The New York Giants may be getting ready to travel across the country to take on the Los Angeles Rams, but as the saying goes: It’s always draft season.
NFL scouting departments are racing around the country to evaluate every prospect they can, while front offices are constantly evaluating and re-evaluating their squads. For now, improvements are limited to picking up street free agents or trading for players. But understanding their strengths and weaknesses is vital to the off-season plan.
Draft analyst
Todd McShay released his September Mock Draft this week, and this is a good opportunity to take stock of where the Giants are as a team to start the season.
12. New York Giants: OT Trevor Goosby, Texas
6 feet, 7 inches, 325 pounds
John Harbaugh wants to rebuild the Giants from the offensive line out, and Goosby fits the physical, heavy-personnel offense that Matt Nagy is installing. Goosby looks the part of an NFL left tackle and could kick over to right tackle for the Giants. His length, mass, and natural power make him difficult to get around or go through, and he can create movement in the running game. Quicker rushers can stress his footwork and change-of-direction ability, but the starting-tackle traits are obvious.
Chris’ thoughts
As things stand now, Goosby is the top tackle in the draft and a shoe-in for a Top-10 pick most years. But this isn’t most years and McShay has six quarterbacks going in the first 9 picks. That will push blue chip talent down to teams that ordinarily wouldn’t expect to have access to those players.
That said, I don’t want to get too caught up in the prospect at this point.
Instead, I want to use this in the same way as I use our Saturday college posts; as a different lens through which to look at the state of the Giants.
From a philosophic perspective, I do like the approach of finding a long-term bookend for Andrew Thomas and remaining committed to building the biggest, baddest bully on the block. It’s widely expected that Sisi Mauigoa will eventually kick out to right tackle, but after watching him at guard… Why? He played very well against quality opponents in Week 1 and looked like a natural fit at right guard. Leaving him there and finding a new right tackle once Jermaine Eluemunor’s time is done might be the best course of action.
However, I also don’t think this is the time to do so. Eluemunor is a solid right tackle and the Giants just re-signed him to a three-year contract. They also have 6th round rookie JC Davis who could develop in the meantime. I could see drafting an offensive tackle high in 2028 if Eluemunor begins to decline or Davis doesn’t develop, but for now the Giants have more pressing long-term needs.
As things stand now, I would look at defensive tackle, cornerback, and wide receiver as the positions of greatest need. This also looks like a fantastic year for all three positions.
At iDL, McShay has four defensive tackles going in the first round, each after the Giants’ pick at 12 (more on that in a bit).
- Will Echoles (Ole Miss) – 18th overall – Jacksonville Jaguars
- A’Mauri Washington (Oregon) – 22nd overall – New England Patriots
- Bear Alexander (Oregon) – 31st overall – Buffalo Bills
- David Stone (Oklahoma) – 32nd overall – Cleveland Browns (via Los Angeles Rams)
Each of those players would have an immediate impact on the Giants’ defense and could be core pieces as the Giants continue to build their defense.
His Top 50 board also has three corners who could be in range for the Giants in the first round:
- Ellis Robinson IV (Georgia) – 25th overall
- Vicari Swain (South Carolina) – 27th overall
- Zach Lutmer (Iowa) – 29th overall
The Giants’ starting corners are on one-year contracts and they might find that they need to continue to infuse talent into their secondary. Lutmer, in particular, could be interesting as a multi-faceted Nickel or STAR in Dennard Wilson’s defense if Dru Phillips struggles.
And finally there are several wide receivers who could be available depending on where the Giants pick.
- Charlie Becker (Indiana) – 14th overall
- Ryan Coleman-Williams (Alabama) – 31st overall
- T.J. Moore (Clemson) – 40th overall
- Trey’Dez Green (TE, LSU) – 12th overall
Green may be a tight end, but he’s an exceptionally talented pass catcher who can be a nightmare mismatch for a lot of defenses with the ability to be a factor at all levels of the field. Likewise, each of the receivers in the Top 50 that the Giants may realistically be able to draft have the potential to add the kind of explosive deep threat that they lacked in Week 1 against the Cowboys.
The big question, of course, is where the Giants will be picking, and the order for this mock draft is based on FanDuel’s Super Bowl odds. That said, McShay and Steve Muench each said in a recent podcast that if the Giants keep playing like they did against the Cowboys, they could be one of the real surprise teams this year. Some have even gone as far as to suggest that the Giants could be a 10 or 11-win season.
That would be enough to have them drafting in the late teens or 20’s if they make the playoffs.
That would lock them out of the Blue Chip talent, but the glut of quarterbacks could still push some very talented players down the board to them. One of the things to keep an eye on as the year progresses is if the Giants need to continue building their offense around Jaxson Dart or whether they’ll be able to continue to add highly drafted players to their defense.
Either way, early mocks like these give us an opportunity to step back and see how the Giants can be most helped as the year unfolds.
