The lone thing the New York Giants have excelled at this season is losing.
That makes it doubly startling that they just sabotaged their chances of owning the No. 1 overall pick in the 2025 NFL Draft by winning Sunday for the first time since Oct. 6.
The Giants, who entered Week 17 ranked last in the NFL in scoring offense at 14.3 points per game, somehow tripled that average with a stunning 45-33 home win over the Indianapolis Colts.
It was like Y.A. Tittle came down from the heavens to run the New York offense.
Think about it: these Giants have lost by more than 20 points on five occasions. New York also knows how to lose calls, sitting 0-5 in games decided by five or fewer points.
The Giants are so good at losing that they set a franchise record with 10 consecutive losses. So call them historic losers.
So when these guys need to lose two more games to land the No. 1 overall pick, you would think it wouldn’t be hard for these guys to tank.
Apparently, mention “tank” to these guys, and they go home and put food in the fish tank. Or they go to the museum and look at a military tank.
Who exactly expected the Giants to leave the field victorious and extinguish the playoff hopes of the Colts? New York hadn’t won a home game all season.
But just like that, the Giants went from favorites to pick first in the draft to watching the New England Patriots sit in the best position.
Congrats to the current players for not folding and delivering a stellar effort on Sunday. But yeah, your chances of landing a quarterback of the future is on life support.
Colorado’s Shedeur Sanders is the best QB available in the draft, with Miami’s Cam Ward also expected to go among the first few picks.
New York could now miss out on both.
In November, the Giants correctly parted ways with Daniel Jones, which means they finally agree with the rest of the football world that using the No. 6 overall pick in 2019 on the Duke product was a major mistake.
Let’s hope that the fans of the team don’t suddenly think Drew Lock represents the future just because he matched his career high of four passing touchdowns and rushed for another against the Colts.
Lock is 10-17 as an NFL starter and the Denver Broncos and Seattle Seahawks both decided that Lock wasn’t the right guy to lead their franchises. Lock is a long-term No. 2 guy; he’s not going to suddenly emerge like Brad Johnson did at age 28 and eventually lead a team to a Super Bowl title.
The Giants’ flop leaves the Patriots in the driver’s seat. New England has lost six straight games but nabbed its quarterback of the future by selecting Drake Maye third overall in the 2024 draft.
The Tennessee Titans—who definitely need a quarterback—and the Cleveland Browns also are in better position than the Giants. Both Tennessee and Cleveland have lost five straight games.
The Las Vegas Raiders hurt their draft positioning with back-to-back victories, another stunning occurrence. The Raiders lost 10 games in a row before beating the Jacksonville Jaguars and New Orleans Saints in consecutive weeks.
Las Vegas would be in the pole position without those wins but now could fall out of the top five. The Raiders are still trying to figure out whether or not they need a quarterback.
They know Gardner Minshew isn’t the answer, but 2023 fourth-round draft pick Aidan O’Connell has displayed signs that he could be a serviceable starter. If the answer is yes on O’Connell, the Raiders can fill a need at another position with a top-flight draft pick.
If they had their eyes on Sanders, they can close them now because he’s out of reach.
Definitely bad timing for the Raiders to post a few wins. Of course, coach Antonio Pierce badly needed those victories, or he isn’t going to be part of the future.
Either way, on draft day, fans of the Giants and Raiders will be asking, “Why did we suddenly win?”
