As easy as it is to hate most New York teams, the Giants have never really bothered me. Other than the fact that they’re not really in New York State, but no matter how much we complain about it they’re going to keep building stadiums in New Jersey and keep calling themselves “New York”. It’s a thing.

The Giants win championships on a fairly regular basis, but they never overstay their welcome on top. They don’t hang around long enough for you to get tired of them. They also have this air of competence about them, even when they’re going through a period like right now where they’ve lost ten or more games in six out of the last seven seasons. Looks terrible when you look at it on the screen, but we don’t make mockery of the Giants like we do other teams. I think it’s because they share the same stadium with the Jets, who are always something of a dumpster fire even when things are going well. The Giants look better by comparison.

They’ve also had some pretty good looking quarterbacks over the years. Let’s look at the best!

5. Fran Tarkenton

Tarkenton started & ended his Hall of Fame career with the Vikings, but spent five seasons in the middle with the Giants, where he was selected to the Pro Bowl four times. Statistically speaking, his best season was 1967, where he threw for 3,088 yards & 29 touchdowns, the latter standing as his career high for a season. He finished in the top four in passing yards every season he was in New York. Despite Tarkenton’s best efforts, the Giants weren’t able to make the playoffs during his time there.

4. Y.A. Tittle

While Tarkenton’s teams came up short of making the playoffs, Tittle’s came up short of winning championships. Tittle’s Giants lost the NFL Championship Game his first three seasons in New York, part of a stretch where they finished second in the league five out of six seasons. Tittle had already had a lengthy career in Baltimore & San Francisco before being traded to the Giants at the age of 34, but his best years came in New York.

Tittle led the NFL with 33 touchdown passes in 1962 & 36 in 1963. The latter tied George Blanda’s record set in the AFL in 1961, and stood for over twenty years. His 104.8 QB rating in 1963 led the league and was his career best by a wide margin. He was selected to three Pro Bowls, two All-Pro teams and was named Most Valuable Player in 1963.

3. Charlie Conerly

Chucking Charlie’s collegiate & professional football careers were delayed by a stint as a Marine in World War II, but he made up for lost time when he arrived in New York in 1948 at the age of 27 and was named Rookie of the Year. He still held most of the team’s rookie passing records until Daniel Jones debuted in 2019. Conerly made the Pro Bowl in 1950 & 1956, and was a key part of the 1956 Giants squad that won the NFL Championship.

Conerly is considered one of the best players to not make it into the Hall of Fame. I figure it has much to do with his statistics, which were good in their time frame but don’t pop off the page. They probably would have been better if not for the fact he split a lot of time with Don Heinrich in a system that offensive coordinator Vince Lombardi came up with. He would use Heinrich (or somebody else) as a starter, then Conerly would come in to exploit the defense’s weaknesses. It was very successful for the team, but led to Hall of Fame voters under-selling Conerly’s impact on the team.

2. Phil Simms

The 1970s were little to write home about for Giants fans, the team finished last in its division more often than not and didn’t come close to a playoff appearance. Hope came in the form of the 1979 NFL Draft, with a seventh overall pick that most Giants fans hated when it happened. A quarterback out of Morehead State? Simms quieted the doubters for a minute with an decent rookie campaign showing some promise, but followed that up with a couple of mediocre seasons & issues with injuries. Bill Parcells chose Scott Brunner over him in 1983, and when Simms finally got back on the field he got hurt again.

Things turned in 1984. Simms started taking the game more seriously & got in better shape, and his performance on the field improved. Who would have thought that studying game tape, reading the playbook & working out could have helped performance? It definitely took Simms to the next level, throwing for over 4,000 yards in 1984, getting selected to the Pro Bowl in 1985, and leading the Giants to a 14-2 record in the 1986 season and a Super Bowl XXI victory where he set multiple Super Bowl records & was named game MVP. To top it all off, he was the first Super Bowl winner to tell us he was going to Disney World!

Simms kept trucking through the rest of the 1980s & led the Giants on another Super Bowl run during the 1990 season, but wouldn’t end that run since he got hurt in Week 15. Jeff Hostetler finished the job, and was also given the starting gig in 1991. Simms got it back in 1992, but got hurt again. 1993, his final season, saw Simms attain a Pro Bowl selection and throw for over 3,000 yards while leading the Giants back to the playoffs.

Honorable Mention: Jeff Hostetler

When you lead a team to a Super Bowl victory, I pretty much have to include you on one of these lists. Even if you took the team over in Week 15 like Hostetler did. He had been Phil Simms’ backup going back to 1985, so he was familiar with the system & the talent and ended up being not that much of a drop-off. He led the Giants through the playoffs & won Super Bowl XXV, one of the most memorable Super Bowls of all time.

Honorable Mention: Kerry Collins

Collins also led the Giants to a Super Bowl, but his performance there wasn’t quite on the level of Hostetler’s. He threw four interceptions in Super Bowl XXXV against the Baltimore Ravens, who had a pretty good defense that season. Kerry did have a solid run with the Giants, throwing for 4,073 yards in 2002 and setting a franchise record. He also set a league record with 23 fumbles in 2001, so he was kind of all over the map.

1. Eli Manning

Eli’s career has been one of the most debated during the 21st century, and it will continue to be debated while his candidacy for the Hall of Fame nears. The only statistic he ever led the NFL in was interceptions, which he did three times. He went to four Pro Bowls & threw for over 4,000 yards seven times. The Giants made six playoff appearances during Manning’s fourteen seasons as QB1, with most of them coming early on. As Eli’s numbers went up, the Giants’ overall performance tended to go down.

We will remember Eli Manning for two seasons: 2007, and 2011. Both seasons, the Giants went into the playoffs expected to go out early against superior teams. Both playoff runs saw Eli step his game up to yet another level. In 2007, Eli threw six touchdown passes and only one interception during a four game run, while in 2011 he threw nine touchdown passes and only one interception. 2011 saw him throw for over 300 yards per game & set the record for most passing yards in one postseason. Both times, the Giants worked their way through the NFC & met Tom Brady’s New England Patriots in the Super Bowl. They weren’t supposed to win either time, but Eli wound up with two Super Bowl rings and two Super Bowl MVP awards.

Manning always got it done when it mattered most. That 2011 season saw him throw the most fourth quarter TD passes in a single season. He was also always there to get it done, starting 210 consecutive games for the Giants and never missing a game due to injury. Eli took just as much abuse as other quarterbacks of his era and sometimes ended up running by accident, but you couldn’t hurt the guy. Eli didn’t have the numbers his brother had, but who did? He tied Peyton in the stat that our culture reveres the most: championships.

Thanks for reading! Join us next time when we look at the New York Jets!