Giants news, 11/18: MetLife Stadium to get new turf field, more headlines

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Giants vs. Lions: 5 questions with Pride of Detroit

Pride of Detroit’s Mike Payton offers that “despite the Lions’ losses, they’ve been in every game except one. Their youth and experience has shown early and often, but the improvements have been there every week. What really hurt the Lions early on was that they pulled arguably one of the hardest early schedules in the league. If the season ended today, six of their first seven opponents would be headed to the playoffs. If the Commanders keep winning, that could make seven. It’s been a rough ride.”

More from Big Blue View

• NFL Week 11 picks, predictions: Will Giants tame the Detroit Lions?
• Giants-Lions injury report: WR Wan’Dale Robinson, G Josh Ezeudu miss practice
• Eagles sign DTs Linval Joseph, Ndamukong Suh

Other Giant observations

Giants, Jets will get a new synthetic surface — not grass — next season at MetLife Stadium | NJ.com

MetLife Stadium confirmed Thursday afternoon that the Giants and Jets will indeed have a new playing surface next season, a fact revealed to NJ Advance Media Wednesday by Giants safety Julian Love.

The new surface, however, will be synthetic rather than grass, which is the preferred surface of almost all NFL players, including Love.

“We evaluate our field each season and historically have replaced our playing surface every 3-4 years,” the company said in a statement. “We have made the decision to replace the field in 2023 and are currently reviewing proposals from multiple vendors for a new synthetic surface.”

Your weekly Wink Wisdom about the Giants

What’s behind Brian Daboll’s magic? | The Athletic

Head coach Brian Daboll connects with everyone. At his daily breakfast with the team’s groundskeeper, assistant equipment manager and assistant trainer, the stories are loud and the laughs are hearty. “Dabs,” as everyone calls him, makes it a point to walk down the hall and visit with people in marketing, community relations and human resources. He reaches out to his players throughout the day, but he’s more of a FaceTime guy than a text guy.

Archie Manning: Daniel Jones can lead Giants to Super Bowl | New York Post

Informed that Giants owner John Mara had told The Post that he envisioned Jones as a future Super Bowl winner “without any hesitation,” Archie Manning quickly embraced the assessment.

“I think Daniel can absolutely take his team to a Super Bowl,” he said. “I think Daniel can be one of the top quarterbacks in the league. He’s accurate with the football, he’s tough, he’s got escapability and he’s smart. If you put a good team around Daniel, he can lead them down the right road.”

Notebook: What’s driving Daniel Jones to succeed | Giants.com

“I think trying to be smarter seeing coverage and understanding when to take shots (and) when not to,” said Jones. “That’s something that I talk with (quarterbacks coach) Shea (Tierney) a lot in our quarterbacks meetings. We talk to Kaf (offensive coordinator Mike Kafka) a lot, too. I think they’ve done a great job of helping me understand when those situations are, when we’re going to take shots and when we’re going to be more aggressive. And when we’re not (going to be aggressive), we’re going to take care of the ball.”

2023 NFL Free Agency: The top running backs set for free agency, including Saquon Barkley | PFF

Barkley will be 26 years old in February and is clearly one of the few “special” running backs in the league when healthy. His 931 rushing yards lead the league through Week 10, his 594 yards after contact rank third, and no player at the position has racked up more yards from rushes of 10 or more yards.

As Giants’ Evan Neal returns, will he finish rookie year strong, like Andrew Thomas did? | nj.com

Whether Neal returns this week (with eight regular season games left) or on Thanksgiving in Dallas, this question looms large: Will he finish his rookie season strong, like Thomas did?

Neal is currently 59th in Pro Football Focus’ offensive tackle ratings, including 58th in run blocking and 54th in pass blocking. Thomas is second, sixth, and second in those categories. Among all NFL offensive linemen, Thomas is second overall, 13th in run blocking, and second in pass blocking.

Ex-Jet Lawrence Cager starting to make impact with Giants | New York Post

“It just all goes to preparation and staying the course and putting in the work. Staying ready. Whenever your number is called, you need to be ready,” the 25-year-old Cager said. “Unfortunately, [Bellinger] went down with the injury, but my number was called, and if I wasn’t ready, I wouldn’t have been able to have that first touchdown or be a part of that win."

Giants' Mike Kafka praises Kenny Golladay's professionalism | WFAN.com

“Kenny’s been a pro; he comes to work every single day, this week was no different,” offensive coordinator Mike Kafka said. “He’s had great days of work, and it’s just one of those things that you play through it.”

Between injuries and inconsistency, Golladay has played 125 snaps over five games and has just two catches for 22 yards on eight targets

Should We Pump the Brakes on New York’s Giant Expectations? |The 33rd Team

Few imagined the New York Giants would be sitting at 7-2 through 10 weeks of the 2022 season. Brian Daboll has the Giants winning close games as all of their seven wins have been by one score. Former head coach Marty Mornhinweg answers the questions if the expectations for 2022 are getting too high?

Ejiro Evero, Ben Johnson and DeMeco Ryans among young NFL coaches to watch | NFL.com

Giants OC Mike Kafka, 35: The Giants have been one of the NFL's best surprises under new coach (and alum of this list) Brian Daboll, thanks in part to Kafka's work as play-caller on a team that lacks horsepower at receiver. Kafka knows how to execute both facets of offense at a high level, which should make him intriguing to teams that need not only a head coach but a plan for fixing an attack.

Other names on this list for this cycle include Lions OC Ben Johnson and Raiders and former Giants DC Patrick Graham. NFL coaches to watch in future years include Giants QB coach Shea Tierney.

This week’s opponent

Lions vs. Giants Week 11 preview: Latest news, analysis, injury updates, predictions | Pride Of Detroit

“This is a good football team that knows how to win,” Campbell said. “They don’t make mistakes. They have a good ground game. They have a good defense, and so this will be another challenge, but I feel like we’re a little better suited now than we were when we started this season. I mean we’re kind of at the point now where we’re progressing a little bit, but it’s another one, and we have another big challenge.”

A win over the Giants would prove these teams are far more close in their rebuilds than their records suggests, and would go a long way in making Lions fans believe this team is headed in the right direction.

10 takeaways from Detroit Lions coordinators Aaron Glenn, Ben Johnson & Dave Fipp | DetroitLions.com

Over the last two weeks, both wins by the Lions over the Packers and Bears, Detroit's defense has been on the field at the end of the game to make a critical play. Defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn thinks that's been huge for his young defense. They are learning what it takes to win and starting to believe in themselves, and Glenn said he's seen it before where something like that can really push a unit forward.

NFL Head Coach Rankings 2022: Ranking All 32 Head Coaches | ProFootballNetwork.com

27. Dan Campbell, Detroit Lions. Dan Campbell has an endearing personality, and it was clear on Hard Knocks that he’s earned the respect of the Lions’ locker room. Still, Campbell has won just six games as Detroit’s head coach in two seasons thus far. His other five career wins came while he was the interim head coach of the Dolphins in 2015. The Lions have the worst defense in the league, which is hard to square with Campbell’s tough-guy persona. Hopefully, he’ll get another chance in 2023, when Detroit should be able to land a franchise signal-caller.

Matt Cassel’s Week 11 NFL Quarterback Power Rankings | The 33rd Team

22. Jared Goff, Detroit Lions. The Lions are starting to figure some things out. Goff has played well in his last three games with just one interception and two wins against the Packers and Bears.

Around the league

Browns-Bills moved to Detroit due to epic snow storm set to hit Buffalo | CBSSports.com

The reason the date of the game isn’t changing is because there was no way the league was going to be able to make it work with Buffalo’s schedule. After their Week 10 game against the Browns, the Bills have to turn around and play a Thanksgiving game against the Lions in Detroit. With the Bills playing just four days later, that means moving the Browns game back to Monday or Tuesday was out of the question.

Fritz Pollard Alliance initiates inquiry on Colts interim coaching hire | ProFootballTalk

“In light of the recent interim head coaching hire in Indianapolis, the FPA has initiated an inquiry with the NFL into whether this hiring process conformed with NFL Hiring Guidelines for naming an interim Head Coach,” the Fritz Pollard Alliance said in a statement issued on Thursday. The alliance issued a statement last week, in the aftermath of Colts owner Jim Irsay’s hiring of Jeff Saturday, expressing concern over the process — and suggesting that it should be applied in interim hiring situations.

Commanders sued for allegedly cheating fans out of ticket money | ESPN.com

D.C. Attorney General Karl A. Racine on Thursday announced the filing of a lawsuit in civil court against the NFL team for its actions in taking season-ticket holder money and keeping it for its own purposes. It's the second civil suit by Racine's office in eight days, the District says the Commanders as of March still held nearly $200,000 in unreturned security deposits paid by season-ticket holders who qualify as D.C. consumers under the Consumer Protection Procedures Act.

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