Ben McAdoo is the new head coach of the New York Giants, but the team itself won’t undergo many changes because it simply promoted the offensive coordinator to replace fired head coach Tom Coughlin.
Consequently, the 2016 Giants will be directly compared to 2015 since not much changed except for the main guy wearing the headset. According to Art Stapleton of the Bergen Record, McAdoo said he can’t worry about living up to his predecessor.
Ben McAdoo on following Tom Coughlin: "I can't worry about being in Tom's shadow. I have to be comfortable in my own skin." #Giants
— Art Stapleton (@art_stapleton) January 15, 2016
The comparisons will be unavoidable. McAdoo is expected to keep the coaching staff intact, and the roster won’t be overhauled.
McAdoo will take a majority of the same players Coughlin coached into the 2016 season. Anything worse than a 6-10 record would be considered a failure, while anything better is a small step in the right direction.
Is that fair? Of course not.
Nevertheless, though McAdoo says he doesn’t feel the pressure of being the replacement, fans and analysts alike may use New York’s performance as a way to measure his worthiness to replace Coughlin more than to assess McAdoo’s actual coaching ability.
After all, Coughlin led the Giants to a pair of Super Bowl championships during his 12-year tenure and reached the playoffs four times in his first five seasons.
McAdoo feels comfortable to coach outside of the shadow, but through no fault of his own, Coughlin’s shadow will never leave.