Tom Coughlin is gone, but it appears things aren’t going to look much different on the team’s coaching staff next season.
Ben McAdoo is getting bumped up to head coach and, according to multiple reports, Steve Spagnuolo will remain the team’s defensive coordinator. Spagnuolo began his second stint in that role in 2015 and oversaw a unit that finished 30th in the league in points allowed and last in yards allowed.
Those numbers don’t scream “bring me back” but there were certainly factors that contributed to the defense’s poor performance for the majority of the season. Jason Pierre-Paul’s fireworks accident cost the team its best defensive player for half the season, other injuries limited them in the secondary and at linebacker and there was a generally low level of talent on hand for Spagnuolo to work with on the field.
That’s on General Manager Jerry Reese to fix, something that owner John Mara said he believed Reese could do during the press conference that followed the team’s parting of the ways with Coughlin. Mara also said that he felt the Giants “lost some credibility as an organization” over the course of three losing seasons, which will likely make some wonder if the best way to regain it was to dispatch Coughlin while otherwise holding onto the status quo.