This year in the 2014 Hall of Fame Game the New York Giants took on the Buffalo Bills kicking off the NFL Preseason. Two teams with a great past who struggled the last couple seasons. With new additions on both New York and Buffalo the hope is to once again find themselves at the top of the NFL. Even though this is only the first preseason game, everyone wants to see improvement in problem areas. So have the Bills and Giants made the steps necessary to become competitive in the NFL this season?
Buffalo Bills
The Bills lost the game and there were plenty of issues we can pick at. For starters quarterback E.J. Manuel only completed two out of seven passing attempts for just 19 yards. One of the incompletions was on an attempt where he seemed to overthrow star rookie Sammy Watkins who had a step on Prince Amukamara. Maybe Manuel who missed a lot of time last season is just knocking the dust off, but many of his incompletions were due to the fact that he was telegraphing his passes.
On the bright side I liked what I saw from most of the receivers and back up quarterback Jeff Tuel and Robert Woods. Woods is fighting for a top spot in this receiver rotation and he made a strong case this sunday. Even though he was playing against backups you saw him fighting for extra yards after the catch and he even scored the team's only touchdown.
Duke Williams also stepped up on the defensive side of the ball. After the departure of Jairus Byrd in free agency the team needed someone to step up into that starting safety role. Williams made it seem like he was ready for that role making a couple of really nice plays in the secondary, including a hard tackle where he laid the boom on Giants rookie, Andre Williams.
So there was a mix of good and bad, but in the first week of the preseason that’s what you expect for the most part. I firmly believe that if the Bills can get consistent play out of the quarterback position, then they can be a decent team this year. They have the weapons on offense and defense, its all about putting it all together which is never a sure thing with young players.
New York Giants
The Giants struggled last year as they had an absolutely horrendous start to the season. They started off the season 0-6 and I’m sure that Eli Manning would love to just erase the entire season from existence. But with the new year beginning what changes have they made to compete in the NFC East.
Honestly I wasn’t very impressed with Manning and I’m not confident in his ability to again be considered as an elite quarterback. He had a terrible fumble after a routine sack early on in the game. If the team turns the ball over like last year then there’s no way for them to be successful. What I did like from the offense is the implementation of the dink and dunk passes under the coverage. That will definitely cut down on the turnovers by not going deep every pass.
Something else that will help Manning and the passing game will be the newly revamped running game. I don’t care what anyone says about the NFL being a “Passing league now”. If you don’t have balance and your passing 70% of the time that makes things 10 times easier for the defense. You gotta keeping guessing and break them down, the running game is your jab to the body. In the game this weekend you saw rookie Andre Williams running hard breaking tackles and choosing the right running lanes. We also saw veteran rusher Peyton Hillis have a good game as well. But Williams and new signing Rashad Jennings look to be the top two at this point and I don’t think any team would be mad with those two.
Unfortunatly David Wilson last year's starter and one of the biggest pieces for the offense this year has retired due to injury. With the team bringing this dink and dunk system to the Wilson would have been a great asset. So it really hurts the team to not have his speed out of the backfield.
Luckily for the Giants they still have Jennings who did well catching the ball out of the backfield on Sunday, and a couple of receivers that can make it happen on short receptions. Victor Cruz has proven to be one of the top playmakers in the NFL. Him and rookie Odell Beckham will look to help Manning by getting open with excellent route running. When Beckham returns from injury we will get a real look at what this offense will be this season. With their full compliment of players this will be a much improved offense from last year. With a solid run game passing lanes should open up for Manning and the passing game.