Author: metbaseball

Football Giants need major changes

Posted on by metbaseball

It will take a miracle for Giants GM Jerry Reese to put a contending team on the field in 2010. The team has too many needs. It needs to upgrade its safeties and linebackers, and add a defensive tackle. Plus, its offensive line is aging. (In previous drafts, the Giants could have drafted both Joe Thomas and Nick Mangold, but didn’t.) And its main running back, Brandon Jacobs, is too injury-prone. (They should have re-signed Derrick Ward.)

Why Reese didn’t upgrade both the safety and linebacker positions this past season befuddles me. For example, in the last draft he selected only two players who made a difference: Nicks and Beatty. Simtim and Beckum weren’t difference-makers. Barden didn’t play until the last game. Brown didn’t play at all because of an injury. Bomer, though not injured, didn’t play. And their final two draft choices, Wright and Woodson, didn’t even make the team.

Finally, of their three major free agent signings, Boley, Canty, and Bernard, Boley and Canty missed too many games because of injury and Bernard underperformed.

It’s unlikely that Reese will be able to acquire through the draft and free agency enough quality players to fill the Giants deficiencies, so unless a miracle happens and he does, don’t expect the Giants to be a playoff contender next season.

Yesterday’s Giants loss to the Panthers

Posted on by metbaseball

Two men are most responsible for yesterday’s loss: Tom Coughlin and Jerry Reese. Reese is the person who signed Chris Canty and Rocky Bernard, failed to upgrade the safety position during the off-season, allowed Derek Ward to sign with another team, and drafted Ramses Barden in the third round, a player who has yet to play in a game. Coughlin must bear responsibility for making Bill Sheridan his defensive coordinator and for the team’s pathetic play in yesterday’s game.

To solve the problem, the first step is to replace the entire coaching staff, Coughlin included. The second step is to revamp the defense, starting at the safety and linebacker positions. The third step is to trade Brandon Jacobs. This season he was not the same player. Whether it was because of the big contract the team gave him, I don’t know. But the team needs to rebuild its running back core. Finally, the needs to upgrade its offensive line.

Two amazing lines from a Nelson poem

Posted on by metbaseball

Poetry is a powerful weapon against the ignorance that clouds our world, even on the sunniest days.

Yesterday, I read Marilyn Nelson’s poem, Sequence, for the first time. It contains two lines that erased a tiny spot of ignorance from my brain, a spot I’ll never miss and, for its absence, I’ll be forever grateful.

Here are the two lines:

For him, I gave away my father’s name.
He gave away his mother’s love for me.

That sounds like such an unfair trade, a father’s name for a mother’s love. But then, life often seems unfair when viewed through judgment’s lenses.

A “broken” breaking news story

Posted on by metbaseball

The writing and editing of news stories isn’t being done with as much care as they used to be. The story below appeared in the New York Post and was written by Philip Messing. What caught my attention was its last sentence: “It is not known yet how many people were aboard during the accident.” Did its author forget that in its first sentence he wrote that 750 people were aboard the ferry? And did anyone copy-edit it?

A Staten Island ferry packed with 750 people slammed into a dock in Staten Island tonight, leaving nine on board with minor injuries, authorities said.

The accident occurred at about 7:10 p.m. in the St. George ferry terminal, on the north end of Staten Island.

“The boat came in kind of hard when it was docking,” said a law enforcement source.

Emergency crews are on the scene now. It is not known yet how many people were aboard during the accident.