Giants defense preaching simplicity going into Browns matchup: Doing our job

CLEVELAND — Too much has thus far provided the Giants with far too little. The confession was first revealed by inside linebacker Bobby Okereke and subsequently echoed by his colleagues on defense.It is something that must change, immediately, if the Giants are to answer the SOS distress call on their season Sunday when they face the Browns at Huntington Bank Field. Simply put, the Giants on defense must stop trying to do too much — stop being busybodies and attend to their own business. In the anatomy of the bizarre, 21-18 loss on the road to the Commanders, there were missed tackles galore for a unit that never got off the field in a very real way.

The stats say the Giants pitched a shutout — six trips allowed into the red zone, zero touchdowns allowed — but the eye-test was an indictment, as the Commanders with seven possessions (not counting a kneel-down at the end of the first half) went 7-for-7, as far as producing points with field goals — along the way hogging the time of possession, a glaring 15-minute disparity, to prevent Daniel Jones from targeting Malik Nabers 20-25 times instead of the 18 passes Nabers ended up getting thrown his way. Okereke, a true team leader in word and deed, the next day talked about “discipline doing our job’’ and let the hammer down — on himself. “Talking about me specifically, kind of three quarters doing your job, a quarter trying to do someone else’s job, trying to make a play, and that trickles down,’’ Okereke said.“I think everybody just needs to focus on doing their job.’’ Players trying to do too much to cover for those around them and thus ruining the overall scheme is a textbook self-critique when a team is 0-2 and wondering what the heck is going on.

The problem is apparent and the solution is right there, as long as the Giants reach out and take it. “Once one guy doesn’t do his job, that leaves holes and other people feel like they have to fill that hole,’’ said Micah M...