Friday, August 25, 2017

The Giants & Jets Preseason Rivalry




When I was growing up and first getting into the NFL, it seemed that I needed to pick one local NFL team or the other to root for.

Luckily for me, I picked the Giants. It might have been for as trivial a reason as liking their uniforms better, or it might have been the string of particularly exciting games that allowed the Giants not only to qualify for the playoffs for the first time in 18 years right at the end of the season, but also to pull off an upset win at Philadelphia, the defending NFC champions, before bowing down to the San Francisco 49ers, who ultimately wound up winning the season's Super Bowl.

It might have been any of those things, or it might have been something else that made me pull more strongly for the Giants than for the Jets. However, I never hated the Jets or anything, and they have remained my second favorite team, although I am thankful to have the success of the Giants to offset the disappointment of pulling for the Jets through all of these years.

Here is the strange thing: at the time, the Jets seemed to me the far and away more successful team. They had not only been to the Super Bowl, but had won it in historic fashion, pulling off a shocking upset against the very heavily favored Baltimore Colts. They had also been to the playoffs several times during the long drought that the Giants were suffering through. Finally, that 1981 season, the Jets had been the more successful team, finishing 10-5-1, to the Giants 9-7. They even hosted a playoff game, although it wound up being the Giants who actually won a postseason game.

For years afterward, the Jets seemed like the more successful team, to boot. In 1982, the Jets again qualified for the postseason, while the Giants did not. The Jets were impressive, too, demolishing the defending AFC champion Cincinnati Bengals, 44-17, then dismantling the mighty Los Angeles Raiders, before losing to Miami in the AFC Championship Game. Neither the Jets nor the Giants were impressive in 1983, and in 1984, the Giants made it to the playoffs again, while the Jets did not. However, in 1985, the Jets once again enjoyed a better regular season then the Giants, finishing 11-5, and flirting with being the top seed in the AFC before losing a couple of must win games late in the season. But the Giants were better in the playoffs again, finally beating the defending champion 49ers before losing to the famous "46" defense of the Chicago Bears.

It was only in 1986 that the Giants finally managed to completely get past the shadow of the Jets success, at least in my then young mind. Even then, it was not clear until very late in the season, and really only in the postseason, that this would happen. After 11 weeks of play, there were five teams with records of 9-2 or better, and both New York teams were among them. However, the Jets, with their 10-1 mark at that point, had the best record in the league. But they then took a nosedive, losing five straight, while the Giants won some important showdowns against Denver, San Francisco, and then Washington to clinch their first division title in decades, and then to clinch the top seed in the NFC. In the playoffs, the Jets beat Kansas City, but then lost a heartbreaker in Cleveland, while the Giants romped past San Francisco, 49-3, then shut out Washington in the NFC title game, 17-0, before dousing red hot Denver, 39-20, in the Super Bowl for their first championship of the Super Bowl era. 

That was the point when the Giants finally clearly shot past the Jets to enjoy more success. That was emphasized still more when the Giants finished with three consecutive winning seasons from 1988 through 1990, when they won their second Super Bowl in five seasons, barely knocking out the 49ers, 15-13, in the NFC Championship Game, before just barely edging out the Bills, 20-19, in Super Bowl XXV. Since then, the Giants have generally enjoyed considerably more success, as well, qualifying for the Super Bowl three times in the post-Parcells era, and winning a pair of Super Bowl rivalry games against New England, including the second biggest upset in Super Bowl history against the previously undefeated Patriots in 2007.

In the meantime, the Jets kind of had a bumpy road. Up and down, if you will. They were bad in the late 1980's, qualified for the postseason (barely) in 1991, and then had another string of bad seasons, until "The Tuna" came to the Jets in 1997. They went from 1-15 in '96 to 9-7 and almost in the playoffs in 1997, and they finished with a solid 12-4 mark in 1998, winning the AFC East and beating Jacksonville in the divisional round to qualify for the AFC title game. They were beating the Broncos in Denver, 10-0, before ultimately losing. But they were decent for a few more years, then mediocre again for a few years after that. In 2009 and 2010, they were once again strong, qualifying for the AFC title games in those two consecutive seasons, but falling just short against Indianapolis and Pittsburgh, respectively. But since then, it has been almost all downhill, as the Jets have failed to qualify for the postseason.

Now, the Jets are widely projected to be among the worst teams in the league this season. 

As for the Giants, they have not been especially strong since beating the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XLVI, either. However, they did win that championship, and last season, they qualified for the postseason for the first time since that historical 2011 season. Now, many are predicting that they could make another run at the playoffs, and some are even suggesting that they could go far once there, to boot.

Let us hope.

All of that aside, the Giants and Jets always seem to meet in the preseason, and for that one preseason game, it matters for the fans of both teams, as bragging rights go to the winners, except for those seasons when the two teams meet during the regular season.

There are some significant games in this rivalry, but even if we merely focus on the preseason games between these two teams, there have been some memorable ones. The first complete NFL game that I recorded, commercials and all, was the 1990 preseason game between the Jets and Giants, and I was happy to have it. Unfortunately, I misplaced it somewhere along the line. Two years later, the finally hosted their first preseason game against the Giants, and they won that one, 20-14. It seemed to mark a shift in the balance of power locally, as the Giants, two years removed from their Super Bowl XXV championship, suddenly seemed mired in mediocrity, while the Jets had high hopes for a return trip to the playoffs, having qualified the season before.

The first preseason game between them that I attended, back in 1995, wound up being quite memorable, too, as it was a shootout ultimately won by the Giants, coming from behind to win it in the final minutes by a score of 32-31. Another very memorable game was the preseason encounter in 2010, in which Eli Manning lost his helmet during a play, and then unknown wide receiver Victor Cruz dazzled and went a long way towards earning not just a spot on the roster, but a starting position, as well. Incidentally, that was the first meeting between the two teams at their new stadium, which was then known as the New Meadowlands Stadium, and which since has come to be known officially as MetLife Stadium. 

Of course, the preseason games generally do not matter, either to the teams themselves, or mostly to the fans. Yet somehow, this one preseason game means more, because there is a rivalry that exists between these two franchises - the only two franchises that have to share a stadium, and they have done so now for well over three decades. 

This preseason's meeting is set for this Friday, and it is impossible to say who will win, because after all, it is a preseason game. The Giants have not yet managed to score an offensive touchdown, which is not encouraging for us fans of Big Blue, especially since this team managed to make the playoffs last year despite their offense, rather than because of it. 

So, I will not make any predictions. Either team could win. However, what I thought might be fun is to review some important moments not just in this rivalry, but specifically to review the history of preseason meetings between these two teams.

To that end, I added both an article, as well as some videos from Youtube that I found on it.

Enjoy!




11 Memorable Jets-Giants Preseason Games by Randy Lange Senior Reporter, newyorkjets.com, August 21, 2014:










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