The Giants Cash Out

By all means, lose this guy

Today, the NY Giants released three reasonably good players for the simple crime of having played long enough, and well enough, to cost actual money. The moves allow the club to get under the salary cap now, and potentially free up cash later for more important assets like WRs Hakeem Nicks and Victor Cruz. And if you are a fan of the laundry, you're probably a little bummed out, but not to the point of serious depression, because it's not as if the guys that where let go are world-beating talents... but it speaks to a central fact of the devil's bargain that is professional football.

That is, you should grab every damn dime as quickly as humanly possible, because the franchise is going to, and damned near has to, cut you off at the knees at the first instance where it becomes advantageous.

Ahmad Bradshaw was the Giants' RB1 as little as eight games ago, the engine to two Super Bowl runs, and a guy that played through an absurd amount of injuries and adversity. He's probably got another year or two left as a quality back, but it won't happen in New York. Linebacker Michael Boley was good enough to start 11 times in 2012 and at age 30 might still have a couple of useful years. Once more, it won't happen with the team that was going to pay him real money. Chris Canty has 19 career sacks as a situational difference maker, and has also reached the Logan's Run age of 30 and gone.

The three moves save the team just under $14 million in cap space, clear room for for David Wilson, Andre Brown, Marvin Austin and Jacquian Williams... and so long as the young guys all work out and stay healthy, there won't be any issue on the field that the fans will notice.

But the thing that I find striking, and more than a little sickening, is how the general public has come to just go with this, as if the player who puts his health and body on the line should be cheated. The Giants aren't going to be a better team in 2013 for losing these veterans; they are just going to avoid getting penalized under the cap. Wilson and Brown aren't going to get more out of their carries than Bradshaw and Wilson, and the team's suspect linebacking corps isn't going to improve just because the older guys have been shuffled off.

However, one thing will, most assuredly happen.

Fans will tear the next guy who takes advantage of any moment of leverage, or avoids any moment of training camp to squeeze for dollars, to shreds for being selfish, or egotistical, or greedy.

When, well, he's only doing what the club does every damned chance they can...