Eli Manning Exclusive: Giants legend talks John Harbaugh, ownership, quick turnaround

Two-time Super Bowl champion Eli Manning has stated that he is ecstatic over the New York Giants hiring John Harbaugh.

Manning is very familiar with Harbaugh’s coaching over the years, with a large portion of Manning’s career overlapping with the latter’s tenure with the Baltimore Ravens.

Harbaugh is a Super Bowl-winning head coach, having won AP NFL Coach of the Year in 2019 and guiding Baltimore to the playoffs in 12 of his 18 seasons as head coach.

Harbaugh will look to turn around a New York Giants franchise that has made it to the playoffs just twice over the past 14 seasons.

“It’s that person that you get, the same person every single day, there’s going to be highs and lows through the course of a season, but you gotta bring that same commitment and work ethic every single day,” Manning told Esports Insider in an exclusive interview. “I think that’s what you get with Coach Harbaugh. 

“You see him on the sidelines, you see him in press conferences, and it’s a determination, but it’s never getting too high, too low, out of control. It’s that steady force that’s just there. That’s what you want from your head coach, and you want the players to kind of take over that mentality as well. We gotta be team players, and we gotta always stay focused and understand what the goal is and how we’re going to get there.”

Manning, along with his former coach Tom Coughlin, were two key figures who talked to Harbaugh during his recruitment process. The Super Bowl champion detailed some of the things they talked about, including how the Giants are a “family atmosphere” along with the owners’ commitment to winning.

“I really just talked about the family atmosphere that is around the Giants and obviously the Mara family, the Tisch family, their commitment to football,” said Manning. “There’s no ownership group that is better than them, and all they do is care about winning games. 

“They do everything for the players, for the coaches, to anyone that needs anything that they believe is going to help out the team and help them get a win and help them perform better and stay safe and healthy,” Manning continued to say. “They will do it. They do not second-guess anything if they think it’ll help the organisation and help the team win a championship. That is all they care about, and their commitment is unmatched.”

Manning hammers home that Harbaugh is the guy who can bring that confidence and winning culture to an organisation that has been starving for it for 15 years.

“Everyone in that building cares about winning games, and it is a great environment,” said Manning.

“They will do anything to try to help the team, and that’s what you want. The commitment’s been there; now they just need the results. They need someone to come in and give them the belief that under any circumstance of a game of a season, they can turn around, they can get a win, they can get a comeback. It’s that belief that I believe helps you win those close games, and those are the differences in making the playoffs.”

The New York Giants legend brings up how Harbaugh is used to coaching in tight and close games with big implications. That’ll help serve him as he looks to lead a young Giants nucleus led by Jaxson Dart, Cam Skattebo and Malik Nabers into the playoffs for the first time.

“There’s a couple of those tight games where you make a comeback, or you get a key stop, and just hoping that because of Coach Harbaugh, because of the situations he’s been in, the success he’s been in the critical games, that he’s going to create that attitude, that culture and that winning belief,” said Manning.

New York plays in a competitive division in the NFC East, but not one that’s dominant. The Philadelphia Eagles won the division as the No. 3 seed and struggled throughout the season, finishing 19th in offence. Meanwhile, the Dallas Cowboys finished second in the division with a 7-9-1 record after finishing with the worst defence in the NFL.

In other words, it’s a winnable division and one in which the Giants can compete with a quick turnaround, especially when you consider all of the young pieces that they have.

“Yes, because of his success and the way the NFL is set up, and you see it a lot with some of these teams this year,” Manning said of the Giants having a possibly quick turnaround.

“You look at the Patriots today, they got a second-year quarterback and a new coach, and you can make that jump. The Giants have a talented roster; they have good players, and it’s about getting your leaders to play at a high level, but also for them to lead the others and have that belief that we can make changes, and it’s a commitment.

“But I think we have the right players and the right leaders that can get everybody to believe that they can be a playoff team,” Manning continued to say.

“So excited for Jaxson Dart, excited to get Nabers back. You gotta stay healthy, and you gotta have some things go your way. But between the draft, free agency and the players that we have and a great coach, you can make that turnaround very quickly.”