The New York Giants are not a good football team. They entered their Sunday Night matchup against Green Bay with the worst point differential in the NFC and ranked 32nd of 32 teams in the advanced metric DVOA (Defense-Adjusted Value Over Average). They were starting their third-string quarterback Tommy DeVito, an Illinois alum who took an incredible number of sacks in college.
In his short stint as the Giants’ starter, DeVito had averaged six and a half sacks per game, including a nine-sack game against the Washington Commanders.
There was no reason to think that the Giants’ offense could be stopped by the Packers. Furthermore, there was no reason to believe that the Packer offense, which had just destroyed a superb Kansas City defense, would have any trouble facing one of the worst defenses in the league.
Rather, in all three phases of the game, the Packers were apathetic. DeVito managed to rush for 71 yards on ten carries despite the fact that they were unable to record any sacks of him. Although DeVito didn’t throw for a lot of yards in this game, he was successful when he did, finishing 17 passes for 158 yards and a touchdown with just four interceptions during the game.
It didn’t really matter because the Giants’ receiver Wan’Dale Robinson had an incredible game both through the air and on the ground, combined with DeVito’s running and Saquon Barkley’s ground efforts, leaving the Packers with no way to respond. This was an embarrassing performance considering that every other team that has faced the Giants has easily won the trench warfare.
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