Giant Football Blog

Jinys may need new punter

Few NFL players leave on their own terms, with their team practically begging them to stay. Jeff Feagles appears on the verge of telling the Giants what they do not want to hear: They need to get themselves a new punter.

Feagles, according to sources and based on recent events, is expected to announce his retirement sometime soon. He, his wife Michelle and their four sons have left their home in New Jersey, packed up their belongings and returned permanently to the Phoenix area, where the Feagles family maintain an offseason home. Continue

Eli pick no snap decision

Eli Manning and Ben Roethlisberger will be compared every step of the way, just like John Elway and Dan Marino. So far, the Giants' decision to trade so much to get Manning when they could have just stayed put and taken Big Ben looks like a Big Blue Blunder. But it's very early, the equivalent of the second round of a 12-round heavyweight fight. Roethlisberger is off to a big lead. Manning's development the next few years will determine if it's insurmountable.

"At the time, we felt it was a clear-cut decision," Giants vice president John Mara said yesterday. "You can't second-guess yourself." Mara laughed when he said he warned GM Ernie Accorsi they were in for two weeks of Eli-Big Ben talk as soon as the Steelers beat the Broncos to advance to Super Bowl XL. Continue

Giants add Giunta as DBs coach

Tom Coughlin wasted no time finding a secondary coach for the Giants, hiring former Kansas City Chiefs defensive backs coach Peter Giunta yesterday, one day after Ron Milus was fired. Giunta, 49, spent the last five years in Kansas City after coming over from St. Louis, where he was Dick Vermeil's defensive coordinator in 1999.

"I think he's a guy that is going to help us from a standpoint that he's an excellent teacher," Coughlin said. "He is a technician. I think our players will learn and grow under his tutelage. I also think he's going to be a big help for us on game-plan day." Continue

Giants fire DB coach Milus

Tim Lewis is most likely on his way back for at least one more season as the Giants' defensive coordinator. And his first order of business will be to help Tom Coughlin find a new secondary coach. The Giants fired secondary coach Ron Milus yesterday after two disappointing seasons by his defensive backs. On his watch, the secondary became known mostly for being unable to make interceptions. In fact, his cornerbacks had only two all season, while the Giants' pass defense ranked 26th in the NFL, giving up 224 yards per game. A team spokesman said the Giants expect to hire a replacement by the end of the week. Continue

Eli's on the prize

Eli Manning isn't playing football this weekend. His second season as a professional ended last weekend in a blurry fog of blitzes, interceptions, overthrows, underthrows, three-and-outs, and general misery. It's a hell of a way for a season to end, zero points on the board, zero excursions beyond the opponent's 39-yard-line, zero headlines that you'll want to press between the pages of your scrapbook.

"It was awful," Manning said when it was over. "I was awful." Because he is Eli Manning, though, because he not only was born into football royalty but thrust into the fast lane of expectation given the draft-day machinations that delivered him to the Giants in the first place, his season really isn't over, especially given the featured matchup on today's Super Bowl tournament board. Continue

Giants want to lock up Eli through '09

Although Eli Manning fizzled in Sunday's playoff loss to the Panthers, the Giants are preparing to exercise an important clause in the second-year quarterback's contract that would keep him with the team through at least the 2009 season. Two people familiar with the Giants' thinking told Newsday that the team is in position to give Manning a $5-million bonus during the offseason, which would trigger a clause that extends the deal to six seasons. The Giants could wait until after next season to exercise the clause, but it's believed they are prepared to do it now. If they do not exercise the clause at all, Manning's deal voids after the 2007 season. If the Giants pay the bonus, they can spread Manning's salary-cap payment over the next four seasons.

If they wait until next year, they will have only three years to spread out that bonus. Manning signed a six-year, $45-million deal in 2004 that included $20 million in guaranteed salary. Giants general manager Ernie Accorsi declined comment on the situation. But Andrew Kessler, an associate of Manning's agent, Tom Condon, yesterday confirmed the clause in Manning's contract. Another person familiar with the Giants' salary-cap situation said one reason the team was so eager to extend the deals of Jeremy Shockey and Osi Umenyiora during the past season was to free up salary-cap space to extend Manning's deal. If the Giants agree to the provision, Manning's salaries will escalate to $8.5 million in 2008 and $9 million in 2009. (Newsday)

Ernie: No plan to ax lax Plax

Plaxico Burress was a no-show in the Giants' playoff loss on Sunday, then was a no-show for the team's final meeting on Monday. Considering the reputation he brought with him from Pittsburgh, no one was surprised. But Giants GM Ernie Accorsi doesn't see a problem looming with his enigmatic receiver. And he believes Tom Coughlin can handle any problem that does arise.

"I like Plaxico," Accorsi said. "He made a lot of big plays for us. What Tom has to do, I support Tom completely on keeping order in the team's locker room. "But I liked Plaxico as a person and he made a difference on our team this year. He was a good kid. Some things happened in the course of the season, but I don't know how far we would have gone without him." Continue

Time not on his side

Whether you believe Tiki Barber courageously spoke the truth or cowardly pointed fingers with his "we were outcoached" bombshell, there can be no debate as to his mindset. It was less than an hour after a pathetic 23-0 loss to the Panthers that had a similar souring effect on the season as did the playoff collapses in 1997 and 2002.

Barber was frustrated to the point of erupting, his magnificent season, in his mind reduced to rubble, the 11 victories and NFC East title mere afterthoughts en route to ruin in the playoffs. This was a nine-year veteran seeing something promising again end in despair, and inwardly wondering just how many more chances he gets. Continue

Not Blue over flop

In the middle of telling everyone why Tiki Barber was wrong to say the Giants were "out-coached," Tom Coughlin paused and looked around the media room at Giants Stadium on Monday morning. "Raise your hands in here, all of you who thought we'd win 11," Coughlin said. "I don't see anybody's hand in the air. Isn't that amazing?" Though they exited the playoffs in an embarrassing way, the Giants did have a much better season than anybody expected. They went 11-5, won the NFC East and won eight of their 10 home games. Continue

Accorsi won't overreact to loss

The first thing Ernie Accorsi thought of when he woke up yesterday morning wasn't what you'd assume. "I thought about which route I was going to take to Giants Stadium because there's always a traffic problem coming out of Manhattan," Accorsi joked yesterday afternoon. "What do you think I was thinking about?" The Giants' general manager was thinking about what every Giants fan was thinking about, of course. And yes, he was just as depressed as you were a day after the Giants were thumped, 23-0, by the Panthers at Giants Stadium in an NFC wild-card playoff game.

The only difference is, he can do something about it. From now until training camp starts in July, this is Accorsi's team to tinker with in an effort to take the next step in what he hopes will be a journey to a championship. "I've been in this business a long time, and when this happens, you swallow hard and you don't overreact," he said. "Thinking about where we need to improve isn't something I decided to think about just this morning. It's always on your mind. It's an evolving thought. It's what we do for a living." Continue

Big Blue in corner market

Free-agency doesn't begin for another two months, but Giants linebacker Antonio Pierce already has a shopping list for GM Ernie Accorsi. He wants an "impact" cornerback. Pierce, a free-agent addition last March, said a confident, intimidating corner is what the defense is missing most. He wants someone behind him who can change the game.

"You want somebody out there that when somebody puts that ball up they're going to intimidate," Pierce said. "In Washington, playing with guys like Champ (Bailey), Fred Smoot, Shawn Springs and Sean Taylor, you notice the difference right away. Guys don't want to go over the middle, they're not going to catch that post ball that's just thrown up in the air. It changes the whole game plan for offensive coordinators." Continue

Jints picking up the pieces

The two sat together yesterday morning, Tom Coughlin and Tiki Barber in a darkened room, the tape rolling of Sunday's abominable 23-0 playoff loss to the Panthers. Just where, Coughlin wanted to know, did we get out-coached?

That was the accusation leveled by Barber immediately following one of the worst home-field post-season losses in franchise history, a defeat so wretched that Coughlin attempted to scour away the stain so as not to tarnish whatever luster remained from an 11-5 season and NFC East title. As disturbing as the shutout was, the incriminating words by the team's mega-star running back added intrigue to the ugliness. Continue

Jints rip coaches

Standing behind a lectern, analyzing a game he wanted to forget, Tiki Barber, in full public view yesterday, stated, "I think in some ways we were out-coached," and later willingly explained precisely why. A few minutes later, off to the side, after posing for pictures, greeting family and friends and receiving a big hug from his wife, Ginny, Barber was asked again about his critique of the Giants coaching staff. "It was obvious," he said. "They knew what we were doing. We didn't adjust."

It was the most stinging but hardly the only abuse heaped on the strategies employed by the Giants in their desultory 23-0 playoff loss to the Panthers at Giants Stadium. Players far and near in the locker room sprinkled frustration with their own shoddy performance along with disgust at the game plan they were handed, and the inability of the Giants to alter an approach that clearly wasn't working. "We knew they were going to try to stop the run," Amani Toomer said. "I just felt like we didn't adjust quickly enough. I don't know what happened." Continue

Clueless Jint defense run into ground

The Giants have long prided themselves on their defense, their stout stubbornness against the run. But in yesterday's NFC wild-card game, Carolina gashed them all afternoon on the ground, running them right out of their own stadium and into their offsea son with a 23-0 pounding. The Panthers rushed for 223 yards, including 151 by De Shaun Foster and a 12-yard end-around touchdown by wide receiver Steve Smith.

Afterward, players called it tough, awkward, and embarrassing, but it can best be summed up thus: It was their worst rushing defense in the postseason in 70 years. "When you get into the playoffs, in a game of this nature, you have to win the physical battle," said Tom Coughlin. "We didn't tackle well, and we weren't as physical as we want to be on defense. I make no excuses. We didn't tackle well. We didn't meet force with force." Elite running teams had throttled the Giants before this year, with San Diego ringing up 268 yards on Sept. 25, Denver hitting 191 and Kansas City 188. Continue

Giants simply Mann-handled

The time for reflection was not now. Not after their playoff dreams not only ended, but crashed and burned and turned into a nightmarish mixture of embarrassment and ineptness of historically bad proportions. Maybe in a week or a month, or perhaps never, will the Giants look back on this season and believe they built something lasting.

But not now. Not yesterday, not after as thorough and severe a whipping as one team can absorb as punishment - in their own building, no less. This was no time to see anything positive. "Not today," receiver Plaxico Burress said. "You take that position later. Today the bottom line is we got the hell beat out of us." Continue

In finale, Barber cut down to size

Tiki Barber had five runs of 50 yards or longer this season. Against the Panthers yesterday, he didn't make it to 50 for the game. Barber's worst performance of the season came at the worst time as the Giants' season came to a stunning end with a 23-0 thrashing at the Meadowlands.

Barber was held to a season-low 41 yards on 13 carries, without breaking off a run of more than nine yards. The guy who had 2,341 all-purpose yards, who finished just behind Seattle's Shaun Alexander in the rushing race, caught just three passes for 28 yards. And while he knew the Panthers would focus on stopping him, Barber was stunned that no other Giant was able to break any big plays. Continue

Without a catch, Plaxico goes from hero to zero

When Plaxico Burress trotted onto the field for the Giants' first offensive series yesterday, he expected to see two defensive players staring at him from across the line of scrimmage. When he realized that the Panthers were planning to use single coverage on him, though, he figured it would be another routine day for the Giants' offense, one of the best in the NFL this season.

"When I came out, I was like, 'Man, it's gonna be a great day,'" Burress said. Instead, Burress, who made 76 catches for 1,214 yards and seven touchdowns during the regular season, did not get a single reception during the Giants' 23-0 loss to the Panthers. Continue

Three and out for Giants

The Carolina Panthers beat the Giants at their own game, in their own place. Steve Smith scored a pair of touchdowns and Carolina rattled Eli Manning into four turnovers to lead the Panthers to a 23-0 win over New York in the first round of the NFC playoffs Sunday.The Panthers did it with a stout defense and a strong running game -- the same principles the Giants used this season to win their first divisional title in five years. Playing nearly as well as they did in their Super Bowl season two years ago, the Panthers (12-5) handed New York its first playoff shutout in 20 years. "Everybody may say we're a Super Bowl team -- we're not," Smith cautioned. "All we are is a one-win playoff team." Continue

Super weight on Eli's back

Eli Manning plays his first playoff game at 1 p.m. at Giants Stadium today. It is still a great football place to do that, a magic hour of sports. Sunday at 1. At that time of day, at this time of year, Manning is asked to win the kind of game that Phil Simms once had to win to keep Giants fans off his back. Asked to win the kind of game Jeff Hostetler had to win when Simms was hurt. It is even the kind of game Kerry Collins, a career journeyman, won the last time the Giants made a run. Eli's turn now, the first of many.

Already, his second year in New York, he has found out all about New York. He has been properly celebrated as the Next Big Thing every time he has lit things up this season. And when he has started missing his spots like a good pitcher missing his spots, being wild in and out of the strike zone, he has heard all about it, seen and heard his mechanics dissected as if he were some kind of crooked Washington lobbyist. Continue

'Do or die' for Giants

Is Eli Manning ready and is Steve Smith stoppable and which set of defensive ends is better and can anyone cool white-hot Tiki Barber and the John Fox factor and the home-field advantage and identity of this week's fill-in linebacker?

It all turns this afternoon from speculation and words into grunts and snarls. In football terms it's only 60 minutes, in actuality spread out over more than three hours, where a split-second can be the difference, where one crack can create a fissure and where a single mental lapse can wreck the best-laid plans. Continue

Tiki time: Five-year wait ends today

Giants fans have waited five years for this day, this playoff day at Giants Stadium, and so generations of them, grandfathers who remember Huff and Gifford and sons and daughters who remember LT and Carson and Simms and Bavaro and grandchildren who live and die with Tiki and Strahan and Osi and Eli, will show up today and be the sound that ignites the fury in their Giants.

Five long years since their Giants trampled the Vikings 41-0 and defiant Wellington Mara stood on a podium and could see his third Super Bowl in the distance. Continue

LT: Jints can be super men

This doesn't feel like 1986, when Lawrence Taylor decapitated quarterbacks, and Harry Carson and Carl Banks brutalized ballcarriers, and Mark Bavaro dragged defenders, and Phil Simms owned Pasadena. This feels more like 1990 to LT, when no one thought the Giants were the best team in the world until they became the best team in the world one night in Tampa when Scott Norwood went wide right.

"It's a good team; I do believe there are three or four other teams better in the league," LT was saying yesterday from his cell phone. "When we won in 1990, we weren't the best team in the league. We just played together the best at the time. Continue

Shockey gains pains

Jeremy Shockey will not be 100% when he takes the field for the Giants' opening playoff game tomorrow. Then again, it's hard for him to remember the last time he was. Playing through a high ankle sprain will seem like nothing to the tough tight end, who revealed yesterday that he has battled a fractured sternum and a separated clavicle throughout the second half of the season. He said the injuries were "very painful," though he insisted they have since healed.

They healed enough, at least, to allow him to make 28 catches for 306 yards in the six games since the injuries occurred. "In this league, no one's really healthy," Shockey said. "The only guy that should be healthy is the quarterback. It's tough. I was never hurt in college, then I come here and it seems like I get little injuries here or there." Continue

Strahan cool with Eli's calm

It is the most obvious defensive strategy Carolina can deploy against the Giants in their wild-card playoff game on Sunday: neutralize running back Tiki Barber and force Eli Manning, the Giants' second-year quarterback, to beat them through the air.

That would put Manning, who will be making his first playoff start, in a position where he would have to carry the Giants. It is the kind of career-defining opportunity that every NFL quarterback would love to have at some point. And if Manning is nervous about those prospects, he didn't show it during a brief press conference at Giants Stadium yesterday. You needed a mirror under his nose to see if he was even breathing. Continue

Tiki is stopped short in MVP bid

Tiki Barber added another award to his trophy case yesterday, but not the big one many of his teammates felt he deserved. The Giants' running back was named the NFC Offensive Player of the Month for December, but lost out on the NFL MVP award to Seattle running back Shaun Alexander. Barber - whose 2,390 total yards were the second most in NFL history - finished fourth in the MVP voting. Continue

Panthers plot to stop Burress

Most of the talk in the Panthers' locker room this week has centered on stopping Tiki Barber. But the team's defensive backs know while No. 21 is the top priority, controlling Plaxico Burress is a close second. Carolina's DBs have been studying the 6-foot-5 receiver and watched him tear through the Raiders defense last week on his way to a 78-yard touchdown. They don't want to see a repeat on Sunday when they face him in the NFC playoffs.

"If he was just big, that's one thing," safety Mike Minter said. "But when you're big and good, that's another thing. That's what you have in Burress. You have a guy that can go deep, can get the jump ball, can also catch a slant and take it to the house, as we've seen against the Raiders. That's the type of problem that he causes because he's so fast.'' Continue

Panthers shrug off DE Umenyiora's jab

Julius Peppers did his best Thursday to resist reacting to Osi Umenyiora's claim that the New York Giants' defensive ends are better than Carolina's. But with every "No comment" Peppers offered, it became clearer and clearer that the Panthers' Pro Bowl defensive end was slightly irritated. Finally, he cracked. "I mean, he ain't going to button up his chin strap and get in front of me, so it doesn't really matter," Peppers said with a smirk. "If he was, he wouldn't be talking like that."

Umenyiora may have been trying to have a little fun with reporters Wednesday when he called Peppers and Mike Rucker "the second-best defensive end tandem in the league." But the shot was heard all the way in Charlotte, where the Panthers (11-5) are preparing to play the Giants (11-5) on Sunday in the first round of the playoffs. Statistically, Umenyiora and Michael Strahan have the edge in the battle of the ends. The duo has combined for 26 sacks this season, including Umenyiora's NFC-leading 14 1/2. Peppers and Rucker have 18 this season, but together, the two have racked up 73 1/2 since 2002 - third best in the NFL. Continue

'06 Tiki's last year?

A Giants Super Bowl victory, either this year or next, might mean the premature loss of their signature player. Tiki Barber, who just completed not only the best season of his nine-year pro career but the second-most productive season of any running back in NFL history, might be tempted to retire after the 2006 season if he were to accomplish the last of his career goals, winning a Super Bowl ring.

"I don't know how long I want to play," Barber said in a telephone interview Tuesday night. "There's certain goals I have for myself. I'd like to rush for 10,000 yards, you know, and I'd like to accomplish some other individual goals, but obviously winning the Super Bowl is paramount for me. Beyond that, I'm not gonna play just to play or just to accumulate stats. There's too much other -- that I want to do in my life." Continue

No Shock, Jeremy to play

Jeremy Shockey wasn't available to the Giants against Oakland last week. The helplessness that came with sitting out while his teammates tried to secure the NFC East title and a home game in the playoffs made him more miserable than his high ankle sprain.

Shockey may have to deal with some pain, but he won't have that helpless feeling. He plans to play against Carolina in the first round of the playoffs at Giants Stadium on Sunday despite still being listed as questionable. Shockey returned to practice on a limited basis yesterday. Continue

Absence Pierce-ing

No one feels more helpless than Antonio Pierce, who hobbled through the Giants' locker room yesterday nearly pleading for his teammates to extend the season at least one more week to give him a shot at getting back on the field. Pierce, out since suffering a severe high-ankle sprain Dec. 11 against the Eagles, will sit out Sunday's playoff game with the Panthers. His right ankle remains immobilized, but he said the cast will be gone by next week. If there's another game to play, Pierce said he'll do whatever it takes to assume his rightful place at middle linebacker.

"They just got to get this one for me and I'll try everything in my might to get back," Pierce said imploringly. "Me wanting to do something is different than what the doctors let me do. If it was up to me I'd already be out of the cast, rehabbing. I'd say my chances are about 70, 80 percent to be able to play the following week. That's what I say. They're worrying about the longevity of it, my career next year, that's what we're dealing with right now." Continue

Big day awaits littlest Giant

When Shaun O'Hara finally got a chance to look up, he wasn't surprised to see Tiki Barber streaking down the sidelines. Yes, the Giants were backed up at their own 5 Saturday night, and the play called didn't usually turn into a big one. But it was a big game, a big spot and the Giants needed a boost.

Isn't that always when Tiki Barber comes through? "When you have a back who is capable of doing that it makes your job fun, it makes it exciting," O'Hara, the Giants' center, said. "You never know which play is going to be the one that he breaks, which play is going to be the one that ends up on ESPN." Continue

Phifer out as LB losses mount

Another day, another lost linebacker. The Giants placed LB Roman Phifer on injured reserve with a knee injury yesterday. The 15-year vet signed with the Giants on Dec. 19, and his knee swelled up a few days after his arrival. He saw limited action in the last two games of the season.

He is the fourth LB the Giants have placed on IR this season, joining Barrett Green (knee/ankle), Chase Blackburn (neck) and Carlos Emmons (pec). Antonio Pierce, meanwhile, will be out at least a few more weeks with a high ankle sprain. LB Marcus Lawrence was promoted from the practice squad to take Phifer's place on the active roster. LB Tyson Smith, who was in Baltimore's camp last summer, was signed to the practice squad. ... All 6,000 general public tickets for the game Sunday sold out yesterday in 11 minutes, according to the team. Continue

When it comes to Eli, father knows best

Here's the word to playoff-crazed Giants fans from Archie Manning, late on the day his baby boy turned 25 years old: "Don't worry about Eli," Archie said last night. "Just know he's gonna give you all he's got. Just relax, enjoy it. Enjoy this team." Archie, who will be at Giants-Panthers Sunday, who will naturally be rooting for an Eli-Peyton Manning Super showdown in Detroit, was asked where Eli has made the greatest strides from his rookie season.

"I think he's a much better manager, if you will, than he was a year ago," Archie said. "He knows a lot more, and he's certainly more comfortable." And he's certainly comfortable being a New York quarterback, which is no small thing, because a lot of them are not. "I sense that he LOVES playing in New York," Archie said. "I've never seen any slight indication he doesn't absolutely love playing in New York." Continue

Giants' faith in young gun

Tom Brady won a Super Bowl before his 25th birthday. Dan Marino got to a Super Bowl before he turned 24. Even David Woodley led a team to the Super Bowl when he was just 24 years and three months old. So when Eli Manning awakens this morning and begins to celebrate his 25th birthday, he is already an old man compared to those Super Bowl studs. He also has had more NFL starts (23) under his belt than either Brady or Marino had when they led their teams to the big game. Continue

Sstrahan, Tiki & Eli all feeling good to go

Michael Strahan broke into a song yesterday when asked about the vision in his left eye, which was poked and nearly swollen shut last Saturday night in Oakland. "I can see clearly now . . . " Strahan sang happily. Why not rejoice? In the span of five minutes in the 30-21 win over the Raiders that clinched the NFC East for the Giants, Eli Manning, Strahan and Tiki Barber all were either shaken up or writhing in pain.

An inch here or there either way and the fate of three indispensable Giants would be far different heading into Sunday's playoff game against the Panthers. Manning turned his ankle late in the third quarter. Strahan was incensed and in tremendous pain and fear when backup tackle Chad Slaughter got his finger inside Strahan's helmet, nearly gouging out his left eye. Barber caught a 3-yard pass and as he was dragged down safety Jarrod Cooper rolled over Barber's left ankle. Continue

Blitz is on for Lewis

One day after the NFL's regular season ended, there already were six head coaching vacancies. And Giants defensive coordinator Tim Lewis reportedly was a candidate for five of them. That could make for a busy next few weeks for the 44-year-old Lewis, who figures to be one of the hottest assistant coaches on the market. He's eligible to be interviewed next week, and could meet with the Houston Texans, the St. Louis Rams, the Minnesota Vikings, the Kansas City Chiefs and the Green Bay Packers. Lewis also has to get his banged-up defense prepared for an NFC wild-card playoff game on Sunday afternoon. Continue

Big supply of Blue bluster

The Giants got exactly what they wanted out of their New Year's Eve trip to Oakland, and it wasn't just the NFC East title and a playoff game at home. They regained some momentum and rediscovered their confidence. They got their swagger back, too.

"Absolutely," defensive end Osi Umenyiora said after the Giants' division-clinching 30-21 win over the Raiders. "I don't see why not. Whoever we play, they know they'll be in for a battle. It doesn't matter who they are. The sooner everybody recognizes that, the better off everyone will be." Continue

All's well

n the afterglow of victory, John Mara stood in the visitors locker room at McAfee Stadium moments after the Giants defeated the Raiders 30-21 to win the NFC East title. As the Giants executive vice president, his thoughts, as always, drifted back to his father, team patriarch Wellington Mara, who died on Oct. 25 at the age of 89.

"My father really would have enjoyed this team," John Mara said, "and he would have gotten a good kick out of winning, particularly winning out here in Oakland. This has never been his favorite franchise so I think he would have enjoyed this a great deal." Continue

Shockey may return for Cat fight

Jeremy Shockey missed the Giants' division-clinching party in Oakland on Saturday night. But there's a chance he'll be back for their playoff party on Sunday afternoon. Tom Coughlin said yesterday he's "very hopeful" Shockey will be able to play against the Carolina Panthers, despite the ankle sprain that kept him out of the regular-season finale. And he said that before he knew the date of the Giants' playoff opener, which gives Shockey an extra day to rest. Continue

In Tiki we trust

The Giants would have built a stairway to Big Blue Heaven right there and climbed it, one by one, if only they could, just so Wellington Mara and Bob Tisch could have shared the moment with them. Just so they could have included the old men in the avalanche of embraces that swept over the visiting sidelines at McAfee Field and didn't seem to want to end.

They should enjoy it while they can. Because the message the Giants, 30-21 winners last night over the Charaiders, so badly wanted to deliver to the rest of the NFC — but most importantly to themselves — on the night they captured their first division championship in five years, was this: Wait 'Til This Year. Continue

Hat's off: Strahan slams helmet over cut to left eye

Michael Strahan left last night's game in the fourth quarter with a bad cut under his left eye, but not before slamming his helmet to the turf and screaming at Raiders RT Chad Slaughter. On a third-down pass, Strahan tried to rush around the outside when Slaughter blocked him with two hands to Strahan's face. Apparently at least one of his fingers poked through Strahan's facemask.

Strahan spent the next few minutes bleeding on the sideline, holding a towel up to his face. No penalty was called. Strahan returned on the next series, a shield on his facemask, and Slaughter gave him a friendly tap on the backside. Continue

Giants ring in East title

The Giants know that if they're going anywhere in the playoffs, they're going on the back of Tiki Barber. Last night Barber showed he's capable of carrying the team a very long way. The 30-year-old running back powered the Giants with his third 200-yard rushing game of the season, gaining 203 yards on 28 carries, including a 95-yard touchdown dash, the longest run in team history. His MVP-caliber performance led the Giants to a 30-21 win over the Oakland Raiders, and locked up their first NFC East title in five years.

"It feels real good," veteran wide receiver Amani Toomer said. "We accomplished a lot. The so-called experts had us finishing last in the division. That goes to show how much they know." Continue