Guess What? The Giants are Going to Beat the Patriots Tonight
Nobody in the entire world is looking at this game the right way. They just do not understand. They just do not understand Tom Coughlin, and they do NOT understand the magnitude of this game tonight on the future of the New York Giants. They do NOT understand the amount of PRESSURE that the Patriots are under for this game. A 15-0 team, trying to go 16-0? Are you kidding me? Does anyone out there get the picture? The Pats are going to be TIGHT.

In the last two seasons, Coughlin led Giants teams into the playoffs that were injured, struggling and without any sort of momentum. This year, although the Giants and Eli Manning have been sloppy in the second half after a 6-2 start, they actually have a chance to say, "Hey, we went 5-3 in the second half of the season, won our last two games and went 11-5 for the season. We were 7-1 on the road, and we actually have a better record than our first-round opponent, and we're playing well. We're coming off ending the 15-game winning streak of the greatest NFL team since 1985." And Coughlin's an old-school coach. He thinks - and perhaps correctly - that the Giants have a fighting chance in the playoffs if its players believe in themselves. And if their comebacks at Chicago and at Washington earlier this year tell you ANYTHING, it's that this team's players DO BELIEVE IN THEMSELVES.

Coughlin might very well rest Brandon Jacobs (he should), and perhaps pull a few starters out early. But here's what's going to happen: The Giants are going to build a stunning halftime lead, something like 23-7, and yes, they are going to start sitting some players in the second half, but THEY ARE GOING TO HOLD ON. This HAS to happen. It's the only thing that would make any sense. The Giants, perhaps incorrectly, believe the gap has closed between themselves and the Green Bay Packers and the Dallas Cowboys, so they actually think that beating the Patriots is going to give them momentum into the playoffs, and that they're going to shock the world all the way to the Super Bowl.

They might be wrong. The momentum might not carry over the way they think. But they are going to beat the Patriots tonight. It's just so obvious. All the Giants have to do is protect Manning a little better than they have lately (for some reason, the offensive line has given up 18 sacks of Manning in the last seven games after allowing just eight through the first eight games), and Eli himself has to make some plays. Say what you want about Eli Manning, but he's better than A.J. Feeley of the Eagles, who almost beat the Patriots IN FOXBORO earlier this year. There's no question that the Giants can run the ball on the Patriots, no matter WHO the running back is. They're bigger and tougher than the Patriots, and that's going to show.

It all comes down to one thing: Will the Giants be able to create front-seven pressure on Tom Brady? I say yes. You could argue with me all you'd like, and you might be right. But when this game is over, and the Patriots are 15-1 and the Giants are 11-5, don't come crying to me.

Giants 30, Patriots 27

Liners, Sliders and Steroids

I can’t actually sit and not say ANYTHING about this steroid business, so Liners, Sliders and Scoops is back on the air.

Due to the fact that everyone has said something, there really isn’t much new to write. I’ve thought for a long time that it was weird that a declining Roger Clemens was able to win consecutive Cy Young awards throwing a combined 498 innings in 1997 and 1998, way past his prime. Other people have pointed this out.

The only two things right now that I can add to this whole Mitchell Report business are these:

There needs to be a meaningful reevaluation of players who played from, let’s say 1975 to 1995. We need to see if maybe some of the guys who weren’t Hall of Famers because their numbers weren’t good enough are actually Hall-worthy. Maybe they don’t look so bad – I’m talking the Keith Hernandez-, Don Mattingly-type guys – considering the fact that their immediate peers cheated. Nobody’s talking about that right now. I’ll think about it. These guys could be really positively impacted by the whole drug thing.

The fashionable thing to do – let’s call it the Andy Pettitte, Fernando Vina, Brian Roberts defense – seems to be to say, “I cheated a few times, then I stopped, because it was wrong.” PR-wise, this is totally the smartest way to go about it. Roger Clemens is still denying everything through his agent, and nobody believes him. Pettitte, Vina and Roberts learned a lot from Bill Clinton’s mistakes. I hate to say it, but I can’t say I totally believe Pettitte, Vina and Roberts, but they at least look like they’ve got SOME character. Of all the people whose first real link to steroids and human growth hormone came in the Mitchell report, let’s wait and see how many come out with the “Dude, I did it, but only a few times because I was hurt,” and how many totally deny everything. I can almost guarantee that the “Sorry for this, but I did it a few times,” will come out looking more honest to fans.

And that’s really all that matters, is the fans. Or more accurately, the records the fans love. Baseball will survive this. Home runs are already down, testing is already working, but some fans are disenchanted. This is NOT as bad as the 1919 scandal that had the White Sox fixing World Series games, or even as bad as the 1994 owner’s lockout that cancelled the last quarter of the season and the World Series. But it’s bad, because it’s a one-size-fits-all asterisk on all the game’s records since the 1980s – and don’t even think it doesn’t go back to the mid 1980s – and more than any other sport, baseball is a game of records. And we want them sacred, and we get flustered and angry when they’re not sacred. So once baseball can assure us that the numbers are all sacred again, the game will be okay.

There are some players who come out as winners here. Those include finesse pitching, 300-game winners like Greg Maddux and Tom Glavine. Maddux is going to go down as the best starting pitcher of his generation. Glavine’s even going to go down as better than Clemens. Who would’ve thought THAT two years ago?

And Mattingly, Hernandez, Dave Parker, all those types of players, maybe they’ll also be the big winners.

Parker’s 339 career homers don’t look so bad anymore, do they?