Ram-Giants preview

The Giants are giving -9 on the road. I know that everyone reading this understands that just because the Rams laid an egg in W1 does not mean they will necessarily do so when they return home to play the Giants today. With that said...

It really is quite simple: if the Giants play for 60 minutes they will cover that spread and still manage this game comfortably. If the Giants play footsie they will make this closer than it should be. ALL THE GIANTS NEED TO DO IS EXECUTE AND THEY WILL WIN THIS GAME HANDILY.

The single most talented player on the Rams is Steven Jackson. But he held out this summer. So to watch the rust of Week 1 in their ugly defeat at the hands of the Eagles was obviously a confluence of events. You can rest assured the Rams will be far more organized because they will have had this opportunity to review their mistakes and execute far better. CASE IN POINT: RB Blitz pickup was sloppy- the Rams gave up two sacks to the Eagles because of RBs doing a poor job on those assignments. You have to expect them to do a better job on that this week.

Overall the Rams offense was not that bad last week. It was their defense and specials that stunk up the joint. Specials gave up poor field position constantly. The Eagles offensive line gave McNabb the time (ZERO sacks in 39 pass attempts) and the defensive back 7 of the Rams were picked apart all day. The Rams leading tackler, LB Witherspoon hurt his groin in preseason and was not effective in Week 1. The Rams did not gang-tackle last weekend and they KNOW they need to gang-tackle Jacobs this weekend to survive, so no low hanging fruit expected here.

But here is where it gets good for Giants fans- the Giants made plenty of ugly mistakes in their first week win vs the skins, and were busy sorting all that out for TEN days to get ready for Week 2. So look for a focused effort today where the Giants do their part to out-physical each line of scrimmage of the Rams and win the game where it is always won.. in the trenches.

The thing to watch for is that it is always possible for the Giants to come out of the blocks slow when they are on the road. And yet we see them dig in and slowly/steadily reassert their will. The Giants gave up 7 to TB early. They had to come from behind vs the Bears. It happened a lot last season. Ideally the Giants assert themselves early, take that Dome crowd out if it and win easily, but if it is one thing we have seen from the Giants it is that they do not like getting it done easily. How about a QUALITY (>10 point margin) win this weekend? If they play 60 minutes, we'll get one.