Giants Can Upset Perfect Team With Xxv-style Perfect Game

Thought this would be an Interesting Read, from Today's New York Post

January 22, 2008 -- THE Giants have played The Perfect Game in a Super Bowl once, and now they will have to do it again. Only this time, Bill Belichick is the enemy. Which means Super Bowl XLII is the perfect day to give Belichick a taste of his own medicine.

None other than Mark (Rambo) Bavaro, the great tight end, thinks the Giants can play The Perfect Game in Super Bowl XLII and give us Deja Blue all over again against the Perfect Team.


"Absolutely," Bavaro told The Post. "With Brandon Jacobs and (Ahmad) Bradshaw, that 1-2 punch is pretty formidable, and you combine that with Eli (Manning) all of a sudden looking better than his brother . . . he looks like a top-rated quarterback." Any and all recollection of images from Super Bowl XXV, from start to Wide Right, makes the heart of every Giants fan pound with excitement and hope.


They close their eyes now and imagine what another Super Sunday like that against Belichick would look like, The Perfect Dream, if you will: Jacobs, a bigger battering ram than Ottis Anderson by 40 pounds, turning the corner and running over Tedy Bruschi, getting stronger as the game goes on, inexorably moving the chains, leaving Junior Seau with his tongue hanging out by the fourth quarter, as Chris Snee gleefully engages safety Rodney Harrison with trash talk.


Tom Brady and Randy Moss grow increasingly frustrated on the sidelines. Pepperpot rookie Bradshaw, who never goes down on initial contact, who keeps his powerful legs churning to the whistle, stuns Patriots defenders with his quickness and power, and keeps Jacobs fresh.

"It was Ride 35 or Ride 35 bootleg," Bavaro said last night. "We could run it straight at Bruce Smith - Jumbo [Elliott] would open holes - or [Jeff] Hostetler was so athletic, he could bootleg out of that. He'd do a complete turnaround and go the other way. He had a couple of options as he sprinted out, or sometimes he kept it. The defense didn't know what was going on.

Manning, playing flawlessly one more time in the postseason, manages a game even better than the one Hostetler managed in Tampa. Hostetler, playing for the injured Phil Simms, kept the Bills off-balance with rollouts, bootlegs and play-action; Manning does it all even better, and sprays short and intermediate passes around to Amani Toomer ,Steve Smith and Kevin Boss.

Plaxico Burress, knowing he has a full offseason to rest his ailing body parts, goes all out and picks balls out of the air over smaller Patriots corner Asante Samuel, especially when Manning calls his number on a fade pattern or two in the end zone.

Corey Webster, the Giants' most physical corner, roughs up Moss at the line. And when Moss decides to go over the middle, Antonio Pierce and/or Gibril Wilson wait in ambush to deliver the kind of blows that Belichick's safeties and linebackers used to rattle Andre Reed. Let them catch it, and tackle them. Hard.


"It's predicated upon giving up yards," Bavaro said, "but making you pay for it. After a while, you don't want to catch the ball. It's almost like they kinda go through the motions. They start ducking, they start to slow down . . . that's a huge disruption."
Defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo, Tom Coughlin's Belichick, opts to employ six defensive backs, sometimes rushing only two defensive linemen, and concedes the running game to Lawrence Maroney the way Belichick conceded it to Thurman Thomas.
"A big part of the philosophy was slowing down the pace of everything," said Steve DeOssie, middle linebacker on the XXV champs. "From something as simple as unpiling slowly, if the ball got moved accidentally or whatever."


Maroney gashed the Chargers for 122 yards in the AFC Championship Game with his cutback prowess.
"Our guys were overpursuing," Chargers defensive coordinator Ted Cottrell said.
All things being equal, the Giants should not welcome a shootout akin to their 38-35 loss last month to the Pats. They will have to control the ball for longer than 23:42, or Brady will throw for 356 yards and a pair of TDs to Moss again.

So welcome to Deja Blue.

You say it can't be done?

Jim Kelly's K-Gun offense had scored 95 points in two playoff victories. But only 19 points in 19:27 in Tampa.
"I think this Patriots team is better-coached than that Buffalo team," DeOssie said.
That's why this would be The Perfect Upset.