QB Controversy is a Giant Headache
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

Throughout their 79-year history, the New York Giants have been just as dedicated to the avoidance of controversy as to the pursuit of winning football games. Some might say even more so.
Owner Wellington Mara’s preference for decorum over dazzle caused the team to pass on the supposedly rebellious Joe Namath in the 1965 draft in favor of the white-bread assurance of Tucker Frederickson. It may also be why the Giants have rarely had a genuine star in their galaxy. For every Frank Gifford, Phil Simms, Lawrence Taylor, or Jeremy Shockey, there’s a dozen Gary Reasons and Bart Oates, colorless workmen who got their jobs done with a minimum of fuss.
Well, now the Giants have what they have rarely had and what they have never wanted. Eli Manning is both the star quarterback they’ve somehow managed to miss out on, and the controversy they have desperately tried to avoid.
Despite the wisdom of head coach Tom Coughlin’s decision to name Kurt Warner his starting quarterback – for now, anyway – the controversy over when to hand the job to Manning is not about to go away.
Coughlin got as clear a message as a coach can receive last Friday against the Jets, when Warner looked every inch the seasoned pro and Manning the not-quite-ready-for-prime-time rookie. No dummy, Coughlin knew what he was seeing and acted upon it.
After all, throwing Manning behind the Giants’ decimated excuse for an offensive line would be as wise as letting everyone in your neighborhood know you had a priceless Ming vase in the house, and then leaving the doors unlocked.
If any of the Giants’ quarterbacks are to be used as the designated pinata for the swarming defense of the Philadelphia Eagles in Week 1, it may as well be Warner.
Warner’s greatest danger, however, may come not from the Giants’ opponents, but from their fans.
How long do you think it will be before the fans start calling for Warner’s head to be replaced by Manning’s body? How many interceptions from that curious sidearm sling of a delivery will it take? How many fumbles lost due to the lingering thumb injury Warner suffered nearly two years ago? How many losses with a quarterback who has not won a game as a starter since the 2001 NFC title game against the Eagles?
Allie Sherman took the Giants to the NFL championship in three straight seasons, but all it took was an embarrassing pre-season loss to the Jets in 1969 – Namath again! – to inspire some grandstand Gershwin to compose “Goodbye Allie!” on the spot and set the stage for Sherman’s dismissal.
It is not as if Giants fans owe Warner the same kind of allegiance they owed Sherman, or, in fact, any more allegiance than that afforded anyone who happens to be wearing the jersey on any given Sunday.
But the Giants have a lot invested in Manning and thus, in Warner. The former Ram’s every move will be scrutinized, his every sentence parsed for hidden meaning, his every stumble presented as Exhibit A in the case of the People for Eli Manning. If the team – and especially its quarterback – gets off to a bad start, the roars of the Giants Stadium crowd will make the Roman Colosseum seem like the New York Public Library by comparison.
None of this will make Wellington Mara very happy. The 88-year-old patriarch of the NFL’s oldest surviving franchise has already suffered the embarrassment of bad actors such as Elvis Patterson, Jeremiah Parker, and Tito Wooten. Collectively, the entire organization holds its breath whenever Shockey strays off his leash. They tolerated Taylor because he was LT, but a full-blown quarterback controversy, with questions to be answered every day, is not what the Giants are in business for.
News of Coughlin’s decision to sit Manning behind Warner led sportscasts across the country on Monday. Weekly, if not daily, updates are soon to follow. How long before the notoriously control-conscious Coughlin pops the top button on his shirt having to deal with the same issue, day in and day out?
Eli Manning is not Joe Namath, by any stretch of the imagination. He will never, I would guess, be accused of consorting with gamblers, never be caught sharing an apartment with a mob legbreaker, never wrestle himself into pantyhose before TV cameras for a few thousand bucks.
But in his own way, this All-American son of the world’s most prolific sire of quarterbacks brings the same kind of worries the Giants sought to avoid 40 years ago. He may be the quarterback of the future, but for the present, having Eli Manning on the sidelines is one Giant headache.