It sounds like such folly to discuss something as abstract as culture in a business like football that is so rooted in physical combat. Yet if you are running football or any business, having bad culture will be costly. If you ever worked at a place with bad culture, you know what I am talking about. Heads they win, tails you lose. The good people leave. There is no team. And if there is one thing we can agree on, football is a team sport.
Culture is one of those intangibles that we just don’t talk about enough. Bad culture manifests itself in the front office with bully GMs. It manifests itself in the scouting department with nepotism. And it manifests itself on the field with dysfunctional coaches/players.
This writer loved Jeremy Shockey out of the draft (5 years before beginning the blog). Yet we did not know the corrosive effect he would have on the team.
Earlier this offseason, former Giants wide receiver Amani Toomer, now a fill-in host on SiriusXM NFL Radio, spoke about the development of quarterback Eli Manning. One of Manning and Toomer’s offensive teammates was tight end Jeremy Shockey. The former Canes star and college teammate of Winslow took advantage of Manning during the Giants quarterback’s first few years in the league, so Toomer detailed, bullying him after virtually every play in the huddle.
Toomer spoke how Shockey constantly demanded Manning get him the ball. Shockey, naturally, was open on each play, so he told Manning, game after game, week after week.
In short, Shockey was in Manning’s head, and it greatly affected his play. It wasn’t until late in the 2007 season, Toomer said, that Manning began to turn the corner, becoming one of the NFL’s better signal-callers. No small reason, said Toomer, was Shockey was on the sidelines with a broken leg.
JoeBucsFan 5/22/12
It was painful to admit that one of the guys I rooted for was a bully who was killing the team with bad culture. Confront the brutal facts. Exit Shockey, enter Boss. And we know how the story ended. XLII. Good culture wins. Bad culture loses. What happened in 2007 may be an oversimplification of how that Super Bowl run evolved, yet I do trust Toomer to give us an accurate accounting of what obviously made a big difference in 2007.
After Joe Judge was fired, the stories came out how players were afraid to make mistakes. Bad culture. Onto Daboll. The early reports are good. We never know exactly what is happening until after the fact, but consider the words of Waller, Simmons and Wink.
“They value our opinions here and you know, as a player, I feel like a lot of places I’ve gone, you’re told to do things a certain way and you do those things. But here, it’s like they ask a lot of questions, they want to know what you’re thinking, why, what do you like to do more. So to offer input’s a really cool thing because coaches and players gotta be in partnership. We’re all together.”
Darren Waller
“Everybody’s welcomed me with open arms like I’ve been here from the jump. I appreciate them for that, that says a lot about the culture here and just what type of team this is. I appreciate all the guys just bringing me in and welcoming me in.”
Isaiah Simmons
“It’s, like I said, I know you hear the word selfless, but it truly is a selfless group who cares about our success and that is cool in today’s day and age of the NFL. Like you got (cornerback) Adoree’ (Jackson), who is helping those young corners out. I mean, he’s a stud and he wants them to be great and I just love the people here. I think that’s what Joe and Dabs and even the prior regime, there is some good people in this building that want to do right for the Giants and do right for our defense and do right for our team most importantly.”
Wink Martindale
After all the entanglements with Saquon Barkley’s busted contract talks, Barkley did the right thing and showed up for camp anyway; the Giants give him an extra $1M.
“Once I made the decision I was going to show up and I was going to be there and do my job, you got to put all that aside. Got to be mature about it.”
Saquon Barkley
Winning is the best deodorant.
“It’s a cliché, but it is true. When people talk about a culture change, Brian Daboll was a part of that culture change in Buffalo. Now, the quarterback became all-world, but a lot of that is coaching, a lot of that is building around the quarterback the right way, and building it the right way. If you talk about culture change, it starts with belief and faith, and you can tell that these guys, not only do they like him and respect him, but they’re playing for him.”
Brian Baldinger 9/22/22
When you’re winning, you have good culture, and when you’re losing, the culture s*cks. Correlative or causative? I know it is causative, but I do recognize that there is a feedback mechanism too. If these coaches are asking the players what plays they like to run and what they like to do on the field, that has to make a difference in success and effort. As long as the coaches hold themselves as accountable as they do the players, the Giants will do well. Right now, the Giants are doing well.