Official Game Thread - Week 1 - Giants @ Commanders

[Chris 44]

It's just about exactly like it was for Jonathan Allen was this off season. You can cut bait and save a ton on the cap, And everyone who covers the team has echoed, Payne likely released even if they intend to bring him back. Contract needs to be renegotiated. He's not a 28 million dollar player, not even close let alone going into his 30s.

To say otherwise would be like whomever is covering the Terry contract has missed the plot with the contract he just signed where they said its basically a 1 year extension ontract -- and instead they are stuck with every penny on the 3 year deal whether they like it or not so the guaranteed money aspect of the deal isn't important.

Isn't Payne the highest paid player on the team? Or did TM pass him? That's kind of hard to believe, though obviously JD going to surpass him...by a little bit at least.

 

[RandyHolt]

Our DL dominated and us hardcore extreme folk don't need to see advanced stats to know what we saw. ALL. DAY. LONG. A thing of beauty - so rare to see. I can't remember the last time. No TDs allowed tis a rare thing. Hopefully, twas.

Dart would have been a deer in the headlights. Career, Heath'd Ramsey'd ruined.

It was an easy day for our DBs. When they did get targeted they were in great shape because they only had to cover their man for a few seconds. GB will be a better test for them.

Scat was a bowling ball. Rick Badanjek / Robert Newhouse 2025 edition. But their run game was stuffed like a turkey by a Redskin tribe on thanksgiving.

 

[skinsinparadise]

Isn't Payne the highest paid player on the team? Or did TM pass him? That's kind of hard to believe, though obviously JD going to surpass him...by a little bit at least.

Grant Paulsen said he is the highest paid, I haven't bothered to double check.

He's a decent player. But it was another dumb in a series of dumb moves from Rivera to pay him that much. He got paid like he's a top 5 DT. And he's more like a 15-25 level DT. I recall one of the beat reporters saying that Kam Curl would have gotten a big contract out of Ron, too if it were not for the sale looming. Curl is a nice player but if you paid him like he's a superstar, that would have been another bad one.

But yeah if he plays like he did during this contract year he's a top 10 player. This time, I am good with Payne having that drive because i don't mind renting any play this year or next.

But considering this is the exact same plot line from his contract year, about how locked in he is and how different he is -- no way I'd be doing some big committment to Payne if he has a big season.

I don't recall the narrative exactly but I recall one of the beat guys repeating something they heard about Payne from a former coach, it was something like he's not one of the harder workers in that building, not lazy either, but nothing special. And it was either the reporter making the conclusion or the coach said they weren't surprised about the fall off for Payne after getting paid -- or something like that.

 

[skinsinparadise]

Our DL dominated and us hardcore extreme folk don't need to see advanced stats to know what we saw. ALL. DAY. LONG. A thing of beauty - so rare to see. I can't remember the last time. No TDs allowed tis a rare thing. Hopefully, twas.

Dart would have been a deer in the headlights. Career, Heath'd Ramsey'd ruined.

It was an easy day for our DBs. When they did get targeted they were in great shape because they only had to cover their man for a few seconds. GB will be a better test for them.

Scat was a bowling ball. Rick Badanjek / Robert Newhouse 2025 edition. But their run game was stuffed like a turkey by a Redskin tribe on thanksgiving.

Yeah the D line was the story of that game.

As for Dart, probably would have been a problem for him. He's more mobile and faster than Wilson I believe at this stage of their careers so that might have helped some.

If I am the Giants, no way I'd start Dart until Thomas is back.

But what they have cooking against them is Dabol's job is on the line. He needs to change the narrative. I was just reading some of the NY Post's coverage of the game online. The thing that I think hurts Dabol among other things is he's played into the team's preseason hype and set the expectations high. That's what makes this loss likely feel more miserable for NY. And they lost without (as the NY Post pointed out) Daniels on his A game.

So I think he's desperate to change the narrative.

 

[Emir of Schmo]

I thought the defense was better at forcing plays inside. I don't recall any NYG runs outside that picked up significant yards. One of the major weaknesses Fowler had last year (and I read he was exposed in the DAL loss to PHL) was his inability to set the edge.

 

[Darrell Green Fan]

When Nabors refused to slap hands with Dabol I knew they had a problem, he has lost the team already.

Skattebo is going to be a problem for us in the future. I saw him at Arizona State and he is a tank.

I've been saying all offseason look for Payne to have a big impact in what is essentially a contract year. So infuriating, get a good year out of him and let his ass go.

I don't really notice announcers unless they are really good or really bad. I'm no Tom Brady hater but he sucks as a color guy. I'll never forget him saying "call time out! What are they doing?" when it looked like the play clock ran out on the Commanders on a play near the goal line. When it was announced that the penalty was on the Lions for too many men on the field in that playoff game he acted like he was talking about Detroit the entire time. Lost all respect for him after that.

 

[RandyHolt]

Yep. It's easy to see that Brady was a far better QB than color guy.

He was obsessing a bit on about how we should have saved a timeout for a FG when really the problem was we ran a QB draw from 15 yards out with no timeouts, and then had an intentional grounding.

3 shots at the endzone / outs FG seemed a no brainer to this couch coach.

Brady has no idea if the timeouts we burned early in the half were better used when we used them.

 

[method man]

Then JP is a dummy, we aren’t likely letting Payne hit the cap for his number next year and cutting or trading him is low consequence. So for all intents and purposes it is a contract year for him, aka he has a very high chance of being on the open market with this season being the tape that matters. His agent is smart enough to tell him that and he’s preparing and playing accordingly

JP is a dummy

He’s basically playing on the same number this year.

Spotrac seems to be down at the moment but I looked this up a few weeks ago. Payne’s 2026 cap number is like $1.5m more than his cap hit this year.

When the site is back online i will doubt check that.

It would’ve been tough to cut him this past offseason with the amount of dead cap that would’ve been incurred. Ron gave him a lot of guaranteed money. It would be easy to cut him next offseason with minimal penalty.

It’s easy to forget Payne is the highest paid player on the team this year. We obviously have not been getting production to match that.

 

[Darrell Green Fan]

The end of the half reminded me of Kirk Cousins. I still can't believe Jayden made that mistake with the intentional grounding play.

 

[method man]

Random long term thought - if Payne does have himself another Pro Bowl caliber year, maybe we can recouple a couple more picks in this upcoming draft. It was nice to get the 6th for BRob. We are down a couple already for Tunsil

With Tunsil, Luvu, Biadasz and other extensions (perhaps Armstrong if he has really improves) looming next offseason, it feels unlikely we see Payne here in 2026 even if he has a good year

 

[Chris 44]

The end of the half reminded me of Kirk Cousins. I still can't believe Jayden made that mistake with the intentional grounding play.

Without going back to watch It seemed JD was waiting for someone to be open but had to throw it "somewhere" or take the sack which would have ended the half anyway. Needed a better call I think, but hindsight 20/20

 

[RandyHolt]

Without going back to watch It seemed JD was waiting for someone to be open but had to throw it "somewhere" or take the sack which would have ended the game anyway. Needed a better call I think, but hindsight 20/20

I fault the play before. I don't know if JD5 called his own number on that draw or not, but I doubt it being so far out. I know some QBs have the leeway to silent call a QB draw and walk it in if the seas part. I seem to remember Cousins calling his own number one time. I hope one of you lurking reporters asks Kliff about that draw call.

But the fateful final first half play was obviously rushed. Maybe Ertz or someone else was supposed to break outside. A miscommunication. We had NO ONE on the left side of the endzone which means the other half was a cluster eff - seems OCs wouldnt do that. The grounding call was kinda lame IMO #Homer because we see QBs toss balls out of the back of the endzone NOT rushed quite often. What difference does it make if a defender appears. The clock was our enemy as much as the pass rusher, for we couldn't take a sack because time would run out.

 

[SmiffySkins]

Ertz did have that penalty and drop, and Jayden had the clock management mistake to end the half, I’m sure they take those to heart, but honestly they both played great.

Yeah I guess my point is that these guys are never satisfied, always looking to improve. And I’m so happy that we have guys like that in this team

 

[Enforcer]

I see why Burns had his poor little feelings hurt that JD5 was not intimidated. LOL

 

[DixieFlatline]

 

[Conn]

You can throw the ball out the back of the end zone towards nobody, but you have to be outside the pocket. They kinda had to call that intentional grounding, it was egregious

I didn’t have a problem with the draw, Jayden’s gotten in on those plenty of times and it’s would’ve been electric. I think they probably should have just spiked it, but I also like that they trust Jayden to try to catch the Giants off guard there when you expect the spike. It wasn’t an ideal sequence but there were still points to be had, easily, if Jayden doesn’t have a brain fart. It’s okay that sometimes it’s just his fault, even if other things could’ve been done to prevent putting him in that position—at the end of the day, he’s our elite trigger man, we want him having that responsibility in that situation. I’m okay with how it played out given he doesn’t generally make those sorts of errors. It is possible someone didn’t cross to the left side of the end zone the way they were supposed to, or it’s possible it was a clusterfuck bc Jayden had the right to call for a spike or a quick play to catch them off guard, which was then screwed up. Who knows. I want him making that call though, and even if it’s higher risk I do like them prioritizing trying to steal a TD there rather than immediately settling for the FG.

The QB draw is a risky call (or risky decision from Jayden) there but that sort of ballsiness is why we made the NFCCG last year, and they still had a clear shot at a FG without the final mistake. I prefer them to stay aggressive and trust their gut, even though if it was me in Madden I would have just run 2-3 passing plays into the end zone first.

 

[Voice_of_Reason]

While I expected a slow start from our outside WRs because of missing preseason but more so camp. And that indeed happened especially with Terry. I don't think they can beat GB with Terry AWOL. So hopefully he can ramp up. While I thought Orlovsky was over the top when saying Terry needs 4-6 weeks to ramp up. I do think think two weeks is possible. Granted, I'd feel differently probably about Terry if they connected on that deep ball. Hopefully that happens on Thursday.

I don't think there is going to be a huge difference between week 1 and week 2 for Terry because it's a Thursday night game. Otherwise, I'd say there would be some chance he could get some good work in, but I don't know if they'll even have a real practice before the game.

I was grumpy about the missed practice time for Terry. Even Brady said that practice matters. And I trust Brady on that. He did it at the highest level for so long. And his comment was a good one: there are only 17 games. Unlike Baseball with 162, and Basketball/Hockey with 82. You can't get better from just playing in the games. You have to improve in practice.

 

[SmiffySkins]

I just think on Payne that having Kinlaw do his thing allows Daron to take a role more suited for him. I think that the last few years he had to try to cover for Allen’s role indiscipline at times. I don’t think we pay him though. I think Newton takes that role and we draft a guy. Although if Payne has an absolute monster year it’s gonna be hard to let him go.

 

[SmiffySkins]

I see why Burns had his poor little feelings hurt that JD5 was not intimidated. LOL

You can’t catch me!

 

[SmiffySkins]

Oh wow Kinlaw on that first play