Super Bowl XLVI: The Giants Defense Got Healthy At the Right Time

Was New York the best team over the course of 19 games this year? No. They went 9-7 in the regular season and allowed 25 points a game, 25th in the league. They allowed more points than they scored, the first Super Bowl team to ever be outscored in the regular season. In the Giants’ case, it’s not as much a fluke, though, in the current system, as it is a case of surviving just enough until they got their best players healthy, and then thriving in the playoffs.

Before the season started, the Giants defense was decimated by injuries, losing starting middle linebacker Jonathan Goff, starting corner Terrell Thomas, and reserve linebacker Clint Sintim to knee injuries, and second round pick Marvin Austin to a torn pectoral. First round pick Prince Amukamara had a foot injury that kept him out of action for half the season and linebacker Chase Blackburn had a right knee injury that kept him out for more than half the season [Edit: Blackburn’s injuries were in 2010, and he was not on the roster at the start of the season, and was re-signed at midseason as a free agent]. Add in injuries that limited Osi Umenyiora and Justin Tuck during the first 6 weeks of the season, and the Giants were mixing and matching most of the season.

As a result, they had to play three rookie linebackers–Greg Jones, Jacquian Williams, and Mark Herzlich–a substantial amount of snaps. They had to mix and match, and Mathias Kiwanuka had to go back to linebacker from defensive end.

Fortunately, for the Giants, the injuries slowed, and they eventually got their optimal lineup (at least among those not on injured reserve) in the game. Chris Canty and Linval Joseph played every game at the tackle positions, and the starting secondary stayed healthy once the season began, with Kenny Phillips only missing one game, and Corey Webster, Aaron Ross, Antrel Rolle and Deon Grant playing every game. Umenyiora and Tuck eventually got healthy, though Umenyiora still missed time. The veteran Chase Blackburn got healthy, and Michael Boley came back from a midseason injury, so the rookie linebackers weren’t forced to play as much.

I went through the game books to look at games where the defensive end rotation included all three of Jason Pierre-Paul, Justin Tuck, and Osi Umenyiora, and where the linebacking group had Michael Boley and Chase Blackburn active along with Mathias Kiwanuka. I then adjusted for the opponent, based on the opponent’s average yards and points scored, versus what the Giants allowed based on who was playing that game. Here’s a quick summary:

Now, it has been only four games since the Giants have had the same depth and rotation at linebacker and defensive end that they will have in the Super Bowl, and the results have been stellar. It’s a small sample size, and some of that point performance has been turnover and fourth down luck, as the yardage profile shows they are holding teams to about 50 yards below their average.

While they probably wouldn’t play like the 1985 Bears over the course of the full season, I think it is equally true that they will not play like the Giants defense of this season when Tuck and Umenyiora were injured, and when they had to play the three rookie linebackers heavily. Even when the linebackers were still not at full strength, as long as they had all three defensive ends, they were an above average defense.

Even discounting the crazy points improvement, if we just look at the yards with all the top guys who will be playing in the Super Bowl, we see a pretty good improvement. Over the course of a 16 game season, that yardage profile would have been 4th, behind Pittsburgh, Houston, and Baltimore, and just in front of San Francisco and the New York Jets in yards allowed. Instead, with the injuries, the Giants were 27th in yards.

The four teams closest to the current incarnation of the Giants defense in yards allowed permitted an average of 17.8 points a game (league average points allowed was 21.7). That’s probably a closer estimate to the true quality of this current unit.

However, it is not wise to look at this as a bad defense, at least the group that will actually be playing the game. If they had this same group most of the year, they would have likely been a top 8 unit. That improvement, due to personnel, is how a 9-7 team with a negative point differential can be only a slight underdog to a high powered offense that went 13-3 in the regular season.

[photo via Getty]