Flukes? Giants feed off negative vibes of skeptics

ALBANY, N.Y. -- They are the defending Super Bowl champions, but they're nobody's choice to repeat, they're not a popular pick in their own division and they don't even have the keys to their own city.

RB Brandon Jacobs will be a force for the Giants so long as he can stay healthy. (Getty Images)

I can't remember the last time a defending Super Bowl champion was given less of a shot at doing something, anything, as this year's Giants, but I do know it's a subject that dovetails beautifully with the Us-Against-The-World mentality that helped push the Giants through Super Bowl XLII.

"I understand it," said quarterback Eli Manning, "and it's fine by me. I kind of like the position we're in. I like going under the radar. It makes you know we still have a lot of work to do.

"No one else is giving us credit. So we know we got to go out there and earn it. We have to become a better team and play better football than we did last year."

I don't know how you better a Super Bowl championship, but I know what Manning means. He must throw fewer interceptions. Brandon Jacobs must stay healthy. The same goes for Plaxico Burress. Someone must emerge at tight end. And the Giants must find a way to play as well at home as they did on the road.

A year ago they were an astonishing 10-1 on the road -- 11-1 if you include the Super Bowl. They were 3-5 at home, with all but one defeat by 11 or more points.

It seems as if that's too much for the oddsmakers. When I contacted a spokesman for a Las Vegas sports book earlier this summer, he told me the Giants were fifth on his hotel's preseason board, making a charge that week to bypass Jacksonville.

That's right, Jacksonville. Now tell me how many Super Bowls the Jags have won. Better still, tell me how many they've been to.

So what's the deal?

"I don't know," said defensive end Justin Tuck, "and, honestly, we don't care. When it comes down to it, we have that big shiny thing on our fingers right now, and everyone wants to be where we are. Until they dethrone us, we are the defending champs, and we're going to go out and play this season just as we did last year.

"I don't care about floating under the radar. I don't care about cameras in our face or what outsiders say. Look what outsiders said last year. They weren't right."

Well, yes and no. They said the Giants would have trouble making the playoffs, and they were right. They didn't clinch a playoff spot until the penultimate game of the regular-season, a defeat of Buffalo where they had to rally from a 14-0 deficit.