Giants GM Dave Gettleman says he has a plan, actually doesn't

Fear not, Giants fans. It may be hard to believe, but Dave Gettleman has a plan … apparently.

The Giants general manager spoke with the media for the first time since trading Odell Beckham Jr. to the Browns for two draft picks and safety Jabrill Peppers and he was on the defensive for the duration of the conference call.

Gettleman explained that it was never really in his intentions to trade Beckham — that the Browns came to him with an offer he could not refuse.

“We didn’t sign him to trade him, but things changed,” Gettleman said. “Frankly, what changed, is another team made us an offer we couldn’t refuse.”

That’s all well and good, but Gettleman also admitted that he did put in a call to the Bills to gauge their interest in Beckham after Buffalo’s trade for Antonio Brown fell through. So, yeah, which is it? Were the Giants looking to trade Beckham or not?

I’m not sure Gettleman even knows the truth. But this is all a part of his masterplan, which, um, he doesn’t need to explain to any of us.

Gettleman explained that the Giants have “positions to fill” and that the Beckham trade will allow them to do that, which makes sense: New York’s roster isn’t very strong, especially at the positions considered to be the most important on the roster, like quarterback, wide receiver and edge rusher. One problem: New York just traded an elite receiver, a very productive defensive end in Olivier Vernon and, guess what? The team never even considered moving on from Eli Manning and upgrading the starting QB position this offseason…

“There wasn’t really a decision to make.”

Amazing.

You probably stopped paying attention to the Giants by the time December rolled around, so I’ll forgive you if you can’t recall how Eli’s 2018 season came to an end. Here are his numbers for the final month of the season…

Games: 5
Completion rate: 58.9%
Touchdowns: 7
Interceptions: 4
Yards/attempt: 6.9
Passer rating: 83.7

Those are underwhelming numbers. And, yes, stats lie, but the film watchers weren’t too impressed with that stretch, either. Here are his Pro Football Focus grades for each of his final five games:

Week 13 vs. CHI: 51.9 out of 100
Week 14 at WAS: 72.9
Week 15 vs. TEN: 30.5
Week 16 at IND: 78.5
Week 17 vs. DAL: 53.2

So, basically, a lot of poor play with two above average blips peppered in. In other words, Eli Manning’s entire career. How much are the Giants paying Manning to run it back in 2019? His cap hit for the upcoming season is “only” $23.2 million, the eighth largest cap hit in the league. Cutting Manning and moving on would have saved the team $17 million in cap space, but…

“There wasn’t really a decision to make.”

Let’s just say Manning is able to replicate that run but do it over the course of the entire NFL season: How much would a full season of that production be worth based on market price? We can use For the Win’s “Value Above Market Price (VAMP)” metric, which we introduced last week, to figure that out.

That was a long way of saying Manning isn’t very good and in no way does it make any sense to pay him more than $20 million — or even $12 million — in a season. But trading away Beckham away didn’t make very much sense either. Neither did trading Olivier Vernon for a guard. Or drafting a running back with the second-overall pick. Or making Nate Solder the highest-paid left tackle in the league last offseason.

You have to give Gettleman credit for one thing. Every move he makes fits one common theme. Unfortunately, that theme is “this doesn’t make a lick of sense.”