Danny Rouhier is barely above 50 percent confidence that the Commanders will beat the Giants on Sunday, and expounded early on Friday’s show that he thinks the Giants may see Sunday as a get-right game, but 51/49 is still a win, right?
“Washington’s better and they should win, but I've been down this road too many times with the Giants, with the Chicago Bears, with Ron Rivera and company,” Danny said. “I don't trust them quite frankly to beat a team that they are better than, so I’m slightly confident. I’m the least amount of confident you can be.”
Grant is closer to 75 percent, but Mark in Burke chimed in at being only 20 percent confident just because anything can happen in the NFC East, but GP isn’t feeling it because oh boy does the Giants’ offensive line look like a really great matchup for the Commanders’ D-line.
And he was ready to let ‘em know.
“I need you to make it make sense from the perspective of the Giants offensive line. If Washington's defensive line, the unit the entire team is built around, cannot feast on a group where Danny's at left guard and I am at right tackle, then everyone needs to pack up shop and try again next year and just go away for a while,” GP said. “Sometimes teams just beat teams in the division, true, but there has not been a situation where this group, that they have invested picks and energy and time and money into, has gotten to play an offensive front that was THIS porous from a health standpoint, and had this many replacement-level league backups hanging onto rosters on the field trying to block guys like chase young Monte sweat, John Allen and Daron Payne. If there's a 20 percent chance they win this matchup, everyone over there should be looking for work right now, this second, on this staff. Obviously, that's not the case, because the people who do this for a living say they're going to win the game by a field goal, but I just can't imagine how you work yourself into excitement week in week out to watch this team, if this week you think they're gonna lose.”
All Danny could say to respond was “that’s what happens when you believe and you get smacked so hard, but the Chicago game is still wearing on people.”
Another caller was 50-50 like Danny, although he thinks it’s a 17-14 Giants win because the Bears had junk on the field, too, and MetLife is a house of horrors for the Commanders – and again, Grant doubled down that the Giants’ line is so bad, and if there’s a chance they lose, it’s time to clean house.
Danny tried to step in and give GP a little more perspective on the mindset about things, once again vis-à-vis the Chicago loss and the weirdness of the Giants-Commanders rivalry, but Grant is still adamant.
“I'm not arguing with anything you just said about why people are getting to this result, but we constantly hear from people who think that they're making progress and they're ascending and this thing could work if they just dot dot dot,” GP said. “No. You cannot tell me in one breath that this is not a game they absolutely should win against a 1-5 Giants team with a decimated O-line when the entire strength of your team and foundation is your defensive line, and then also say anything other than as soon as the offseason starts, they need an entirely new front office and coaching staff. I'm sorry.”
And Grant has an answer for all the Bears hate, too.
“Justin Fields was coming off of a career game where they scored 30 points, albeit in a loss, but they were up by I think three touchdowns in that previous loss to Denver in the fourth quarter,” GP said. “This Giants team scored nine points this past week against Buffalo. Their starting quarterback has a neck injury and probably isn't gonna play, but the Bears’ starting quarterback, a first-round pick who runs all over the place and is hard to defend, was coming off of the best game of his career 72 hours before that. I'm just not sure that the comp is perfect, but nothing's gonna be analogous.”
Obviously, Grant gets they should’ve won, and understands the idea, but “as long as we can all acknowledge that this is unacceptable, then I'm fine with having this discussion.”
“It is utterly outrageous that you can be in the fourth year of a program, and that you're playing a team that's 1-5, and they can have potentially as many at best as two starters on their offensive line, when you have your four first-round picks, two of whom make close to $20 million and one of whom is going to after this season and one who might if you tag him as well, and you might lose that football game…then something is broken, and something is sour like the milk in Mark Lerner’s suite, and heads need to roll sooner than later. Let’s just all sign up for that now.”
And then, the dagger:
“This is the gift game, the ‘not who you play, but when you play them’ game,” Grant said. “If everyone’s like, ‘I don’t know, could be 17-14,’ what are we doing? Seriously, like, what is any of this then, and how long does is this allowed to go on, if that’s really what they are? I believe they’ll win, but if they come out and lose a la the Bears game, what are we waiting for? Why are we waiting until the end of the season to do anything?”
Even Danny had to agree.
“If this was a team that had, I don't know, let's say two first-round picks on the defensive line instead of four, just the way they’re built,” Danny said, “if you don't absolutely destroy this God-awful offense, with offensive linemen that they're signing off of refrigerator delivery trucks, then what are we doing anywhere?”
