Giants Handling of Load Management One of Many Head-Scratching Decisions This Season

The New York Giants as an organization has made some head-scratching decisions, one of which has been the handling of players dealing with injuries.

There are still eight games left to be played in what has become a lost 2023 season for the New York Giants. And before a total autopsy can be performed on a season in which there was so much hope--perhaps based on fool's gold in retrospect--those eight games need to go into the books as they will continue offering clues as the Giants attempt to redefine the core of the franchise moving forward.

In the meantime, there has already been some preliminary analysis done on a season gone horribly astray. On the latest Locked On Giants podcast, special guest Ed Valentine of Big Blue View went back to the spring in pointing out what was a curious decision by the team's coaching staff/medical personnel regarding their handling of certain players with injury histories. 

One of the things that drove me a little nuts in the summer and even in the spring was the NBA-style load management stuff that was going on in training camp and throughout the, if you, if you think back on August on those practices,  one guy who really wasn't being load managed was Darren Waller.

He was out there almost every single day, very rarely getting a day off, very rarely getting backed down. And yet we find out once the season comes that he has long-term--I think he said he has long-term-- nerve damage in that original hamstring injury that he has to manage.

And now he's dealing with a hamstring injury on the other side. And I don't know that one leads to the other. But again, it's a curious decision because you look at a guy with an injury history, and it felt like they were pushing a player with an injury history while they were backing off on some other guys.

And I don't know about you, but there's just almost everything Joe Schoen and Brian Daboll did a year ago turned out right. And the things that didn't turn out right kind of got buried because the Giants had an unexpectedly successful season.

According to ManGamesLost, the Giants have been the most injured team over the 2009-2022 seasons, with 3,727 injury occurrences reported over that period.

While not all injuries are the same--one must take into consideration the type of injury, the severity, and to whom the injury affects (starter or reserve), the Giants' inability as a whole to get things under control has left many fans as well as people within the organization itself perplexed over how to curtail what has become an organizational-wide epidemic.

In 2023 alone, the Giants have been hit extra hard, specifically key players they can ill-afford to be without, such as left tackle Andrew Thomas (hamstring), running back Saquon Barkley (ankle), center John Michael Schmitz (shoulder), tight end Darren Waller (hamstring), quarterback Daniel Jones (knee), kicker Graham Gano (knee), linebacker Azeez Ojulari (ankle), cornerback Adoree Jackson (neck), and tackle Evan Neal (ankle), just to name a few.

Injuries are part of the game and can strike at random--that much is obvious. But where a team can potentially help itself is in how it manages the injuries once they strike For example, when Jones initially injured his knee at the end of the first quarter in last week's loss to the Raiders, he insisted to the coaches and trainers that he was okay only to find out that his knee wasn't as stable as he thought.

The Waller situation is also curious, given that Waller told reporters that his latest hamstring issue might have started coming out of the Washington game the week prior.:

So yeah, coming out of the Washington game, it’s a tendon attached to your knee, so it’s not really like you can’t strain your muscle down there. Going out there and playing with that kind of left me prone to a little bit more susceptible to pulling my hamstring, so the injury from last week kind of led into this one.

Another head-scratcher from last week? Allowing Jones, who was just back after a three-week absence due to a neck injury and who, according to a report by The Athletic, was still not 100 percent pain-free from that injury, to run a tush-push in the first quarter against the Raiders.

The players have passionately backed the team's medical staff for their handling of injuries. Gano recently delivered a passionate endorsement of the Giants' medical staff, saying, "We have one of the best medical staffs in the whole league. I saw some stuff online about them questioning them, and I don’t swear often, but I think it’s B.S., honestly, because they’re one of the best in the league. 

"I would trust my own children with them. I love those guys. They’ve done a great job with me. I think my knee probably would have been a lot worse had I not been in there getting it taken care of by those guys." 

The medical people treat the injuries when they occur, which includes giving their advice on when a player is ready for activity and how much he can do. But as to why the injury bug continues to affect the Giants harder than any other team (as it seems), there is clearly a problem that the Giants sports science team has yet to figure out. 

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