What We Learned About New York Giants In Week 1 Of Mike Kafka Era

In many ways, Sunday’s 27-20 loss to the Green Bay Packers was indistinguishable from the previous defeats which litter the 2-9 season of the New York Giants. But look closer, and the hallmarks which will separate the Mike Kafka era as head coach of the team from the Brian Daboll years began to take shape on both sides of the ball.

Kafka was upbeat despite the loss, not because he was satisfied with the result, but from the ways it was clear the Giants embraced the process he had installed within a rocky week.

“Regardless, we want to be aggressive,” Kafka told reporters following the game. “That’s, to me, as a former player, being around a lot of good play callers, head coaches, like you want to have an aggressive mentality on offense and defense, special teams. So that’s really the messaging throughout. We continue to be aggressive, whether it’s one-on-one situations, whether it’s by play call, or whether it’s just by style of play. I want that to be a stamp of what our team’s about.”

Aggression will not be an issue as long as Jameis Winston is under center, which was reinforced on Sunday by both his success and, ultimately, his mistake which cost the Giants their final chance at the win.

To be fair: this one really isn’t entirely, or primarily, on Winston. Note that Jalin Hyatt simply didn’t run the route hard. (Kafka already knows someone like Isiah Hodgins, practice squad signing, is likelier to help the 2026 Giants than Hyatt will.) But Winston threw it without hesitation all afternoon. Several drops by Green Bay defensive players kept his overall line looking decent. It was the same level of aggressiveness that led to a 19-for-29 passing day for 201 yards along with a rushing touchdown.

“I saw that timing and execution is so important in this game,” Winston said of the late interception. “When you don’t have the reps with some of your teammates, you’ve got to capitalize on those moments and continue to work even harder and find solutions because when the game really matters, timing and execution is the most important thing.”

We also saw that, contra the conventional wisdom heading into Sunday’s game, that Kafka will be utilizing Devin Singletary nearly as often as Tyrone Tracy Jr. It was believed in some quarters that Singletary’s role was dependent on his relationship with Daboll, but on a day when Tracy was effective all afternoon, with 88 yards rushing on 19 carries, Kafka got Singletary 16 rushing attempts as well, along with red zone opportunities that led to Singletary’s first to touchdowns of the season.

“Very proud, man,” Singletary said of the overall rushing attack, which produced 142 yards on the ground Sunday. “Big guys up front, they were moving guys. But we expected that, we knew they was capable of that. Me and (running back Tyrone) Trace, all we had to do was run. Even the receivers got in on it, the tight ends got in on all the dirty work, so that was big for us today.”

On the defensive end, we began to see some adjustments as well, even though Shane Bowen is still the coordinator calling plays. We saw the most action from Nic Jones in the secondary, for instance, as the Giants prepare for what feels like an eventuality, moving on from the sunk cost that is Deonte Banks. Figuring out the defensive backfield is a must for this team. Want to see just one example why?

But the most important elements of the build are in place. Against one of the fiercest pass rushes in the NFL, the Giants allowed just two sacks all day, the second coming on the final play, one in which Winston had plenty of time to scramble.

Better still, the Giants are on track to get Jaxson Dart back soon, allowing the precocious rookie a chance to keep on learning. Hopefully he’ll have his top remaining receiver back, too, with Darius Slayton a potential Week 12 return after missing Sunday with a hamstring injury.

No, it won’t be the team that the Giants hope can take that final step forward into winning in 2026, between the absence of Cam Skattebo in the backfield and Malik Nabers as a gamebreaking receiver. But all the losses are going to allow New York to add high up in the 2026 draft, too, and without having to think about the skill positions first.

Kafka, too, is coaching for his next job, even if that turns out to be the one he has now with the interim tag lifted. But he also seems to understand that sending his franchise’s future quarterback into designed runs late in games without a contingency plan to have him protect himself is not a path forward for anyone. Winston, running the Tim Kelly offense since Kelly was promoted to backfill Kafka’s former position as offensive coordinator, ran just three times Sunday, including his touchdown scramble. Dart had no fewer than 5 rushes in any of his starts this season, two times reaching double digits.

What Kafka made clear, and this is absolutely necessary for a 2-9 team: everything is on the table right now.

“That’s the beauty of football,” Kafka said. “It’s a team game. It’s never about one person or one side of the ball. Every unit had opportunities to make plays, and so it’s a team game, and it’s the best team game in all of sports. So, we’re going to look at it. We’re going to evaluate everything. We’re going to evaluate all the players. We’re going to evaluate all the coaches, the calls, be hypercritical of that, and then find out those areas where we can be better and knock those things out, and that’s what we’re going to do this week in practice. So, it’s all of us. It’s all of us together on it, and we’re going to get arm-in-arm and go get back to work.”