1991 Giants v Oilers

Week 16


The Setup


At some point, every Giant fan has to come to grips with the fact that 1991 and 1992 did happen.  Though we all try to forget about this period of Giants history (rightfully so), you can't just pretend it didn't exist.  It got so bad that several people even refused to even acknowledge Robert R. "Ray" Handley by name.  Even masking him with a Harry Potter/Voldemort type quality, referring to him as "he who should not be named" on the bigblueinteractive.com message boards.

However, in the time since Handley was fired, let's realize that the Giants as a franchise did not go into a deep Depression.  In the past 19 years since he was let go, they have had only 6 losing seasons, made the playoffs 9 times, won the NFC East 5 times, made the Super Bowl 3 times, winning the Championship twice.

So let's take a different look at Ray Handley.  How about:  It's not his fault.  Before I go further, I'll invoke the oft used phrase: "Only Nixon could go to China."  Observe the tee shirt which I bought during the 1992 season.


So I was not a big fan of Handley to say the least.  As time has gone by, you step back and you realize that Handley's failings really fall on the Giants organization as much, if not more, than it should Handley.  Let's be clear, Handley was not a good Head Coach.  But the Giants were the ones who put him there.  Without further ado, the top 8 reasons the Ray Handley era was not all his fault:

1. Handley actually was ready to quit coaching after the 1990 Super Bowl.  At age 46, Handley was preparing to enter George Washington Law School.  It was Bill Parcells (along with George Young's blessing) who talked Handley out leaving the coaching ranks.  Parcells offered Handley a promotion from offensive backfield coach to offensive coordinator.  In doing so, Parcells moved the current OC, Ron Erhardt to a new Assistant Head Coach position, where he was going to have greater oversight in the overall team, and help Parcells.
2. George Young did not think much of Defensive Coordinator Bill Belichick.  He didn't feel that he was ready to be a head coach in the NFL, so never stood in his way to keep him around when teams came calling for him after the victory over the Bills.  He was more concerned with Handley going to Law School than Belichick going to the Browns.
3. Bill Parcells really pushed for Handley.  Parcells coached with Handley back in 1968 at West Point.  And in Parcells' second season as Giants Head Coach in 1984, he brought Handley on to his staff as an offensive assistant.  In several interviews over the years, Parcells would refer to Handley as a "computer on his staff".  He was noting Handley's attention to detail, football x's and o's intelligence, breaking down situations.  Unfortunately, the Parcells' Giants were built in his own image.  The team responded to Parcells' mindgames.  Parcells was a cult of personality in leading the Giants.  Handley was not ever going to be that same charismatic guy and Parcells was a tough act to follow.  In fact, a few times, Handley would tell the press that it wasn't the coach's job to motivate players, they should do it themselves as professionals.  So Parcells' own high opinion of Handley, actually would set him up to fail.
4. Media saavy:  This one really pointed to an issue which the Giants and Parcells should have realized that Handley was just not ready for the big stage and media glare.  Now, you don't need to be a media darling to be a successful coach.  Belichick proved that in New England.  Coughlin isn't Parcells when it comes to working with the media, but he slips in his barbs and little jokes here and there.  Generally speaking, a coach needs to understand how to handle the press and understand how they function.  Handley never got that.  Look no further than his infamous exchange with Russ Salzberg in December 1991, when he was asked a question about the QB situation (Simms starting, Hoss out with injury) and he refused to answer the question, mocked a sigh/pout at Salzberg, and then stormed off.  That is blood in the water.  Even years later, in 2007 when he was reached for comments on the Giants in the Super Bowl, he told Newsday reporter Jim Baumbach: "No, I'm not the least bit interested. Thank you very much."  And hung up.  This is who he was, the Giants had him in the family for 7 years, he wasn't ready for NY (and likely would never be), and the Giants should have known or somehow mitigated this.
5. Handley's only stint as Head Coach was in 1977 at Reed High School in Sparks, Nevada.  He had just had his responsibilities increased to Offensive Coordinator.  And then after the draft, when Parcells stepped down, he was handed the Head Coach spot of the Giants.  However, Handley decided to keep his Offensive Coordinator title.  That was simply too much to ask of him.  The safer route should have been to name Ron Erhardt the head coach, as he had previous experience in New England with the Patriots (including a 9 and 10 win season in his time).  Now, Handley compounded that mistake on his own, by actually demoting Erhardt from his Assistant Head Coach position and had him doing, essentially offensive quality control tasks breaking down film on opponents.  Young and Mara should have stepped in here, make Erhardt the head coach, and let Handley grow into the position, if they felt that strongly about him.  Erhardt was 60 years old, he wasn't going to be the long term answer, which is what they had hoped for in Handley.  Make Erhardt the coach and then set up a succession plan to bring Handley on in a year or two.  As it would turn out, in 1992, Handley promoted Jim Fassel from QB coach to Offensive Coordinator to rectify that mistake, but it was too late.
6. The Giants roster was getting old.  Look at the ages of several of the key members: Simms (37 in his 12th year), LT (32 in his 10th year), OJ Anderson (34 in his 12th year), Bart Oates (33), Everson Walls (32), Leonard Marshall (30), Perry Williams (30), Hostetler (30), Banks/Reasons (29).  Of the young core players, the Giants only really had Rodney Hampton and Brian Williams ready to join the lineup right away and make an impact.  So the team was headed towards a downswing/ transition, and that is as much on George Young as anyone.
7. The Giants didn't do Handley any favors on the defensive side of the ball.  As noted above, the defense was getting up there in age.  Losing 2 top defensive minds in one off season in both Parcells and Belichick was an enormous blow.  With Handley stretched so thin keeping his OC title, he was really reliant on his defensive staff to keep things going.  The defensive coordinator job fell to an in house replacement, as Al Groh was promoted from linebacker coach to DC.  In the past, when Parcells was asked about defensive rankings, he would always say that the most important stat he cares about is points allowed.  In 1989, the Giants allowed 252 points (#2 in NFL) and were 5th in yards allowed.  In 1990, the Giants allowed 211 points (#1 in the NFL) and were 2nd in yards allowed.  Under Al Groh: 297 points (#12 in NFL) and 7th in yards allowed.  Groh was out after his only season, and rejoined Belichick in Cleveland.  The Giants decided to go for a more veteran coach and decided on former Chiefs, Patriots, and Steelers DC Rod Rust, who coached on the Stanford staff when Handley was a running back there.  All you have to say to any Giants fan who recalls the era is "Read and React" and they will instantly get nauseous and angry simultaneously. Rust was a horrible fit in 1992 and the stats showed it: 367 points (#26 in the NFL) and 18th in yards allowed.  Bottom line, Handley didn't get much help at all.
8. He actually made a sound decision on Simms v. Hostetler for the starting QB job.  This whole thing was also a perfect storm.  QB controversies can split teams and create a media frenzy.  Add in all the issues listed above and then throw in a popular but aging QB who won a Super Bowl MVP and was coming off an injury (Simms), and the younger, more mobile QB in Hostetler, who just finished a run that resulted in a Super Bowl win.  As a starter, Hoss was 4-0 in the regular season (and he also had wins when he played the balance of the game after an injury to Simms in 1989 vs the Vikings and 1990 vs. the Cardinals) and was 3-0 in the post season.  Hostetler was also in the Giants system for 6 years and was 30 entering 1991.  If you are Handley, looking to make your mark as the head coach for a long time in NY, do you go with a 37 year old Super Bowl winning QB coming off an injury, or a 30 year old Super Bowl winning QB, who also happened to have the added dimension of being able to move and run?  He chose Hostetler, and Hoss went 6-5 as a starter before going down with broken bones in his back in Tampa and Simms took over the rest of the way.  In 1992, he reversed his decision and named Simms the starter.  The Giants decided it was time to move on from the QB controversy and bring in youth, and actually carried 4 QBs in 1992 (Simms, Hostetler, Dave Brown, Kent Graham).  Handley was too inexperienced to deal with this QB problem.  He should have named one a starter and the other should have been traded.  Reeves put his foot down immediately in 1993, chosing Simms (knowing that Brown or Graham would be the replacement) and moved Hoss on to Oakland.  

Anyway, this game was a playing out the string game for the Giants.  After a rousing opening day win vs. the Niners on a last second Matt Bahr FG, the Giants were the model of mediocrity.  Never going more than 2 games over or under 500.  The best record they had was 7-5, which was where they were after beating the Bucs in Tampa, when Simms came off the bench for an injured Hostetler and won the game.  But that good will was ruined the following week, when the Giants lost to the 1-11 Bengals to fall to 7-6.  A loss the next week vs. the Eagles put the Giants at 7-7 and knocked them out of the playoffs.  Once that happened, the Giants slept walked through a blow out loss to the Redskins, 34-17, which got so bad that Lawrence Taylor said the players and coaches both quit.  At 7-8, the Giants had nothing to play for, other than avoiding a losing season and the old standby of "pride".

On the flip side, the Oilers had everything to play for.  they were 11-4, and their biggest problem was bringing their Warren Moon led (Kevin Gilbride coached) run and shoot into the cold weather and away from the cozy confines of the Houston Astrodome.  They finally won out in the cold in the previous week, beating Bill Belichick's Browns on the road.  An Oilers win in this game would make them 12-4 and give them a first round bye and host a home playoff game in the second round.  A loss in this game, plus a Broncos win the following day (this game was played on a Saturday), would make them play a Wild Card game at home and then go on the road to either Denver or Buffalo.

So it was the playoff bound, 8 Pro Bowler strong Oilers vs. the 7-8, collapsing former Super Bowl champ, led by a coach who has looked like he lost the team.  The fans who did come to the game, including yours truly, expected to see the Giants get blown out and be able to voice our collective displeasure at the mockery the team had become.  And then the game started.....

The Game Highlights


All in all it was a fairly typical late December game in Giants Stadium, cold and windy, as you would expect.  The Giants and Oilers were playing a Saturday afternoon game and Giants Stadium was generously 75% full as most fans, like the team the previous few weeks, packed it in.

The Giants got the ball first, as Tillman fielded the kickoff in the end zone for a touchback.  The Giants drive would essentially be the Rodney Hampton show.  Hampton, the second year RB, had taken over the main RB duties from OJ Anderson in 1991, as was the plan.  Hampton started with a 5 yard run and on the next play Simms hit TE Howard Cross over the middle for 24 yards to near mid field.  Cross, never known for his hands, was horrific the previous week at Washington, dropping 3 balls.  The rest of the drive was all Hampton.  A Hampton run and then a reception on a dump off pass went for 1 first down.  Another Hampton catch, where he juked Bubba McDowell, went for another first.  Hampton then followed a huge hole created by Cross and Carthon for a 14 yard run.  Hampton continued to pound on the Oilers, who were forced to call a time out to try to slow things down, but he got the ball to the 3 yard line.


Hampton capped off a marathon with his 10th TD on the season and culminated a 13 play, 80 yard drive eating 9:22 on the clock and keeping the powerful Oilers offense on the bench.  Of the 13 plays, Hampton touched the ball 12 times.

The Oilers finally got the ball with the first quarter nearly over, and started out with a return to the 31.  Al Groh's defensive unit came out in a dime package to deal with the run and shoot, starting 2 DL (Howard and Marshall).  LT, who was nursing a bad ankle, did not play in the game, as the Gianst started rookie OLB Corey Miller in his place.  Moon began with a 16 yard pass to the late Drew Hill.  After a short run by Allen Pinkett to near mid field, Moon on 3rd down nearly had the ball intercepted by Carl Banks and the Oilers punted it away, but Greg Montgomery put it into the end zone for a touchback.

Ray Handley decided to keep the ball on the ground.  Starting with a 6 yard run by Carthon, and another Hampton run for a first down.  Followed up by 2 more short runs by Carthon and Hampton resulted in a chorus of boos by the fans for the conservative calls to end the 1st quarter.  Truth be told, the Giants were leading 7-0 and the fans were really just looking for a reason to boo, as they wanted to let the team and Handley have it for frustration over the way the season played out.  On the first play of the 2nd quarter though, the Giants really gave the fans a reason to boo:


Pretty much sums it up, the Giants lone Pro Bowl representative in 1991, Bart Oates, air mailed the shotgun snap and Simms' half hearted effort to recover gave the ball to the Oilers on the Giants 15 yard line.  Pinkett was stuff by Marhsall and Howard on first down. Moon's next pass floated in the wind for an incompletion and on 3rd down he was sacked by Miller and Marshall.  Al Del Greco came on and hit a 37 yard FG to make the score 7-3 and the defense did it's job.

Del Greco's kickoff went out of bounds, putting the ball at the 35 and the Giants went to the underneath passing game on this drive, along with steady doses of Hampton.  A Hampton 4 yard run and 3rd down pass to Meggett went for 16 yards out to the Oilers 41.  An 8 yard pass to Cross followed by a conversion of a first by Hampton.  A reverse/option pass by Mark Ingram failed as he was tackled behind the line, but a run by Hampton and yet another pass to Meggett for 16 more yards put the ball at the 13 yard line.  And the Giants went again for the short pass


Good protection, Cross coming free, and a nice pick/block by the umpire let Cross trot into the end zone for a 13 yard TD and a 14-3 Giants lead in the 2nd quarter.  Simms was now 7-7 passing in the game.

The Oilers were buried on the kickoff, with Lewis Tillman and Lamar McGriggs nailing the return man at the 10.  However, 2 Pinkett runs got the ball to the 34 yard line.  Moon hit Ernest Givens to the 43.  The Oilers then imploded, a false start, a broken play when Moon had to eat the ball, and 2 incompletions set up a great punt by Montgomery who kicked it out of bounds on the Giants 5 yard line.

Hampton got the Giants out of trouble, plowing over Houston LB Johnny Meads and rumbling to the 19 yard line.  Another Hampton run took it to the 25 when Simms hit the biggest pass of his day, a 39 yard slant to Odessa Turner who took the ball to the Oilers 35.  After an intentional grounding penalty on Simms, and then a hold on Jumbo Elliott (which wiped out a good Hampton run) and then yet another false start made it 2nd and 36.  After a short pass to Meggett, Simms hit Ingram in stride for 25 yards and put the ball at the Oilers 37.  Matt Bahr came out, and with the wind at his back, nailed a 54 yard FG making the score now 17-3.

Bahr continued to muscle up, with a touchback on the kickoff.  The Oilers, who looked so flat with so much on the line, had to get going.  Moon hit an 8 yard pass to start and  Pinkett run for a first.  Moon, who had Miller all over him, then drilled one in to Hill for 21 yards.  Another pass to Hill moved it to the Giants 35.  with :08 to go in the half, Moon hit Givens down to the 10.  With no time outs, Jack Pardee decided to go for the FG and settled for another Del Greco kick, this time a 34 yarder to make the score 17-6 in a half dominated by the Giants who held the ball for over 22 minutes in the first two periods of the game.

The second half began with another Bahr kickoff for a touchback and the Oilers, who you figure would come out all fired up, fizzled and went 3 and out, punting back to the Giants 37.  After a 7 yard pass to Cross, Hampton would reach a milestone


Hampton cracked the 1000 yard mark for the first time in his career and was saluted by the fans for his efforts, one of the very few bright spots on the 1991 Giants.  A pass to Hampton for 8 and two more runs by Hampton to the Oilers 12, where he was finally given a rest and got a Standing O from the home crowd.  A pass by Simms to Lewis Tillman got the ball to the 5.  And then Tillman took care of the rest


Tillman, known as the man who broke Walter Payton's rushing records at Jackson State (hence wearing Sweetness' #34) spent his career with the Giants as a special teamer and a "change of pace" back as a slasher behind Anderson and then Hampton.  In this case, he showed both elusiveness and power, stiff arming Richard Johnson, in his 5 yard TD burst.  A Bahr extra point and amazingly it was 24-6.

The Oilers were now in desperation mode.  A short Bahr kickoff and return got the ball to the 35.  But yet again, after a short pass to Givens, the Oilers went 3 and out and a punt to the 15.  Two Tillman runs made it 3rd and 4, and Simms took off when no one was open and ran for 19 yards and a first down.  A Tillman run and a 17 yard pass to Baker kept the Giants on the move.  After runs by Tillman and Jarrod Bunch made it 3rd and long, Simms would have his first legit incompletion on the day when he was pressured and hurried a throw.  Bahr came on for a 40 yard FG, but it was blocked on an up the middle rush by former Raider Sean Jones and the Oilers survived.

By this time, the Oilers decided to change up at running back, sitting Allen Pinkett, and bringing in Lorenzo White.  An opening pass to Givens got the ball to the 35.  White then popped a run to mid field.  Moon again hit Givens and again White powered ahead to the Giants 26.  Another White run to the 15 ended the quarter.  At the start of the first, Gilbride stayed on the ground, with White taking it to the 5.  After a false start, Moon hit Hill on the 2 yard line.  On 2nd down, White was stuffed by Myron Guyton, Adrian White, and Miller.  Which set up Miller's biggest play of his rookie season


Corey Miller, a 6th rounder out of South Carolina, looked like he could be the next big Giants LB.  Big, strong, with that nasty dark visor and now coming in to sack Warren Moon and force a 4th down. Moon's next pass was incomplete to Hill and the Giants held, keeping the score 24-6.

The Giants however finally stalled and after Simms was sacked on a corner blitz, were forced to bring Sean Landeta in to the game for the first time.  Landeta punted it to the Oilers 46.  After a Moon pass to Heywood Jeffries went for 7, White ripped off a 14 yard run.  Another pass to Drew Hill for close to a first down was followed with a White run to the 16.  The Oilers continued to hand the ball off to the former Michigan State star RB, who got it to the 6.  And then Moon cashed in.


Moon took advantage of a huge hole and ran it in for a TD to make the score 24-13.  Al Del Greco kicked off for a touchback, and with 6:01 left in the game, the Giants started substituting some of their younger players.  Bunch in for Carthon.  Brian Williams in for Oates.  The Giants started off with 3 runs to Hampton, who was just short of a first down, however Pardee for some reason never called a time out, even though he had 3 to work with (plus the 2 min) and the Giants eventually punted it away to the Oilers 28 and left 3:28 to go in the game, up by 11.

After a Moon incompletion, he hit Jeffries for close to a first down.  White was stuffed by Reasons, but given a favorable spot for a first down.  Moon then hit Curtis Duncan for another first, but was kept in bounds.  After a pass to White took them to the 2 minute warning, Moon continued to throw to his WRs.  Passes to Hill, Duncan, and Givens got the ball to the 11 with 1:38 to go in the game.  After a pass to Jeffries (his 100th catch of the season) to the 5 yard line, Moon drilled Givens for a TD


The Oilers made their way down the field, but poor clock management put all hopes on the onside kick.  Though, it's great to see a young Kevin Gilbride as Offensive Coordinator in this highlight.  A few years later, he'd be better known thanks to Buddy Ryan's sucker punch on the sidelines.  Of course, he's now got 2 rings with the Giants.

The Oilers onside kick, as with much they did on this day, they screwed up.  The ball was there for the taking, but about 3 Oilers ran right by it, and Gary Reasons fell on the ball for the Giants.  A big run up the middle by Hampton for a first down gave him 140 yards on the day and enabled the Giants to kill the clock the rest of the way and Simms kneel downs and the Giants would win the game 24-20 to go 8-8 in a letdown of a title defense.


Interesting Tidbits/ The Post Mortem

• The 8-8 season was Ray Handley's "best" of his two seasons as head coach.  
• The Oilers loss dropped them to 11-5 on the season, and a Bronco win the next day, 17-14 at San Diego, forced the Oilers to play in the Wild Card round.  They ended up beating the Jets in Houston 17-10.  However, the Oilers continued to earn their stripes as playoff choke artists, this time blowing a 14-0 lead early and 24-16 lead in the 4th quarter to the John Elway/Dan Reeves Broncos, losing on a FG by David Treadwell 26-24 with :16 to go in the game.  Of course, they would set the bar for playoff chokes a year later, blowing a 32 point lead in Buffalo before losing 41-38 in OT.
• By winning, the Giants avoided their first losing season since 1987.  To be fair, the 1987 season featured a strike and the Giants fielded the worst of all the replacement squads.  The Giants regulars went 6-6.  So you could argue that the Giants did not have a losing season since Parcells' first year in 1983, at 3-12-1.  Handley's 1992 team however left no doubts, going 6-10.  
• Hampton needed 81 yards to reach the 1000 yard milestone.  He rushed for 140 yards, finishing with 1059 yards in his first season as the feature back.  It would be his first 1000 yard season and began a string of 5 straight 1000 yard campaigns.
• Hampton's 140 yards was his 5th highest single game total of his career (in regular season).  He ran for 166 yards in the 1993 Wild Card game vs. the Vikings.
• More Hampton:  he finished with 43 catches in 1991, the highest total by a RB (other than Meggett) since 1974, when Joe Dawkins caught 46.  That number wouldn't be surpassed until 1999, when Tiki Barber had 66 catches.
• This game saw Meggett reach 50 catches for the 1991 season.  In 1991, the Giants had 2 receivers go over 50 catches in the same season: Meggett (50) and Mark Ingram (51), it was the first time this happened since 1988 when Lionel Manuel (65) and Mark Bavaro (53) accomplished it.  The Giants wouldn't match that number again until 1996, when both Thomas Lewis and Chris Calloway had 53 catches.
• Bahr's 54 yard FG was the longest of the season and was the longest of his Giants career (next closest was 49 yarder vs. the Lions in 1990).  It was actually the longest FG of his entire career at that point, and lasted until 1996, when he kicked a 55 yarder at Miami as a member of the Patriots.  1996 was the last year of his career, at age 39, not too bad for an old guy to pull off that trick at the very end.
• Simms 19 yard run was his longest of the season, and as it would turn out, be the longest run for the remainder of his career.  His next longest run was a 9 yard run in 1993.
• Simms had a great day, going 15-17, 200 yards and 1 TD.  His 88.2% completion percentage and 135.3 QB rating was his highest for his 1991 season.  It would also be the highest single game percentage of his career (narrowing out his Super Bowl XXI MVP peformance of 22-25- 88%).  It wasn't his highest QB rating though, that came in the 1984 opening win vs. the Eagles, 28-27.  In that game, Simms would go 23-30, 409 yards, 4 TDs and 0 INTs for a QB rating of 157.6.  Just for fun, here are the highest single game QB rating numbers for the QBs after Simms on the Giants
• Hostetler: 131.5 vs. the Cardinals in 1991
• Dave Brown: 130.4 @ Kansas City in 1995
• Kent Graham: 108.8 vs Denver in 1998 (when he and Toomer ruined their perfect season)
• Danny Kanell: 125.5 vs. Cardinals in 1997
• Kerry Collins: 158.3 @ Indy in 2002 (technically a perfect rating)  It was even better than his 2000 NFC Title game 5 TDs vs the Vikings (120.8 rating) because he had 2 picks.
• Kurt Warner: 104.9 vs. Cleveland in 2004
• Elisha Nelson Manning: 145.7 @ Philly in 2011.
• Jarrod Bunch had 1 run for 0 yards in this game.  It would be his only carry for his 1991 rookie season as a first round pick out of Michigan.  Bunch actually looked to break out after 1992, when he had 501 yards rushing and was one of the very very few bright spots in that season.  But a knee injury, and lack of desire to play, had him off the team in 1994 and he was out of the league by 1995, and eventually went into acting.
• This would be the final game for 2 Giants stalwarts: Gary Reasons and Maurice Carthon.  Carthon was not re-signed and played one more season in Indianapolis before retiring.  Reasons came back to the team in 1992, and battled former Patriot LB Ed Reynolds (brought in by Rod Rust).  Reasons was part of the final cuts and given an injury settlement for a bad shoulder. He would sign with the Bengals but would also retire after the 1992 season.
• This was the Houston Oilers last game as a franchise played in Giants Stadium.  The Giants actually played them one more time in Houston, in 1994 in Jeff Fisher's first game as coach, and beat them in the Astrodome thanks to a couple Kent Graham to Mike Sherrard bombs.  Since the Oilers moved to Tennessee, they have owned the Giants, going 5-0 vs. Big Blue.
• Heywood Jeffries reached the 100 catch plateau in this game, becoming the 5th WR to do so in 1991 (Art Monk, Charlie Hennigan, Lionel Taylor, and Jerry Rice were the others).
• One final note about Ray Handley.  Handley would win 14 games as an NFL Head coach.  6 of those wins would come against teams who would finish with a winning record that season.  The Oilers were the best team record wise that Handley would beat (tied with the 1991 Cowboys at 11-5).  Handley also beat two 10 win teams, the 1991 49ers and out of nowhere, in his final home game in 1992, beat the 10-6 Chiefs, taking a 35-7 lead in the game behind 3 Hampton TDs.  It should be noted, he managed to lose to a 1-11 Bengals team in 1991 (who would finish 3-13) and in 1992 would get shut out 19-0 vs. a Cardinals team that would go 4-12.