Giants takeaways, report card from NFL Week 4 win over Cardinals

Takeaways from the Giants’ 36-24 win over the Cardinals on Sunday.

1. “That’s what winning teams do … find a way to win games.’’ That was John Harbaugh not long after the Giants secured a 30-27 victory over the Cardinals, the second consecutive week needing a last-second defensive stand to seal the deal. Given what has gone down with this team with the damaging injuries to Jaxson Dart and Brian Burns, it is sometimes easy to forget that the Giants one month into the season are indeed a winning team. You play who you play and you can only beat who you play. The wins the past two weeks came against the Titans (0-4) and Cardinals (1-3), NFL lightweights. World-beaters the Giants are not. Alone in first place in the NFC East is what they are. Four games into this, Harbaugh’s winning pedigree is rubbing off on his team.

2. This was the full extent of the Jameis Winston Experience. Great throws. Bad throws. Bold throws. Bad decision throws. Jameis with throws (two interceptions) to take his team out of the game. Jameis with throws (three touchdown passes) to get his team back into the game. This was the 16th game in his 12-year NFL career in which Winston had multiple touchdown passes and multiple interceptions. That is the most for any quarterback in the league since Winston entered the league in 2015, according to ESPN. It is a high-wire act in operation without much of a safety net. 

3. The running game continues to grind along. There was an opportunity to put the hammer down early in the fourth quarter, leading 27-24, when Najee Harris lost the ball on a fumble in Arizona territory. That was the fifth fumble in four games for the running backs. Cam Skattebo (18-58) and Harris (9-30) barely averaged more than 3 yards per attempt, and the longest run of the game was only 9 yards. Grinding it out is tough to do and explosive runs are needed. There is not much speed in the backfield, and the running backs caught only one pass all day.