Big Blue View
Steve Spagnuolo remains a beloved figure in a family-run, loyal New York Giants organization. A two-time Giants defensive coordinator who helped the team win the 2007 Super Bowl. A former interim Giants head coach. A potential future Hall of Famer. A wonderful defensive coach, and, by all accounts, an equally good human being.
Is he, though, a head coach? More to the point, is he the right person to be the next head coach of the Giants?
Spagnuolo failed miserably in his first head-coaching gig. From 2009-2011, he went 10-38 (.208 winning percentage) with the St. Louis Rams. The Rams were a mess at the time, but the record is the record and aside from four games as Giants’ interim head coach after Ben McAdoo was fired in 2017 he has never gotten a second chance. It is possible, in fact, that no one has ever considered Spagnuolo for a second chance.
At 65, Spagnuolo still burns for that opportunity.
“Over the years, we have usually at the end of seasons asked Steve Spagnuolo if he does still have desire,” Pete Sweeney of the Kansas City Star told the ’Valentine’s Views’ podcast. “And every year we’ve done it, he has maintained that there is still a burning in him where he would like to be a head coach or at least get another crack at it. And so I don’t think that’s changed even as he gets to be one of the older coordinators in the NFL.”
It seems like Spagnuolo, with four Super Bowl titles as a coordinator on his resume, his familiarity with what it looks like when it is both good and bad in New York, and his deep ties to the organization, would be a natural candidate for the Giants job.
“Just considering the connections with the Giants, I think it makes sense that he’s going to be heavily considered,” Sweeney said.“ Actually, when [Brian] Daboll was fired, I did ask Steve Spagnuolo, and I framed it as, look, I know where you’re probably going to go with this, but you’ve been connected to the Giants.
“And he quickly said, look, we’re playing Houston or whoever it was at the time of the question. And so I didn’t really want to talk about it, but I think those conversations and those questions can happen once the Chiefs are eliminated. And I tend to think you’ll get the same answer that we’ve heard over the years, that he would love another opportunity to jump into a head coaching position.”
The Giants had an opportunity to give Spagnuolo the head-coaching job in 2018. Instead, they gave it to Pat Shurmur. Two years later, Joe Judge replaced Shurmur. Two years after that, Daboll replaced Judge. Now, the Giants are looking again.
Could they have saved themselves a lot of aggravation by just giving the job to Spagnuolo in the first place?
“I think that time or in the time period where the Giants did let him walk, so to...
