In his three years at Alabama, Giants safety Xavier McKinney saw his Crimson Tide teams go 38-4, winning one SEC Championship and one National Championship (with another appearance in the CFP Title Game).
Quite the stark difference from two years in the NFL, where his Giants are 10-21 so far with two games left in the 2021 campaign, and that’s been a difficult adjustment for the second-year man.
“It's very difficult, but I think the best thing about this is everything in life is pretty much an experience. I always try to look at the positives within the situation that's going on now,” McKinney said. “Obviously, I think this is going to build a lot of character for us as a team, as individuals and especially for me – just seeing all the little things that went wrong, seeing a lot of things I could've done better to help the team out in whatever way I could have. I think it's a big experience for me, something that was much needed.”
The 2021 season will be Big Blue’s fifth straight losing campaign, but after seeing it up close for two years, one thing McKinney wants to do is use the experience to help rebuild the culture.
“Obviously, it sucks to lose, and we all hate to lose. I hate to lose, and I'm trying to be a part of this organization and change the culture, just knowing that's been kind of the culture the last four or five years, however long it's been. I want to be the one to change that culture and turn it around,” McKinney said. “I think having this experience and seeing what loses you games, to be able to fix that and come back next year and obviously be able to change that up. Obviously, we've still got a couple games left, so we just go from there and we keep getting better and keep trying to improve.”
McKinney will have to step up and be a leader in the secondary on Sunday, as safety Julian Love is on the COVID/reserve list and may miss Sunday’s game in Chicago, and it may be McKinney who fills in as the Swiss Army knife that Love portrays in that defensive backfield.
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“We haven’t had meetings yet or talked much about the game plan, but we’ll find out come Wednesday about how we're going to play, and who's going to be in and fill that role for J-Love,” McKinney said. “Obviously, he's a big piece to what we do defensively, so we're definitely going to miss him this week, but we'll figure it out come Wednesday.”
McKinney is also bummed for Love possibly having to miss a game in his hometown of Chicago.
“Me, him, and Logan Ryan have a little group message together, and he told us about it, so we've already talked. Obviously, this was a game that he was looking forward to just because it's his hometown,” McKinney said. “We know that it sucks – the situation that he's in with the whole COVID thing. We're just praying for his safety and his health. We told him we were going to hold it down for the week. But yeah, obviously it's a sucky situation to be in.”
Just another obstacle for the Giants’ defense, and the team as a whole, to face.
“I think this whole year, even to start off with, we've dealt with a lot of injuries on both sides of the ball. It's been a little hard just kind of creating that chemistry with each other and as a team. Obviously, injuries are a part of the game, so you've just got to know how to adjust on the fly, but we just didn't get the good end of the stick with all the injuries. It is what it is,” McKinney said. “Like I said, you've got to know how to adjust on the fly and keep moving forward and be able to get past it because everybody in the league is going to have injuries, so just got to figure it out. Obviously, other teams have figured it out. It's not impossible. We've just got to figure out what the right formula is for that and get it done.”
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