Giant steps forward?

Sporting News, The, May 26, 1997 by Neil Best

The key to New York's '97 season rests with new coach Jim Fassel and underachieving quarterback Dave Brown

Jim Fassel, who has built his coaching career on guiding offenses and quarterbacks, can only wince at times as he watches films of Dave Brown and the Giants' offense of 1996. Call it Nightmare at Exit 16W, a blood-and-guts horror show guaranteed to scare the daylights out of any new coach.

Pow! There goes Brown leveled by one of the 49 sacks he absorbed last season. Yuck! There goes one of his wildly off-target throws, over the receiver's head. Ugh! There goes another pathetic attempt by the Giants to convert on third-and-long after unproductive runs up the middle on the first two downs.

What did Fassel get himself into on January 15 when, in his first official act as the Giants' new coach, he named Brown his starting quarterback? Critics of Brown say Fassel got himself backed into a corner. But four months later, Fassel remains convinced Brown can be an effective NFL starting quarterback.

"Are we ready to make the leap today? No," Fassel said as the team began a series of minicamps and voluntary workouts in early May. "He needs all the month of May, he's going to need a little bit of June, he's going to need training camp. It is just continuing step by step."

Those steps are the biggest story of this off-season for the Giants, who finished 6-10 last year. Fans are counting on Fassel to turn around the worst offense in the NFL in '96, the worst passing offense in the league two years running, and the foundering career of Brown, a former supplemental first-round pick. Fassel has the credentials; he gets rave reviews from the likes of John Elway, Phil Simms, Jeff Hostetler, Boomer Esiason, Kent Graham and Scott Mitchell from previous coaching stops. But Brown is his biggest challenge yet

"The quarterbacks he's been with have been very successful, so my feeling is why shouldn't I be along those same lines?" says Brown, 27. "His relationship is very close in that he's played the position, so he knows the ins and outs of the problems you might have and the benefits you can have. In that respect, it's kind of different than what we've had in the past."

Ah, the past. That would be former coach Dan Reeves, who started Brown in 47 of 48 games the past three seasons. Despite his 20-27 record in that role, Brown is convinced that Reeves never fully supported him. That is not an issue with Fassel, who as a Giants assistant was instrumental in the team's decision to select Brown in the 1992 supplemental draft, which cost the team its '93 first-round pick. Fassel sees in Brown the same smarts, toughness and work ethic that he saw in him at Duke, but now he must strip away the layers of baggage and bad vibes built up in the past five years.

"Dave needs to get into a situation where he's sure of himself, he's got confidence in himself, he's got confidence in the system, confidence in who's calling the plays, confidence in a lot of things," Fassel says. "I've got to build his confidence."

The first step in Brown's reclamation was the hiring of Fassel. And almost everything the Giants have done since then should aid the process. For the first time since 1985, they selected offensive skill-position players in the first two rounds of the draft (Ike Hilliard and Tiki Barber). Hilliard, the No. 7 overall pick joins Thomas Lewis and Amani Toomer to give New York two first-round choices and a high second-rounder at wide receiver over the pest four crafts an ease you're wondering, the Giants haven't had a Pro Bowl wide receiver since Homer Jones in 1968).

Then there's the system, which should minimize the emphasis on Brown by spreading the ball around, using quick drops and short patterns to take some pressure off a shaky offensive line. The play-calling will be much simpler than it was in Reeves' offense. Most of all, Fassel must convince Brown that despite the constant suggestions from outsiders that the season--and the organization's near future--depends entirely on his performance, he is not alone.

"The most important thing is he cannot put too much pressure on himself, where he thinks he has to make all the plays," Fassel says. "All he has to do as a quarterback is drop back, find somebody, lay the ball off, and let them do their work."

If Brown--who had the lowest quarter-back rating among qualifiers in the NFC last season--fails again, he will be viewed as another disastrous personnel mistake by general manager George Young, who has supported Brown throughout his career. Fassel won't say how long he would wait before pulling the trigger on Brown, but he has a promising backup in Danny Kanell, and the Giants also drafted Murray State quarterback Mike Cherry in the sixth round this spring. Barring injury, though, the job is Brown's until at least early in the regular season.

Fassel does not plan any dramatic changes in Brown's delivery, but he spent much of March and April working with Brown to smooth out and shorten his drops. He also had to re-teach him patience after years of shell shock. Brown and Kanell threw three days a week, working with Fassel and quarterbacks coach Rod Dowhower, in addition to extensive film and conditioning work.