Don't Fire Tom Coughlin from New York, Just Yet

Since Coughlin's arrival in New York, he's been labeled by the media as none other than a dictator and high act that pushed around star players and fines them for being late to meetings. But no one's mentioned the fact that the Giant's have made a complete 180 since the Fassel days. In the three years since he's been with the organization, Coughlin has led this team to two playoff opportunities, restored overall prominence on the Giant team; even contributing to Tiki Barber's new ball control methods. He didn't get any credit for any of that. Infact, everybody is screaming that he should be released from his duties.

The Giants were off to such a wonderful start in the beginning of this previous 2006 NFL football season. 6-2 was a solid start considering the other teams performances within the NFC Eastern division. They looked promising, spectacular and were billed, "Most likely to go to the playoffs." But somewhere, somehow, something went wrong. One of our star players threatened retirement while the rest left due to injury and would be out for the entire season. After those misfortunate dealings, the Giants took a huge drop from the playoff plateau from which they were billed. Terry Bradshaw and his baldhead dismissed us from entering the playoff picture, but we did. We snuck through the backdoor at 8-8 after a wishy-washy season, but we made it in. Justifying the phrase, "It's not how you start a season, but how you finish it."

Why fire Coughlin when we'll just be making the same mistake we did with Jim Fassel? The Giants quit on Fassel. After a disappointing Superbowl loss to the Ravens and a disrupted playoff dream at the hands of the 49ers in 2002, the team threw the towel.

Than the organization threw the towel on Fassel. Here we go again. Déjà vu. Were back at square one and everybody is pointing the finger at Coughlin. The sad part is, it isn't his fault. Unfortunately, coaches are blamed often when indeed a team should make adjustments in order to achieve greatness. Coughlin is doing his best to offer that, but maybe some of these Giant players should step it up instead of always complaining, "We got out coached today." NO - you got out hustled today! You didn't check your man today! You didn't stretch the field out today! You didn't run the proper route today! You didn't open up the hole today! You moved today! You jump offsides or cost us 5 yards today! You got unnecessary roughness today! Stop blaming Coughlin.

Who will be next in New York? If we fire Coughlin, who else are we going to bring in? If the players happen to not respond to him in 2 or 3 years will he be fired too?

This man has taken us to two playoff opportunities since his arrival. Last year was a blow against the Carolina Panthers 19-0. This year, the Giants put up a much more spirited effort but came up short against the Philadelphia Eagles 23-20. There's no possible excuse for the loss other than the fact that Philly is tough and we didn't have our star guns. Perhaps we could've done better. But we didn't. So we move on to next season in pursuit of higher hopes. Therefore, we should grant Coughlin a pass into next season; giving him a legitimate chance to help restore the force in New York.