A double agent working inside the Giants’ front office for the Philadelphia Eagles could not have done a better job sabotaging the franchise on behalf of their archrival than Joe Schoen did.
Schoen was hired in 2022 to rebuild the Giants. He sent the Eagles back to their second Super Bowl in three years instead.
He did it by handing them his team’s best player and leader in free agency for nothing. He did that by letting a tough negotiation impact his judgment, by misreading the NFL’s running back market, by underestimating the Eagles and by having no clue what a strong culture looks like.
Barkley’s 15 carries for 118 yards and three touchdowns in Sunday’s 55-23 NFC Championship win over Washington continued a season-long Giants nightmare. Barkley has compiled one of the greatest seasons ever for an NFL running back.
He now has 66 carries for 442 rushing yards and five touchdowns in Philly’s three playoff victories, on top of his 2,005 rushing yards in the regular season. That puts Barkley 30 yards shy of breaking Terrell Davis’ record for most rushing yards (2,476 in 1998) in a season, including playoffs.
Barkley’s production while the Giants ran the NFL’s 31st scoring offense, though, still is not the worst part about letting him walk.
The worst part is that Barkley’s competitive example, confidence and humility have turned him immediately into the Eagles’ leader. His cheering on Will Shipley during the Eagles rookie’s long fourth quarter run was a reminder that Schoen’s decision to let Barkley walk in free agency robbed the Giants’ locker room of its soul.
The Giants’ players pointed that crucial missing element during their 3-14 season.
“Specifically with Say, he was somebody who was well-liked, well-respected, obviously a very talented football player, and his role here I think was – obviously he was a really good football player – but I think it was bigger than football,” wide receiver Darius Slayton said in November. “So you didn’t want to see someone like that leave – or whatever word you want to call it, technically he didn’t leave, you know what I’m trying to say.
“But at the same time, we don’t get paid to build the roster,” the wideout added. “So they let him walk for some reason. Hopefully things turn around for us, or whatever vision they had comes to fruition.”
The fans agree. Actor Rick Hoffman, a die-hard Giants fan famous for his iconic role as Louis Litt in the hit series “Suits,” said on the Talkin’ Ball with Pat Leonard podcast that Schoen’s oversight on Barkley’s significance to the team’s culture is glaring.
“Well everybody knew Saquon Barkley was that [culture] in the locker room for the Giants. The only person who didn’t was Joe Schoen,” Hoffman said. “The reason [Barkley] is now doing what he was doing in the Giants’ locker room with Philadelphia: that’s a guy who was gonna get a record and decided it’s better for my team I don’t.”
This isn’t a grand vision on the part of Schoen and the Giants. It’s incompetence.
Schoen let the fatigue of battling Barkley’s agents over a contract extension in 2023 impact him. He admitted during HBO’s ‘Hard Knocks’ that “it was 10 years off my life dealing with” that situation.
He simultaneously completely misread the running back market. His interaction with director of pro scouting Chris Rossetti was telling.
“Are we positive that nobody is going to pay him that kind of money?” Rossetti asked.
“Who would you say would go sign a running back to that dollar amount?” Schoen said.
“I mean anyone that has money to spend,” Rossetti responded.
“There’s a lot of running backs in free agency,” Schoen said.
“But are there any potential difference makers, really, after you watch the film?” Rossetti said.
Kevin Abrams, the Giants’ senior VP of football operations and strategy, interjected: “Even if Saquon’s No. 1 on your board, do you imagine anyone’s gonna have such a gap between Saquon and [Josh] Jacobs, [Tony] Pollard, [Derrick] Henry, whoever else, that they’re gonna want him at $13 million a year or minus whatever we’re willing to eat and send a draft pick?”
“Yep,” Rossetti said.
In a larger free agent meeting, Rosetti projected Barkley would get the most money on the open running back market and presciently predicted: “Put him behind a Detroit offensive line, put him behind a Philly offensive line, there might be more value to another team that they’d be willing to give up a pick or an asset to get him.”
Schoen doubted that the Eagles would commit those resources to a running back.
“Look at the teams that have running back as a need,” the GM said. “Because if you’re Philly, you’re thinking defensive back – where are you gonna allocate your funds?”
Then, when free agency got underway, Schoen told co-owner John Mara that “I just got a text that Chicago’s driving the price up and Philly’s out, I don’t know if that’s true or not.”
The rest is history.
The Giants had no ability to properly handle adversity with Barkley gone. Meanwhile, Schoen had armed the Giants’ archrival Eagles to return to the Super Bowl with Barkley as their catalyst.
Losing to the Eagles all the time is bad enough. Schoen and Brian Daboll are 1-6 against the Eagles head-to-head and went winless in the NFC East this season. But strengthening the Eagles for a championship run is a special kind of bad management.
And it’s unforgivable – or it would be in most places, anyway.
In the Giants, Schoen has found an ownership group in the Mara and Tisch families that appear to blame their problems more on Daboll, the head coach.
John Mara’s breakup day comments indicated that he supports the GM compared to a coach who is on the ropes.
That is why they are doomed to irrelevance.
They might as well take a cue from Barkley’s third touchdown celebration on Sunday and go to sleep – it might give them a few hours respite from this waking nightmare of their own creation.