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A “missed opportunity.”
That’s how New York Giants head coach John Harbaugh summed up his team’s 24-21 loss to the Washington Commanders on Thursday night.
“It’s disappointing, yeah. I mean, I think that’s the best word. It’s just disappointing,” Harbaugh said after the game.
“We worked hard for this, and we put a hard week in. And we were prepared. The guys came out with, I thought, tremendous energy. We played very hard. Plays were made. Plays were missed. But it wasn’t good enough to win the game. And that’s the disappointment of it.”
Indeed, that sums it up nicely, particularly on offense, where the Giants outgained the Commanders 399 to 340 and averaged 6.2 yards per play to Washington’s 5.1.
But a 33.3% third-down conversion rate and points left on the field (kicker Dominic Zvada’s missed 33-yard chip shot comes to mind) reminded one of the dark ages when the Giants repeatedly proved they weren’t good enough to overcome their self-inflicted wounds.
Harbaugh, however, isn’t ready to throw in the towel.
“It’s disappointing, but you can’t let it bring you down,” he said. “We’re going to be good. We’re not going to curl up. We’re going to come out fighting.”
We can only hope. Meanwhile, here is a look at how each player on offense performed.
Talk about someone who deserved a better fate. We thought McCarthy played a winning game from start to finish, but his coordinator and head coach did not.
They let him down by turtling with the lead twice late in the game, taking the ball out of McCarthy’s hands.
We sure would have liked to see McCarthy get a chance to make a play on those two late-fourth-quarter possessions, but the coaches played conservatively and never let him.
Early on, he made most of his plays with his legs. A truly great improvisational play to get the ball to Cam Skattebo while being sacked led to a big, early 34-yard gain.
Later on, when his first two options were taken away on an RPO, he took off instead and got 12 yards, a really good decision.
On the negative side, Washington’s blitzes forced him to hurry his throws and nearly resulted in an interception. He then took a sack on a blitz after ignoring a wide-open Skattebo (who passed up the blitz pickup) in the flat.
A good scramble got him another 10 yards, and a sharp zone-read run added another 8. He finished the first half with a ho-hum 12-of-19 for 92 yards and just 7 points, but he still managed a solid four carries for 30 yards (7.5 average) on the ground.
In the second half, he started slinging it from the pocket. A 25-yard connection to Malachi Fields jump-started the offense on a third-quarter touchdown drive that gave his team a 14-10 lead.
His next possession started with another big play, a 37-yard layered deep out to Malik Nabers. Several snaps later, Nabers fumbled in the red zone, denying McCarthy another touchdown drive as the offense moved.
A dropped pass on a perfect throw to Theo Johnson ended another fourth-quarter drive.
Trailing 17-14, McCarthy then made his best throw of the night: a perfect dart against a blitzer right in his face into Isaiah Likely’s hands in the deep middle. Likely then took it into the end zone to complete a magnificent 66-yard touchdown play and put Washington up 21-17.
Two subsequent interceptions by the Giants’ defense should have closed out this game, but the coaches’ calls gave Washington one last chance to score. Washington took it. McCarthy finished with good numbers: 23 of 36 for 293 yards, one touchdown and just one sack.
One thing we wish McCarthy would push the coaches on: finding Skattebo in the flat, where he was open but ignored numerous times.
Bottom line: McCarthy played well enough Thursday night to win this game. His coaches did not.
The veteran backup converted his first of two tush pushes Thursday night. Still, the second, coming in the fourth quarter after the Jevon Holland interception, failed and forced a punt from deep in Giants territory on a three-and-out. That hurt.
We thought Skattebo played a really good multifaceted game. His 34-yard catch-and-run off a McCarthy improv play jump-started the sluggish offense early on.
Skattebo ran hard between the tackles, pushing piles consistently and getting the yards needed while showing no signs of the hamstring strain that kept him out of the previous week’s game.
His first touchdown of the night came from 1 yard out and was, in a word, tough. His second touchdown came on a cleanly executed pitch out wide, with a sharp cutback at the top of his run, knifing right through the hole for the score.
On the two late-game drives that turned into third-and-shorts, the coaches took the ball out of Skattebo’s hands, and failure resulted both times.
On several of those tough runs, we really wished he had a bit of jump in his lower body to bounce things outside in the hole. He set up the Washington middle with his toughness, but the lack of outside bounce kept things manageable for them, making the coaches’ short-yardage calls easy to stop.
Skattebo finished with 78 yards on 18 carries, a 4.3 average, and had 44 yards on three receptions. All night long, Skattebo was a beast in blitz pickup. We couldn’t find a single miss except on the sack, where there may have been a miscommunication.
One question, though: What was Skattebo doing, apparently taking the play off when Winston’s tush push failed late in the game? The quarterback needed a push, but no one was there.
Skattebo had a chance to get in behind Winston and push; that’s how these things work. Was it a simple brain freeze? That’s the only logical explanation we can come up with to explain him taking a play off at a critical moment.
Singletary got one early touch for 3 yards and then was run over in a pass-pro blitz pickup.
He barely got back on the field, as the offense with Skattebo looked so much more dangerous than Singletary.
The team’s No. 1 receiver's lack of playmaking reared its ugly head for the second game in a row. Last week it was a blatant drop of a perfect throw in the end zone plus a bunch of game-long hissy fits that don’t do anyone any favors.
This week it was another ho-hum line: five receptions for 44 yards (8.8 avg.), including one 37-yard deep sideline connection plus a handful of short, inconsequential catches.
Add in the game-killing third-quarter fumble on a 3-yard catch that was going nowhere, with his team trailing 17-14 and the offense on the move.
Add in a slip coming out of a break on a fourth-quarter route that sent the ball whistling to where he should have been. Add a fourth-quarter desperation heave against a zero blitz that was intercepted, as he not only failed to fight for the ball but did nothing to disrupt the interception.
Overall, it was a negative game from the Giants’ WR1 when they needed him to step up.
Continuing to produce solid results week in and week out, this rookie is as consistent as the day is long. He catches everything in his vicinity. This week he had three receptions for 62 yards (20.7 per catch) on just four targets.
He continues to block not only with physicality but with smarts. If a shield is all it will take to make a block, then he shields. If it’s a heavy block, then he sticks his nose into the contact and stands his ground.
He did miss one edge block Thursday night, but he was key on the 13-yard touchdown run and on several other plays. He probably deserves more targets since he is so strong and reliable. We’re still waiting on him to be a target on a jump ball or two. So far through nine games, zero jump balls.
Mooney made one big play, turning a third-down short crosser into a first down with a neat move that found a defensive back reaching for air.
On the night, he caught only two passes for 8 yards.
We couldn’t believe our eyes when we saw Likely suffer his first drop of the season on an early third down, as he tried to stop and double back against double coverage before running and securing the catch. We suppose, though, it had to happen sooner or later.
Undaunted, Likely went on to catch nine of his other 10 targets, rivaling rookie Fields in reliability. There didn’t seem to be any inconsequential Likely catches Thursday night, as he and his quarterback were pretty much on the same page while defeating Washington’s blitzes.
The highlight of his night was, of course, the fourth-quarter 66-yard connection for a touchdown, with Likely running a picture-perfect deep middle crosser, taking the throw and then taking off down the sideline to finish the big play and give his team a 21-17 lead.
His totals on the night: nine catches for 127 yards (14.1 avg.). Washington had no answer for him. It was another dominant performance by this free-agent acquisition, one of the best this organization has ever made.
Getting a few more snaps than he did last week as he works his way back into the tight end rotation after missing a couple of games with a neck ailment, Johnson caught one pass for 8 yards, but he really came up small in the fourth quarter when he failed to haul in a throw that hit him right in the hands on third down, which forced a punt.
It looked as if Johnson didn’t get his hands in position when the ball arrived.
If this player cannot be trusted to have his hands properly aligned in the receiving game, then he shouldn’t be getting any critical balls thrown his way.
On the plus side, Johnson’s run-blocking was better this week than it was last week.
This veteran blocking tight end had a subpar night, including one false start and inconsistent run-blocking.
Not getting enough snaps for our taste, Ricard was a monster on almost every one of his blocking efforts.
However, why he wasn’t behind Winston on that critical fourth-quarter tush push is a mystery for the ages. His talents were wasted when they had him lining up on the far edge on this snap.
There was nothing wrong with Thomas’ pass-blocking except for the occasional back-pedal roller-skate moments, which never got home.
The night’s lone sack came when an unblocked rusher chased McCarthy right into Thomas’ cleanly blocked man.
Thomas’ run-blocking was also solid, but the coaches aren’t asking him to do anything in space or run anything wide to his side, which seems to be a result of the groin injury he’s still fighting through.
Eluemunor allowed several inside pass rushes to threaten his pocket, but otherwise his pass-blocking was sharp.
On the third-quarter 13-yard touchdown run, the veteran was surprisingly sharp getting out wide and then picking off his man in pursuit with a perfectly timed, well-executed seal. It was a key block on this play.
Eluemunor didn’t have many highlights in run blocking, but that one was textbook.
The O-line’s weakest link continues to fail to sustain his run blocks in any discernible way. Suffice it to say that whenever there’s a traffic jam between the tackles, it’s Runyan’s man who is in the middle of it.
His pass-blocking was better than his run-blocking, but his inability to hold his ground against power continues to take space away from the front of the pocket for his quarterback to step up into.
We were a bit bothered by how the big rookie sidestepped several of Thursday night’s inside blitzes to hang out with his center, double-teaming a non-threatening defensive tackle. At the same time, a blitzer went screaming past him. It seems obvious that the coaches have simplified his reads instead of asking him to react on the move to the unexpected like a veteran guard might.
The coaches kept Mauigoa one-on-one most of the night, and he handled it well, winning most of them with patience and power.
After last week’s lowest point of his rookie season, this was a nice bounce-back effort to calm things down.
Experience via playing time will help him, but until he acquires it, the kid will likely continue to play average ball. He has lost some of his aggressiveness.
We were a bit disappointed with several stunts run inside Thursday night that surprised Hudson. It’s okay to get surprised, but his reactions to them were soft and weak. We expected a stronger response to someone suddenly in his face, but we did not see it.
Hudson is another interior player who is not firing out or playing very aggressively. The interior double-teams are as soft as they get.
We suspect that the influx of heavy blitzing by opposing defenses has taken away some of the quick thinking that young players like Hudson and Mauigoa need to develop.
Playing time and experience should help, but the growing pains have not been pretty.
Stinnie got one snap as a blocking tight end near the goal line, and his powerful edge block opened a touchdown run off tackle.
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