The Giants are off to a 6-1 start, their best since 2008, when they won the NFC East with a 12-4 record, good for the conference’s top playoff seed. Despite their current four-game winning streak, the Giants have faced significant skepticism with many labeling them the worst 6-1 team in NFL history.
While that might be a tad harsh, advanced metrics compiled by ProFootballFocus would suggest the Giants, by virtually every statistic (except, ironically enough, the one that matters most), have been a below-average team this season, ranking in the bottom half of the league in everything from yards allowed (19th) to points scored (18th). In fact, in PFF’s estimation, the only thing the Giants have done reasonably well this year is run the football, grading ninth in that measurement.
Among other determining factors, PFF’s analytics take into account run blocking, pass protection, downfield coverage, blitzing and special teams play. And none of them seem to favor the Giants, whose composite grade of 64.7 ranks dead-last, even below the lowly Detroit Lions (31st) and Houston Texans (29th). The Giants’ six wins have come by an average margin of 4.5 points per game, painting the portrait of a team that, for the better part of two months, has punched above its weight class.
Obviously, there’s no shame in winning ugly and strong coaching, which the Giants finally have in Brian Daboll, will go a long way toward masking any shortcomings a team may have. Still, luck can’t be dismissed as an important variable in the Giants’ early success, grinding out close victories that, with a bad bounce or two, could easily have gone the other way. Perhaps that’s why the Giants enter Sunday as three-point road dogs at Seattle, a team that has similarly exceeded expectations, sitting atop the NFC West at 4-3.
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