka, who has reportedly faced the brunt of Daboll’s eruptions, is also unhappy. And even if he doesn’t land any of the head coaching jobs he’s interviewed for, Raanan expects him to take his leave from East Rutherford as well.
“Mike Kafka, the more I hear, the less likely it is — and I know he’s still there now — even if he doesn’t get a head coaching job, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Giants let him out and he ends up somewhere else anyway,” Raanan said. “He’s unhappy.”
Kafka’s displeasure is nothing new. Word has filtered out over the last several weeks that he’s less than enthused by the situation in East Rutherford.
“I had heard this weeks ago,” Raanan said. “At that point, I had heard it from multiple people. At this point, I’m hearing it from five, six, seven people.
“I had heard on multiple occasions that Kafka’s deal was that Brian Daboll was super suffocating. He was overly involved in the offense if that was possible — even though it’s his offense. But really, just in a way, undercutting, completely undercutting Kafka, who is the offense coordinator.”
Raanan added that one assistant coach, who didn’t come with Daboll from Buffalo and had no personal ties to Martindale, said the head coach repeatedly makes things personal.
That is not the first time a similar accusation has been made.
“I know of at least a handful of people on the coaching staff who weren’t happy or completely disliked Brian Daboll this year,” Raanan said. “That’s just not healthy.”
Despite all of the dysfunction, Giants ownership remains supportive of Daboll and hasn’t blamed him for any of the fallout.
