The Sweetest Victories
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- January
- 5
Happy New Year, all. Sam here with a thought or two about Giants-Eagles.
Before I became a columnist, I covered baseball for the Daily News and spent the better part of four years around the Yankees. During that time, I watched somewhere close to 100 Yankees-Red Sox games. And they were all special.
I remember talking to Jason Giambi once, and asking him about why those games were so different than any other games the Yankees played (and way, way different than any games he’d played in as part of the Oakland A’s). He just looked at me, looked around the tiny and dingy clubhouse at Fenway Park and said, as only he can, “I dunno, I dunno, I dunno … You know, dude – they just are.”
Is it the same with football and a rivalry like Giants-Eagles? It seems like it is. The history isn’t as long as Yankees-Red Sox (which stretches back about a century), but anything that starts with Chuck Bednarik and Frank Gifford in 1960 is pretty legit.
In some ways, facing the Eagles this week is probably the ultimate catch-22 for the Giants (and their fans): They know it’s the toughest match-up but they also know that going through Philly on their way to a repeat would be so much sweeter than running through Arizona and, say, Carolina. Just think about the magic of last year: Beating the Patriots was, obviously, the cherry but wasn’t knocking off Tony Romo and Dallas almost as grand?
That is what the Giants get now. One of those games. One of those chances for the sweetest kind of victory there is. So are you happy about it? Or would you rather just run through Arizona and not have the chance to hold it over those Philly fans for another year?
While you’re pondering that, do me a favor and click over to the FACEOFF blog, where Rick Carpiniello and I are debating another Giants-related question about what needs to happen differently against the Eagles for the Giants to come away with a win this time.
This entry was posted
on Monday, January 5th, 2009 at 9:40 am by Sam Borden. 
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Ernie Palladino
The Big G does have a way with words.
You gotta have faith. This Eagles game is going to motivate them like no other game could. Tough opponent, but they’ve done it before. Last year when everyone was walking around measuring the Patriots for hats, jackets and rings, I said “Wait and see – they’re measuring the wrong team.” They thought I was insane. But the difference is in how badly you WANT it. And the Giants wanted it BAD last year. So now fast forward to this season, and everyone’s saying they can’t do it again – they’re not the same team, too many distractions, yada yada yada … And I still say that they’re going all the way. You gotta have faith…
To win you got to want to have it! You got to go and beat the best!No victory is worth anything unless you beat the best, right now the Eagles are the best team out there to beat! I believe that our team is the best and the coaching staff has done there job. It’s now in the hands of our players!! I have Faith!
To met it doesn’t really matter who we play as long as we win and repeat as champs. Beating philly will be nice, but to me it wouldn’t matter if we played the cards or whoever, I Would still expect the giants to win and still feel great as a fan about winning.
It really depends, you could say that with everyone in the NFC East.
Manimal, I can certainly understand that point of view but how do most Giants fans rank the NFC East in order of hatred? I would think it’d be something like:
1. Eagles
2. Cowboys
3. Redskins (and probably by a lot)
agree?
Yeah I totally agree with the list, the drop between the Cowboys and Redskins is pretty big. It also changes by the year, last year Cowboys were favorites to win it all so those games were more intense than Eagles games.