While most of the attention and discussion around the New York teams has involved who will be playing quarterback for them, another major issue concerns their defenses. Both were really awful the second half of last season.
Looking at the final numbers, particularly in terms of pass rush, you might think they were OK. Each finished with 43-45 sacks, which were top-12 totals. Sounds pretty good. (The Jets' top performer, 2023 first-rounder Will McDonald, who had 10.5 sacks, is pictured.)
But the Giants were wildly better in the first half of the season than the second, while the Jets were not only better the first half, they were best the first five games -- when Robert Saleh was the head coach. Through the first nine weeks of the 18-week NFL season, they ranked 1st and 2nd in sacks (35 and 31). In the final nine weeks, both teams experienced the two worst dropoffs in the league.
Table shows sack and interception totals the first nine weeks of the season, versus the second half, sorted by sack improvement or decline. The New York clubs were worst in that regard by a wide margin.
Because of the 17-game season, game totals can't be split perfectly in half; some teams (with an early bye) played 8 games the first nine weeks, some played 9. Never fear, eventually we'll have the 18-game season that nobody wants but the money-grubbing owners.
| SACKS AND INTERCEPTIONS, FIRST HALF VS. SECOND, 2024 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Defense | Sk(1) | Int(1) | Sk(2) | Int(2) | Sck(Diff) | Int(Diff) |
| Dallas | 18 | 4 | 34 | 9 | 16 | 5 |
| Miami | 10 | 4 | 25 | 6 | 15 | 2 |
| Atlanta | 9 | 7 | 22 | 5 | 13 | -2 |
| Carolina | 10 | 3 | 22 | 6 | 12 | 3 |
| Kansas City | 17 | 5 | 22 | 8 | 5 | 3 |
| Las Vegas | 17 | 5 | 21 | 5 | 4 | 0 |
| Seattle | 21 | 6 | 24 | 7 | 3 | 1 |
| Cincinnati | 17 | 6 | 19 | 9 | 2 | 3 |
| Pittsburgh | 19 | 10 | 21 | 7 | 2 | -3 |
| New Orleans | 19 | 11 | 20 | 3 | 1 | -8 |
| Denver | 31 | 7 | 32 | 8 | 1 | 1 |
| Green Bay | 22 | 10 | 23 | 7 | 1 | -3 |
| Arizona | 21 | 5 | 20 | 4 | -1 | -1 |
| Baltimore | 28 | 6 | 26 | 6 | -2 | 0 |
| LA Chargers | 24 | 9 | 22 | 6 | -2 | -3 |
| Detroit | 20 | 11 | 17 | 5 | -3 | -6 |
| Buffalo | 21 | 8 | 18 | 8 | -3 | 0 |
| Philadelphia | 22 | 5 | 19 | 8 | -3 | 3 |
| San Francisco | 20 | 10 | 17 | 1 | -3 | -9 |
| Tampa Bay | 25 | 5 | 21 | 2 | -4 | -3 |
| New England | 16 | 4 | 12 | 3 | -4 | -1 |
| Indianapolis | 20 | 6 | 16 | 10 | -4 | 4 |
| LA Rams | 21 | 8 | 17 | 5 | -4 | -3 |
| Tennessee | 18 | 3 | 14 | 8 | -4 | 5 |
| Washington | 24 | 3 | 19 | 4 | -5 | 1 |
| Minnesota | 27 | 13 | 22 | 11 | -5 | -2 |
| Jacksonville | 20 | 2 | 14 | 4 | -6 | 2 |
| Chicago | 23 | 7 | 17 | 4 | -6 | -3 |
| Houston | 29 | 8 | 20 | 11 | -9 | 3 |
| Cleveland | 27 | 1 | 14 | 3 | -13 | 2 |
| NY Jets | 31 | 2 | 12 | 5 | -19 | 3 |
| NY Giants | 35 | 1 | 10 | 4 | -25 | 3 |
As for whether either defense will be able to recapture last year's first half magic, that looks dubious so far. New Jets coach Aaron Glenn oversaw a below-average pass rush all four seasons in Detroit. The Lions did rank 10th in takeaways last year, and Glenn's DC Steve Wilks oversaw a strong pass rush in his last NFL job (San Francisco in 2023). It's early, but the Jets have lost more good players on defense (Javon Kinlaw, C.J. Mosley, Haason Reddick) than they've added thus far.
The Giants are running it back with the same defensive coordinator (Shane Bowen). He has a couple of good pass rushers to work with (Dexter Lawrence and Brian Burns) and had above-average pass rushes in two of his three seasons running Tennessee's defense before taking the Giants job a year ago. And New York has added some talent in free agency, most notably in the secondary (Jevon Holland from Miami, Paulson Adebo from New Orleans). They seem like a slightly better bet to recapture that first-half performance than the Jets.
We'll see what happens in the draft and the rest of free agency, but at the moment, I don't think either defense will be in my top 12 for 2025.
--Andy Richardson