With Daniel Jones locked up and Saquon Barkley staying in New York on the franchise tag, Giants general manager Joe Schoen can turn his full attention to upcoming free agency.
Even after shelling out cash to keep Jones and Barkley, Schoen has money to spend, particularly compared to last year, when he was digging out of the salary cap hell inherited from Dave Gettleman and the previous regime.
Asked earlier this week what the big difference is between this year and last year, Schoen was open about the ability to spend to add depth.
"I'll give you a good example," Schoen said on Wednesday. "We were just talking about a player. I won't name the position or anything. We were like, 'Yeah, we're guessing his market might be $2.5 (million),' and I was like, 'We can afford that. It's only $2.5 (million). We can actually afford it.' We're not shopping for minimum players anymore. So, even players like that that can be really good depth players will make us that much better.
"So, just having the flexibility now to be creative, go get players at maybe a little bit higher value, but also being able to sign, whether it's tier three players, two, one, however you do it. We can map it out, and there are players that we can go procure now that maybe we weren't in the past."
Last offseason, Schoen had to retool a roster in disarray. The Giants took their lumps, adding on the cheap. Behind Brian Daboll's Coach of the Year performance, Big Blue made the postseason, despite the spending handcuffs.
New York still has significant holes on both sides of the ball. The Giants need receiver help and playmakers at all three levels of the defense. The GM also must ensure enough money for a Dexter Lawrence extension, but Schoen has some money to spend to ensure his depth isn't as shallow as last season.
"So, this offseason we'll build a bit. I still believe in building through the draft. And we can sign guys in free agency to help the roster," Schoen said. "I still think with Daniel and Dexter coming down the road and some of the other players, you're still going to need to build through the draft because I think there are going to be some players who will be making good money on our roster. So, it's still going to be important."
We're still early in Schoen's rebuild. Starting next week, we'll get a better glimpse of how he plans to allocate his spending now that he's able to shell out a few bucks in free agency.
