Jaxson Dart was asked what his goal is for the Giants‘ final four weeks of their season.
He left no gray area.
“Win,” the rookie quarterback said before Sunday’s home game against the Washington Commanders (3-10).
It’s that simple?
“Yeah,” Dart said. “Win four games. Take it one at a time.”
That’s the right answer, especially from the team’s franchise quarterback. On Sunday at MetLife Stadium, though, this entire Giants (2-11) team has to answer a similar question:
Do they care enough to win when it doesn’t change their season’s outcome? Do they care enough to grind through adversity?
Do they care about results this late in a lost and dysfunctional season?
Do they care not just because they’re trying to hit incentives in their current contracts or earn new ones, but because it means something to them to earn respect on the football field for themselves and the jersey on their backs?
They have to answer those questions because Mike Kafka’s Giants frankly did not look like they were heavily invested the last time they played a game.
That 33-15 Monday Night Football beatdown in New England on Dec. 1, before their Week 14 bye, was a total no-show.
They trailed 30-7 at halftime. They were outgained 269 yards to 104 before the break. Younghoe Koo declined a field goal attempt.
Tight end Chris Manhertz, a veteran sage in this wasteland, doesn’t see a team that has folded or will fold. But he said the Giants have to commit to the foundational habits required to win in the NFL.
“I would say we were outcompeted,” Manhertz said of the loss in New England. “I don’t credit that to a lack of caring. “Guys bust their a–es 10 to 12 hours a day in here — and the coaches are here longer than that — to try to win. As an individual, it would be a disservice to everyone not to care.
Manhertz said that for a variety of reasons, “a lot of teams have more margin for error” than the Giants do given their injuries, coaching upheaval and other factors. So responding to adversity in games becomes harder.
That places more importance on not making critical mistakes in the first place.
“For us, a little setback matters that much more,” Manhertz said. “We have to be on point 99 percent of the time to give ourselves a chance in all phases.”
The Giants, believe it or not, enter this game as 2.5-point favorites despite their seven-game losing streak. That’s because the Commanders have lost eight in a row, coming off a 31-0 road shutout loss at Minnesota. And they’re playing without franchise quarterback Jayden Daniels and veteran tight end and team leader Zach Ertz.
So the Giants are favored in a game for the first time since Nov. 10, 2024, when they faced the Carolina Panthers in Germany.
The Giants remember well, however, that they lost that game, 20-17, to a Panthers game that had entered the game with a 2-7 record.
Right tackle Jermaine Eluemunor also said that even though this year’s 2-11 record is dotted with plenty of encouraging stretches, the Giants can’t pretend like being in close games means they don’t need to make meaningful improvements.
A 2-11 record is 2-11 until the Giants’ results show that they’re better than that.
“I can say that our play is different and we’re in close games, but we didn’t finish those games,” Eluemunor said. “I’m a positive guy by nature, but at the same time we are 2-11. So obviously there’s a lot of things for us to improve as a team and me individually. There’s no cherry-picking at the record. I feel like that’s kind of a losing mentality.”
So what is the Giants’ charge on Sunday?
Well, hopefully it’s to win, as Dart said. The bottom line is what matters.
Still, coming off of that laugher in New England, the Giants truly do need to build up from the ground up here.
Manhertz said they can’t be results driven. The process is what matters. And so on Sunday, before the final score reads whatever it reads, the Giants need to deliver a baseline of competition, toughness and want-to.
“At minimum, for me, the expectation is high effort,” Manhertz said. “You’ll get beat on a play, and some other plays might not be clean. But the effort, focus and discipline, those are types of things we can control. That has always been the expectation.”
Eluemunor added: “The want is not a question. It’s just about us as a team just being better.”
The want is not a question?
OK. Prove it.
