The New York Giants thought they had their offensive line woes behind them when they entered the 2024 regular season.
General manager Joe Schoen had added two key free agents (Jermaine Eluemunor and Jon Runyan Jr.) to mix in with his young core of tackles Andrew Thomas and Evan Neal and center John Michael Schmitz, and optimism was high.
“I felt pretty good about it through the first six weeks and when A.T. went down, he’s… There are certain players on your roster that are difficult to replace and I would put him in that category,” Schoen said this week.
“So, when we were rolling with those six guys, I felt good about it. We made significant gains in terms of the amount of sacks, I don’t have the numbers in front of me, but I think we cut it in half or close to cut it in half compared to a year ago. So, I did feel good about the offensive lineup until that point.”
Then, the wheels came off. Little by little the line disintegrated and by the time the season ended, the Giants had used 10 different combinations along the offensive line — tied for the most in the NFL this season and matching last year’s fire drill of a system.
Only one lineman — 34-year-old Greg Van Roten, who was signed in training camp — played all 1,125 offensive snaps this year. Schmitz (87.7 percent) and Elumunor (82.3 percent) were next, but the tackle positions were revolving door again.
Thomas played in just six games this season before being shelved for the season with a Lisfranc injury. Neal was the opposite. He missed the first half of the season for multiple reasons. He was coming back from surgery to repair an ankle fracture last January plus the team was more conformable with Eluemunor at right tackle coming out of camp.
Neal would only get on the field after the Giants shifted Eluemunor to the left side in Thomas’ spot. His performance was so uninspiring that there’s talk that maybe he should be moved inside to guard.
Schoen is not discouraged. He will continue to tweak and augment the line. He has plenty of other issues to be concerned with. He needs a quarterback and his secondary, especially at cornerback, has been erratic. The line may not get that last needed big boost.
Still, bad luck is the real reason for the unit’s continued failure. They can’t stay healthy. They were healthy in 2022, and look what happened. The Giants ended up in the playoffs.
“You’d hope one of these years the injury gods would take care of us and we could be healthy the entire season up front,” Schoen added. “You watch these games on Sundays, as you get late into December, and you’re looking at these offensive lines, you’re like, ‘Gosh dang, that’s their starting five.’ It’d be nice to have in December.
“Again, that’ll always be a priority for us moving forward. It was tough last year in 2023, the way we played. It was part of the offseason priority this year. I feel good about the four that we have coming back and the depth and the competition we’ll have.”
Don’t be shocked if Schoen continues to address this area both in the draft and in free agency this offseason.
