Giants Should Get Jacobs Involved in Passing Game

Football

By MICHAEL DAVID SMITH
November 14, 2007

Brandon Jacobs is easy to spot. A running back in a defensive end's body, Jacobs is one of those players you can't help but notice when you watch the Giants.

So it's a little surprising, given the way Jacobs sticks out on the field, that Giants quarterback Eli Manning hardly ever looks in his direction when he drops back to pass. Jacobs is a forgotten man in the passing game, but as the Giants look to avoid another late-season collapse, the single best way they could improve their offense is to get Jacobs the ball more often.

Jacobs is doing just fine leading the Giants' ground game. Tiki Barber was the Giants' best player last season, but his retirement has had no impact on their running game, thanks to Jacobs, as well as Derrick Ward and Reuben Droughns. The Giants averaged 134.8 rushing yards a game last season and average 134.2 yards a game this season. They averaged 4.7 yards a carry last season and average 4.6 yards a carry this season.

Where the Giants miss Barber, however, is in the versatility he provided to their passing game. Last year, Manning threw 81 passes to Barber, or just over five a game. Barber caught 58 of them for 465 yards. Early this season the Giants tried to use Ward in a similar fashion, but Ward has missed time with groin and ankle injuries, and without him, the running backs have almost disappeared from the passing game. In Sunday's loss to the Dallas Cowboys, Manning threw just one pass to Jacobs, a 10-yard completion late in the fourth quarter. For the season Jacobs has been the target of just 11 passes, catching seven of them for 34 yards.

There's no way to know for certain how good a receiver Jacobs would be, because the Giants have never given him a chance. Manning will occasionally dump the ball off to him when he's feeling pressure and nothing else is open, but those passes are the equivalent of throwing the ball away. Jacobs hardly ever runs routes designed to allow him to get the ball in the open field.

If the Giants do start to use Jacobs as a real receiver, it seems likely that he'd have a big impact. Few players in the NFL cause the kinds of matchup problems that Jacobs creates. At 6 feet, 4 inches, he's the tallest running back in the NFL, which should make him a good target for Manning, who has a tendency to throw high passes, and at 264 pounds, he's big enough that defensive backs struggle to tackle him. Jacobs is also fast enough that not many linebackers would be able to stay with him step-for-step when he runs pass routes.

Jacobs started his college career at Auburn, where he was a running back on a team that also had Cadillac Williams, now of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and Ronnie Brown, now of the Miami Dolphins. With so much talent at running back, Auburn's coaches — knowing he had the ability to catch passes — asked Jacobs to move to tight end. He wanted to be a running back, so he transferred to Southern Illinois, but the fact that the coaches at Auburn wanted to make him a tight end is an indication of what kind of skills he has as a receiver.

So why don't the Giants' coaches get Jacobs more involved in the passing game? They seem to view him as someone who doesn't look the part of a pass-catching running back. The running backs who catch the most passes are usually smaller players like Barber, Reggie Bush of the New Orleans Saints, or Brian Westbrook of the Philadelphia Eagles. But just because most of the running backs who specialize in catching passes out of the backfield are small doesn't mean a big back like Jacobs couldn't thrive in that role. The most important reason for the Giants to start looking for Jacobs in the passing game is that their next opponent, the Detroit Lions, have one of the worst defenses in the league at stopping passes to opposing running backs. Among the running backs who have had big days against Detroit are Oakland's LaMont Jordan (89 receiving yards), Minnesota's Adrian Peterson (52 receiving yards), Philadelphia's Westbrook (111 receiving yards), and Tampa Bay's Earnest Graham (99 receiving yards). Given the chance, Jacobs can join that list.

The Lions are currently tied with the Giants for the NFC wild card lead, if the Giants can find a way to exploit the Lions' weakness, Sunday's game will firmly establish them as the leaders in this race. If not, Sunday's game will firmly establish that the Giants' annual second-half collapse has begun.

Mr. Smith is a writer for FootballOutsiders.com.

Giants Should Get Jacobs Involved in Passing Game

Football

Reader comments on this article