Tom Rock: Why Jets fans need to jump on the Giants bandwagon now
With their season spiraling to another frustrating finish, Jets fans should to root for the Giants for the rest of the season. Credit: Jim McIsaac; AP / Gerald Herbert
Rooting for the Jets has once again become a futile pursuit. Even the Sundays that dawn with optimism because the team is at home facing an opponent with a winless record or a four-game losing streak wind up in bitter frustration. The players make mistakes, the coaches make mistakes, the owner makes mistakes. It’s a mess. Maybe even enough for those who cheer for them to find another team to support, at least for the rest of this season.
Good news, Jets fans! There just happens to be one that could be worthy of your attention, and it’s right here in the same town. In the very same stadium in fact.
It’s a weird dynamic, and it may not be something everyone can stomach, but jumping on the Giants bandwagon now may be the best way to salvage your Jets sanity for the next few months. It’s certainly going to be easier than agonizing over every pre-snap penalty and unused timeout the Jets put in front of you. The best part? You can absolutely do it while simultaneously maintaining your cred as a die-hard supporter of Gang Green, too.
That’s because there are several elements of the Giants’ season that could impact the Jets’ future, so just consider it a temporary relocation or a recon expedition. Or a survival plan. Once the season is over you are free to go right back to pulling for your Jets.
Just as an example: Two of the Giants’ remaining 10 games are against the Cowboys and Colts. Jets fans will definitely want the Giants to win those contests since it will impact the draft picks that the Jets are getting back from Dallas and Indianapolis. See? That’s one-fifth of the rest of the season down already and we haven’t even gotten into some of the other connections. This won’t be so bad.
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It’s no secret that the Jets will be looking for a head coach and a quarterback heading into next season. Establishing not just a functional but a flourishing relationship between those two positions can be difficult. One never truly knows how they’ll come together and react … unless, of course, they already have.
Maybe, just maybe, the rest of this Giants season will be a preview of that Jets future. If things continue to progress as they have been it’s not outlandish to expect Giants offensive coordinator Matt Nagy to become a head coach candidate. If the Jets hire him he’d bring a lot of elements that recent failures have not had including experience on the job and an offensive background. OK, Adam Gase had those, too. But the Jets hired Gase right off his three-year tenure leading the Dolphins. There was no time for him to learn or reflect on what he’d done well and what he’d done poorly. Nagy, who was the head coach of the Bears from 2018-21 and even won NFL Coach of the Year in 2018, has been humbled since he left Chicago. He’s had to scrounge for jobs in Kansas City and with the Giants. He’ll likely have a better chance of succeeding in his second opportunity to run a team because of it, and because he’s seen up close what makes Andy Reid and John Harbaugh tick.
As for Nagy’s quarterback with the Jets, well, why not J.J. McCarthy? It’s hard to imagine the Giants keeping both McCarthy and Jaxson Dart heading into next season, especially when they have Jameis Winston locked up through 2028 as well. Assuming Dart progresses on schedule in his rehab, McCarthy could probably be had for some of those draft picks the Jets were banking to use on a rookie quarterback in this draft. Considering the uninspiring play most of those collegians have put forth this fall, wouldn’t it be better to spend that capital on a proven NFL passer who will still only be 24 years old when the 2027 season begins?
Nagy and McCarthy could make a nice package deal for the Jets. If you buy into that premise, enjoy the preview they’ll give you for the next two months.
Still not sold on becoming a TGF (temporary Giants fan)? Here’s one more pitch:
The better the Giants do in this first season under John Harbaugh, the more likely other teams are to follow their plan of making a big, splashy hire of a championship-winning coach and giving him complete authority to morph the organization as he sees best. You want Mike Tomlin running the Jets next year? You want Jim Harbaugh (who by the way also has a close relationship with McCarthy)? Nick Saban? Curt Cignetti? Then you better hope things work out as well as they can for these Giants.
Over the years we’ve observed that Woody Johnson is not always driven by logic or profit or sound football reasoning, but the one thing he can’t seem to stomach is embarrassment. It’s reportedly why he fired Robert Saleh a few years ago after the Jets lost in London in front of his British pals. Johnson’s Jets already have an inferiority complex when it comes to the rest of the league but especially the Giants. Seeing the Giants succeed could be just the thing to push him toward following in their footsteps and handing the keys of the organization over to one of those superstar coaches.
So, that’s our case for abandoning ship, jumping in the Big Blue lifeboat, and pulling for a crosstown rival — at least for the next 10 weeks or so. It’s not a natural move, and there may be true Giants fans who will deride you for it. Sometimes, though, the straight path isn’t the best one. A detour can provide some refreshment, insight, and new perspective.
Of course, you are more than welcome to keep rooting exclusively for the Jets. You can keep hoping that they turn things around on their own, that one of their decisions is bound to pay off eventually.
But think about where that has gotten you so far before you commit to it for the rest of this season.
The Jets play Sunday at 1 o’clock against Kansas City. And look! The Giants play the Eagles in the very same slot.
It may be time to change the channel.
Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.
