The offensive line is young, says the general manager.
“And they’re talented, and things take time,” Giants general manager Dave Gettleman said Tuesday.
Well, the Giants’ offensive line isn’t that young if Kevin Zeitler, who turned 31 on Monday, returns to start on the right guard and Nate Solder, who turns 33 next month, will return to play one among the places of attack after giving up the 2020 season.
So maybe Zeitler and Solder won’t be part of the plan for this season.
“I don’t mean that at all,” Gettleman said.
The status of the offensive line is linked to Gettleman as a smartphone for a teenager. He promised to fix it when he was hired in December 2017. Steps have been taken and the improvements are obvious. Fixed? No way. Not yet.
Gettleman labeled his offensive line as young, because, he explained, “when your center and left guard and your left equipment are novices, you’re basically young.” That was the case in 2020, when the initial left-back, Andrew Thomas, was a rookie, starting center Nick Gates was an inexperienced third-year player working at the center for the first time, and left-back Shane Lemieux was a debutant who moved to the starting lineup at the expense of Will Hernandez, who was essentially a bench in the second half of the season.
The Giants will get younger on the line if Matt Peart moves. Peart, a third-round draft pick from 2020 in Connecticut, played in 11 games as a rookie, making a single start and finished with 150 catches, or 14.8 percent of the offensive photos, often completed for a series or two for veteran Cam Fleming on the right attack.
Gettleman said “I am, yes” when asked if he would be comfortable with Thomas and Peart, a pair of sophomores, as the starting team begins this season.
“When [Peart] he played, he played well, he played pretty well, “said Gettleman. “At some point you have to let the little ones play.”
This could be a premonition for Solder. He is a cancer survivor, and his young son is undergoing cancer treatment, which is why he chose to give up in 2020, rather than play against a global pandemic and COVID-19 concerns. Solder is scheduled to raise $ 16.5 million in the salary cap. His release would save the Giants $ 6 million, but it would also cost $ 10.5 million in dead money.
The giants still don’t know if Solder wants to continue his career. What seems certain is that it will not be on the list at its current price.
“Look, I’m not going to speak for Nate,” said head coach Joe Judge. “I talked to Nate and, to be honest, most of our conversations didn’t have to do with football. I talked a little with Nate at the end of the season, I just checked with him about how the free year went, how his family is doing, how his son is doing and how he’s doing personally. We had a lot of conversations, we talked some football. … There are other areas of our building that are in conversation with Nate. When the time comes to address all this, we will know. These things do not all happen in one day and we will see where everything goes. ”
Zeitler is a robust professional who rarely misses a shot, but has not been selected for a Pro Bowl in his nine-year career. He is the most consistent linebacker on the team and is scheduled to score $ 14.5 million over the salary cap. His release, which could happen, would save the Giants $ 12 million.
One way to mitigate Zeitler’s maximum hit is to extend the contract, giving him pro-rata bonus money to lower his limit for 2021. Gettleman doesn’t seem to think this is a smart approach with any player.
“The goal of managing the ceiling best is to get fixed-term contracts,” Gettleman said. “If a guy has a three-year business at $ 45 million, you’d like to have a maximum of $ 15 million every year, that’s the goal. Once you start restructuring and renegotiating, you usually upload them back-end. What you do is kick the box. It depends on how much pain you want to face. Some teams say philosophically, that they are restructuring, and some people are not. It is a philosophical conversation, but it is not a good place to reach, to constantly restructure and renegotiate. ”