The Giants hope that the hiring of John Harbaugh as their head coach ushers in a new era of success for the team and Harbaugh’s first season on the job will include a celebration of the franchise’s first Super Bowl win.
The Giants announced that they will be celebrating the 40th anniversary of their Super Bowl XXI champions during their Week 4 home game against the Cardinals. They went 14-2 during the 1986 season and then beat San Francisco and Washington in the playoffs by a combined score of 66-3 to advance to the Super Bowl. They beat the Broncos 39-20 at the Rose Bowl to secure the Lombardi Trophy.
“This anniversary is about honoring a team that defined Giants football and delivered one of the most dominant championship runs in NFL history,” Giants owner John Mara said in a statement. “We look forward to celebrating these legends while giving our fans unique opportunities to relive and connect with that unforgettable season.”
Former Giants players will be on hand at the game and the first 25,000 fans to enter MetLife Stadium will receive Mark Bavaro bobbleheads. There will also be a halftime ceremony commemorating the team, which featured head coach Bill Parcells, quarterback Phil Simms, linebacker Lawrence Taylor and many others.
Giants Clips
On Monday night, the Giants held their annual Town Hall event. For the first time arguably since the days of Bill Parcells, the team has a good head coach who is also a clear and direct (and at times blunt) communicator.
Art Stapleton of USA Today has posted a snippet from the event that will be music to the ears of Giants fans.
Here’s the question to John Harbaugh, from one of the folks in the crowd: “We turn on the TV on Sundays, and then we face the Eagles and the Cowboys, and a lot of the time they just kick our butts. How confident are you, Coach, that going into this season we’ll go into those Dallas games, those Eagles games, and those Commanders games, and we’ll take them down?”
“I could care less about what’s happened last year, the year before that, or ten years before that,” Harbaugh said. “Honestly, I don’t give a crap about any of it. Not one bit. All I care about is tomorrow’s practice. Because if tomorrow’s practice is the way it’s supposed to be, that’ll be one more step in the direction of being a good enough football team to kick the Cowboys’ ass.”
And with that, the room exploded in cheers.
“That’s our job,” Harbaugh added. “That’s our job to be good enough to do that. We gotta make ourselves good enough to do that. That’s our responsibility.”
And the countdown to Week 1 continues. With the Cowboys coming to town to face the Giants in Harbaugh’s first game of his first year in New York.
While the proof will be in the proverbial pudding, Harbaugh has the fans more excited than they’ve been in a long time.
The Giants held a town hall event for fans in New York City on Monday night and it included an update on running back Cam Skattebo’s condition.
Skattebo’s play was one of the few highlights of the 2025 season, but the good feelings he generated during his rookie year were put on hold when he suffered severe leg and ankle injuries in October. Skattebo said on Monday that he is still working his way back to full strength and that he expects to be there in time to face the Cowboys on the first Sunday night of the regular season.
“Obviously there’s ups and downs in the injury process and coming back and rehabbing, but the mental battle has been the hardest part: making sure that I trust it fully,” Skattebo said, via Stephen Whyno of the Associated Press. “I’m a little ways out. Not too far, but I’ll be ready to go. Week 1, I’ll be ready to go.”
The Giants are also waiting on wide receiver Malik Nabers to return from a torn ACL and getting both players back to their top form would be an excellent way to set John Harbaugh up for success in his first year on the sideline in New Jersey.
John Harbaugh gave the commencement speech at his alma mater over the weekend, and he used his own recent firing to illustrate a point about resilience.
Harbaugh, who was fired by the Ravens and hired by the Giants this year, spoke at Miami University of Ohio, where he played football in the 1980s.
“There’s going to be tough times. They’re going to show up, too. You might get a call with some bad news. Maybe about your job. Maybe they’ll tell you they don’t want you anymore. Time to move on,” Harbaugh said, via ESPN. “It happens. In those moments, I hope you’ll find resilience. And you’ll be able to rejoice in all the good you’ll still have. And all the people who still care for you. That you’ll come to understand that there is a great opportunity on the next horizon of your life. And you can still walk together into every uncertain future with the people you love.”
Harbaugh told graduates he wants them to know about the “amazing power of caring and encouragement” and how they can affect the lives of the people around them by pointing out what’s special about them.
When Eli Manning refused to play for the Chargers after they drafted him first overall in 2004, it was widely believed that his father, former NFL quarterback Archie Manning, was behind the decision. Eli says that isn’t true.
Eli Manning appeared on Bussin’ With The Boys and said that while he and agent Tom Condon were on the same page that San Diego was the wrong place for him, his parents actually didn’t agree.
“My parents really weren’t supportive. My dad didn’t like the idea,” Manning said. “Now, he came to my defense and like supported me after everything was going down, but . . . he didn’t like that. And afterwards he took the brunt of a lot of the criticism because he came to my defense and people were saying, ‘Oh, you played in New Orleans all those years you didn’t win, so you’re trying to dictate like where your son’s going.’ And and he just bit his tongue and said, ‘Hey, this is what Eli wants to do and I support him’ and he did some media to try to save me from doing all the media and taking the hits.”
Manning said he respected then-Chargers coach Marty Schottenheimer but could tell there was friction between Schottenheimer, the front office, and ownership, and didn’t think the Chargers were heading in the right direction.
“San Diego had the first pick, I didn’t really want to go there,” Manning said. “I just didn’t feel like they were the most committed team to winning at the time,”
When the possibility of a trade came up, Condon told Manning the Chargers were going to trade him to the Browns, and he didn’t want to go there, either. Fortunately for Manning, ultimately the Giants and Chargers made a deal, and Manning won two Super Bowl MVPs in New York.
Former NFL defensive end Josh Mauro died last month at 35. Via the California Post, authorities have determined that Mauro’s death occurred as a result of an accidental drug overdose.
Officially, the cause of death was “acute combined fentanyl, cocaine, and ethanol intoxication.”
Mauro, who played college football at Stanford from 2010 through 2013, went undrafted in 2014. After four years with the Cardinals, Mauro spent one with the Giants and one with the Raiders. He returned to Arizona for the final two season of his career, in 2020 and 2021.
He appeared in 80 career regular-season games, with 40 starts.
When 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan aired grievances at the annual NFL meetings in March about his team getting the short straw for a long trip to Australia to face the Rams — at (as Shanahan insists) the specific request of the Rams — Shanahan held out hope for a nugget of consideration when the 49ers return to the United States.
Shanahan wanted his team’s Week 2 game to happen on Monday night.
That isn’t happening for the 49ers. Instead, the Rams will get the extra day to adjust and recover after playing in Australia. They host the Giants on Monday night, September 21.
Only one of the two Australia teams could have gotten the extra day. Still, some will wonder whether Shanahan’s public gripes prompted a little twist of the knife by the league office. At times, the powers-that-be can have a very long memory — and they sometimes don’t react well to public complaints.
To his credit, Shanahan wasn’t bashful about speaking his truth. And if he thinks the decision to give the Rams and not the 49ers the extra day to get ready for Week 2 traces to his willingness to say when he thinks, Shanahan should say that, too.
We don’t know if Fernando Mendoza will be starting at quarterback for the Raiders in Week 1 of the regular season, but we do know who the Raiders will be playing in the first overall pick’s potential debut.
The NFL’s schedule reveal on Thursday night shows that the Raiders will host the Dolphins at 4:25 p.m. ET on Sunday, September 13. The game will be on Fox.
Mendoza will have to get the nod over Kirk Cousins in order to start for the Raiders. Offseason addition Malik Willis is expected to make his first appearance for the Dolphins. Both teams will definitely have head coaches making their offseason debut as Las Vegas hired Klint Kubiak in February and Miami hired Jeff Hafley in January.
Sunday will also feature a pair of divisional games in the late afternoon window. The Packers will visit the Vikings while the Commanders will be in Philadelphia to renew their acquaintance with the Eagles. The NFC North matchup will be on CBS while the NFC East clash will be broadcast by Fox.
The other late game on Sunday afternoon will see the Cardinals visiting the Chargers on CBS. Arizona could have Jacoby Brissett, Gardner Minshew or rookie Carson Beck at quarterback for that contest.
The 1 p.m. ET games will send the Bills to Houston for a date with the Texans while the Browns go on the road against the Jaguars. The Colts will host the Ravens, the Saints will visit the Lions, the Buccaneers will travel to Cincinnati for Dexter Lawrence’s first game as a Bengal, and the Steelers will kick off the Mike McCarthy era — with or without Aaron Rodgers — at home against the Falcons.
Previous reports revealed that the Jets will be in Tennessee and that the Bears will head to Charlotte to face the Panthers. The Jets-Titans game will be on CBS along with the Bills-Texans, Ravens-Colts and Browns-Jaguars games. All the other 1 p.m. games will be on Fox.
The entire Week 1 slate will kick off on Wednesday, September 9 with a Patriots-Seahawks Super Bowl rematch in Seattle on NBC. Thursday will bring a Netflix game between the 49ers and Rams in the NFL’s first game in Melbourne and Sunday night will find the Cowboys at MetLife Stadium to meet the Giants on NBC’s Sunday Night Football. Those games were all announced ahead of Thursday’s full schedule reveal, which was also the case for the ESPN Monday night game between the Broncos and Chiefs in Kansas City.
The Giants signed free agent outside linebacker Khalid Kareem, according to the NFL’s transaction report.
In a corresponding move, the Giants placed cornerback Thaddeus Dixon on injured reserve.
Kareem spent the past two seasons with the Falcons, playing six games. In 2025, he saw action on 71 defensive snaps and 25 on special teams and had seven tackles and one pass defensed.
The Bengals selected Kareem in the fifth round in 2020.
He has played games with the Bengals, Colts, Bears and Falcons.
In his career, Kareem has totaled 41 tackles, one sack, two passes defensed, a forced fumble and an interception in 34 games with one start.
Rookie cornerback Thaddeus Dixon’s bid to make the Giants has taken a severe blow.
Ian Rapoport of NFL Media reports that Dixon tore his Achilles during a workout on Wednesday. The Giants have not made any roster move at this point, but Dixon is destined for injured reserve and a lost rookie season.
Dixon signed with the Giants after going undrafted last month. He played in seven games for North Carolina in 2025 and spent the previous two seasons at Washington. Dixon had 20 tackles and two tackles for loss while playing for Bill Belichick in Chapel Hill.
The Giants drafted Colton Hood in the second round and they signed Greg Newsome as a free agent to go with Paulson Adebo, Dru Phillips, and Deonte Banks at cornerback.
