My Disenchantment with the NFL Continues

Let me get this out of the way: Michael Strahan is probably my favorite Giant player since Phil Simms. Over the past few years, the Giants have been incredibly uneven in record and effort. The drafting has been suspect; some of the trades have been short-sided; and there has been more disappointment than happiness.

Let's face this too: the team--as they are currently comprised--are probably the most unlikable bunch of malcontents that there have ever worn the Giants uniform since I have been alive. It's hard to root "for the laundry" when you have a slump-shouldered QB who looks like he'd be the last person to take charge...and yet...he plays the most important position on the field. We have a coach who looks like he is constantly whining to the officials and appears to be on the verge of an aneurysm on the sideline. The former "All World" running back constantly bitched about the coach--the guy who taught him how to carry the ball to cure his fumble-itis has left in an alleged blaze of glory he did not deserve. Then there's the wideout who runs disinterested patterns half the time and the tight end who wants the ball on every single play and yet makes two drops before he'll catch one. I can keep going on here, but I won't.

Now we can revel in the fact that we have the most insane holdout in Giants history. No, we aren't talking about LT signing a "Future Contract" with Donald Trump to play in the USFL--we are talking about a Hall of Fame Defensive End who wants the Giants to pay for his divorce.

That's why Mike is holding out, people. He got taken to the cleaners by his ex-wife and he has seen other players in the league get bigger (and undeserved) contracts that he thinks he is entitled to. He's not "contemplating retirement". If he is contemplating anything, he's contemplating keeping his lifestyle. Eight million over the next two seasons should be a pretty good life for someone who has missed 16 games over the last three years; but it's not enough. And it is apparently the organization's fault.

I am thinking the Giants are at best an 8-8 proposition right now and I applaud Giants GM Jerry Reese for the stance he is taking with Strahan: forget about it. Go retire. We're not budging.

Look--the last thing this fragile Giants team needs is another distraction. If anything was learned from the Tiki Barber Sendoff last year it was that the focus was taken off of the team (which didn't deserve it anyway) and onto Barber, which he liked a heck of a lot. Strahan is not stupid--he knows that Tiki snowed a lot of people into thinking he was the good guy while undermining the head coach with his own agenda. Mike also knows that the plan worked in a lot of respects. Strahan wants a career in TV as well when it's over and he is probably going to be very good at it. He watched Tiki leverage his future plans not for a better NFL deal but for an improved image with the mainstream media and a non-contact job introducing fireworks with Natalie Morales on NBC.

Strahan is just playing it wrong at this point. Everyone knows about his hyper-public divorce and the claims of his ex-wife--who, it should be pointed out--may be insane. (We don't know for sure.) That's surely how Mike's lawyer painted the wife and she painted Mike as an uncaring father who couldn't even remember the birth date of his daughters when there was only one day to remember between the two of them because they are twins!

As we sit here today, Mike is allegedly torn between trying to hold the Giants up--er, I mean, retirement--and actually coming into camp. The team is bringing in Simeon Rice (Doc Ock to Mike's Spider-Man) to kick the tires and no matter what is said publicly, they're doing it to take a swipe at him just as they feel he's swinging an open hand at the organization. Good for them, I say. Shit or get off the pot.

The Giants are a team that desperately needs something to make their fans feel good about the guys in the room again. The Strahan Retirement Gambit ain't doing it. The whole scenario is just another crappy distraction; which means that we are in store for more of the same at the Meadowlands this fall.