MUNICH — Germaine Elemunor certainly didn't look thrilled about the change in the attacking line.
After starting the first nine games at right tackle and performing well, El Emnor was moved to left tackle and replaced by Evan Neal in Sunday's 20-17 loss to the Panthers at Allianz Arena. He became a right tackle.
This was the first start of the season for Neal, the team's No. 7 pick in the 2022 draft who seemed to be a total failure thus far.
El Emnor, who signed with the Giants as a free agent this offseason, was adamant that he wanted to stay at right tackle rather than switch to left tackle when Andrew Thomas suffered his season-ending foot injury. .
And the Giants have emphasized that they only see Neal as a legitimate tackle.
So something had to give for both El Emunor and Neal to start.
“It just happened,” El-Emnolu said. “It's hard to change positions like that. It's not the most comfortable thing to do. When I say to people, 'It seems like you've been writing with your right hand for a long time,' out of nowhere they say, 'You write with your left hand. I have to write it, the deadline is Saturday, and I have three days to learn how to write it.'' Write with your left hand. ”
El Emnor suffered a blowout loss in the second quarter that resulted in Daniel Jones being sacked for a botched flea flicker.
But if there was any positive to come from Sunday's loss, it came as a result of change.
According to Next Gen Stats, Neal allowed just one pressure on 41 pass-blocking snaps, the lowest pressure rate of his career.
“It was great to be back out there and playing after a year,” Neal said. “I'm just grateful. Not every play was perfect. I didn't have a perfect game. I'm sure there will be things to go back and review the tape and make corrections. But it's my first trip. I think it was a solid trip overall.”
Strangely, Dexter Lawrence did not play the first five plays of the Panthers' first offense of the second half, instead being on the sideline.
Neither he nor head coach Brian Daboll were tight-lipped about the reason or offered an explanation. “I'm not going to go into detail about that,” Daboll said.
Brian Burns said earlier this week that he has extra motivation going into the game against Carolina, where he played the first five years of his career. But his old side had the last laugh.
“It hurt,” Burns said. “It was a little tough to lose like that, to a team that spent a lot of time hurting, and to see the faces of everyone in the building.”
Malik Nabors, who missed two games earlier in the season with a concussion, was tackled in the fourth quarter and hit his head on the ground, which was determined to be a second concussion, but he was quickly treated and returned to action.
