What is this Blog about?

As an avid Giants fan (season tickets have been in my family since the 1950s and I've been going since 1987), I have collected a great number of Giants related items.  Books, pictures, autographs, jerseys, tee shirts, magnets, etc.  You name it, if it had a Giants logo on it, I probably have it, or something close to it.

Growing up as a fan in the 1980s, there was no internet around, no YouTube, no Giants.com, no Giants fan sites such as bigblueinteractive.com for me to keep up with the Giants on a daily basis.  I started a practice back in the mid 1980s to tape Monday Night games (because I had to get to sleep to go to school in the morning) and from there, tape the games that I went to in person, so I can go back and watch it again to see if I missed anything.  The first game that I did this was the 1987 Sunday Night game vs. the Patriots (which I believe was the first NFL game on ESPN).  However, I would watch the game and then tape over it with another game.  At some point, around 1989, I stopped doing that and just kept the games on tape.  I would go back and watch and re-watch the game, particularly during the off-seasons when there was no Giants news/information available.

For 20+ years, these tapes sat at my parents' house, and luckily for me, my room growing up was more or less left untouched as I moved out, including my stack of Giants tapes.  For many years, I've wanted to go back, get those tapes, and convert them to a digital format so I can easily watch them on demand.  With the NFL lockout last Spring, I finally decided to do something about it, and collected more or less all the tapes (I know a few are missing...some might have been thrown out, much to my chagrin).  I spent several months converting the tapes, and was able to recover some 54 games between 1989 and 2001 and save them down on a media sever at my home.

Now, what to do with all of these old games?  Well, at some point, fans always like to go back and talk about games that they watched/went to, etc.  So, I had an idea to take these old games, and using my research background, plus my own personal accounts/memories, go back and do a review of the game, discuss what was leading up to the game, how the game played out with highlights, and now with the benefit of hindsight, see what it meant in the grand scheme, for the players, coaches, and organization itself.

What games are available for review?

As I noted, I have been able to find 54 of them.  I know that I have more somewhere in my old home, but as of May 2012, I haven't been able to find them.  Here is the current library available:

1989:

Giants @ Redskins

Giants @ Broncos

Giants v. Raiders

Giants v. Vikings

Giants v. Cowboys

1990:

Giants @ Cardinals

Giants @ Colts

Giants @ Patriots

Giants @ Rams

Giants @ Redskins

Giants v. Redskins

Giants v. Cardinals

Giants v. Cowboys

Giants v. Dolphins

Giants v. Eagles

Giants v. Lions

Giants v. Vikings

1990 Pro Bowl

1991

Giants @ Cardinals

Giants @ Steelers

Giants v. Cardinals

Giants v. Cowboys

Giants v. Oilers

1992

Giants v. Cardinals

Giants v. Packers

1993

Giants @ Bears

Giants v. Eagles

Giants v. Vikings (Wild Card)

1994

Giants @ Cardinals

Giants v. Eagles

1996

Giants @ Dolphins

Giants v. Cowboys

Giants v. Jets

Giants v. Vikings

1997

Giants @ Cowboys

Giants @ Eagles

Giants @ Lions

Giants @ Redskins

Giants v. Bengals

Giants v. Cardinals

Giants v. Eagles

Giants v. Redskins

1998

Giants @ Cardinals

Giants @ Chargers

Giants v. Broncos

Giants v. Cardinals

Giants v. Chiefs

Giants v. Eagles

Giants v. Redskins

2000

Giants @ Falcons

Giants @ Redskins

Giants v. Jacksonville

2001

Giants v. Seahawks

Giants v. Saints

Hey, all those games are ones which the Giants won

Technically, they are all games which the Giants did not lose.  I have the famed 1997 tie at Washington, when Gus Frerotte knocked himself out when he head butted the wall after scoring a TD.  I am a Giants fan, I don't want to go back and wallow in a loss.  The closest one that I had some part of, was actually the 1992 home game vs. the Cowboys, when the Giants fell behind 34-0 and closed the gap to 34-28 and for a brief moment the score board operator flashed "Giants 35-Cowboys 34".  But it was taped over with something else.

What else did you have in there?

I kept a number of HBO Inside the NFLs as well, from 1986-1991.  Again, I know I'm missing a bunch from 1987 and 1988 and hope to recover it someday.  I also have the Giants Championship videos from 1986 and 1990.  And a few odds and ends of NFL yearbooks, All Madden teams in 1989 and 1990, and other All Pro specials.

What happened to the games in the 2000s?


Technology happened.  Up until around 2002/2003, I had to tape all my Giants games on VHS.  But around that time is when TiVo showed up and changed the way that I was able to review the games.  However, unfortunately, for a long stretch, I was limited to the space on my DVR to hold games and had to erase/over write them and didn't have the tech tools to pull them off on to an external hard drive.  I was able to get this rectified in 2010 and have every game from 2011 available (and in HD).  However, as NFL.com and Giants.com got much better at serving video, not to mention the YouTube community, this became less of an issue. 

How long will it take you to publish new games/updates?

As much as I'd love to say that my primary job is to do this and would be able to make a career out of this, unfortunately, that is not the case.  At this point, this is something that I'm doing in my spare time.  My goal is to be able to produce a game review every 2 weeks, but I'm not sure how that will go.

Can I request a review?

Sure, drop an email to mattinsgs@gmail.com and put it out there.  I'll see what I can do.  I'll try to put up a publishing schedule and do my best to keep it updated.

I have some old tapes, can I donate them for a review?

I don't have those logistics worked out yet, but feel free to email me at mattinsgs@gmail.com and maybe we can work it out.