Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Hard Knocks: Offseason with the New York Giants’ On HBO, Where The Front Office Puts Together An NFL Team Preparing For Their 100th Season

In Hard Knocks: Offseason With The New York Giants, narrated by Liev Schreiber, the people from NFL Films train their cameras on the Giants’ front office as it tries to improve upon the team’s disappointing 6-11 record in 2023. The team, winner of eight NFL championships, including four Super Bowl victories, is celebrating its 100th season in 2024. And in the early days of the offseason, the big topic of conversation is whether star running back Saquon Barkley will be offered another franchise tag contract or be allowed to leave via free agency.

HARD KNOCKS: OFFSEASON WITH THE NEW YORK GIANTS: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: “FEBRUARY 16, 2024.” New York Giants general manager Joe Schoen discusses star running back Saquon Barkley with his senior staff.

The Gist: The series starts with head coach Brian Daboll giving the team a final talk after the final 2023 regular season game. Schoen, in his third year as GM, and the scouting and personnel staff go right to work, discussing potential free agents and how much they made the previous season.

Of course, the main topic of conversation is about Barkley. The team put the franchise tag on him the year before, restricting his free agent movement, but Schoen thinks it’s unlikely they’ll do it again in 2024. There’s a good chance that he’ll leave, but Schoen and his staff think that the running back market is saturated to the point where they can get a replacement form him for less money than Barkley could get on the open market, though Schoen has his doubts he’ll be in such high demand (Barkley ended up singing with the Eagles).

But the team is looking for more than a new RB, the front office reviews free agent defensive linemen that could take some pressure off star nose tackle Dexter Lawrence. Of course, the draft is another huge undertaking for the front office, and we see Schoen talking with fellow GMs — friends he’s made since his years with the Carolina Panthers and Buffalo Bills — at the East-West Shrine Bowl and the Senior Bowl.

We also look in on quarterback Daniel Jones rehabbing from his ACL surgery. But Barkley is still the main topic. Schoen tells co-owner and CEO John Mara that they have too much invested in Jones to not spend the cap room they have finding people to protect him better than in recent years, when he’s suffered three injuries in two years. Mara reluctantly agrees, though he wishes there was a way Barkley could stay.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? This is not only the first time the Giants have been the subject of Hard Knocks, but it’s the first time Hard Knocks has concentrated on a team’s offseason activities. It usually concentrates on a team during either preseason or during the season.

Our Take: Mara was never a fan of Hard Knocks, but he finally agreed to let the cameras in because it’s the team’s 100th season and it was a good way to highlight the team’s extensive history on a national scale. What’s interesting is that the only way the team would do it, though, is to have the cameras mostly around Schoen, Daboll and the front office, not the players.

This iteration of Hard Knocks is certainly one that’s going to be fascinating to people who are interested in seeing just how the decision-makers of their favorite NFL teams make personnel decisions every year. But as far as action is concerned, it’s not exactly scintillating. It’s as if HBO came and put cameras all over your office; you’ll see video of meetings, PowerPoint presentations, and people having discussions in offices. There may be more cursing here, depending on what your office is like.

But to anyone who wonders just what the discussions over free agents and potential draftees is like, this offseason edition of Hard Knocks is definitely going to be of interest. The conversations Schoen has about Barkley are, of course, going to be the most talked-about of the season’s early episodes. While it seemed on the outside that Barkley wasn’t going to be re-signed, there still seemed to be some hand-wringing about it among the members of the team’s front office.

But the edit we see shows that Schoen is pretty adamant that Barkley can be replaced for far less money than either what the franchise tag would bring or what he’d find on the open market. The footage also shows that Schoen’s commitment to Jones, who was drafted by his predecessor, Dave Gettleman, is more solid than sports radio hot-takers have speculated it is. For a buttoned-down organization like the Giants, that’s a pretty revealing thing to see.

Will we see some personal moments? Probably. For example, we see Schoen driving into work eating an Uncrustables, talking about how he used to eat PB&J as a young scouting assistant for the Panthers 20 years ago and how he had his wife make him the same sandwiches for the ride to his press conference when the Giants hired him as GM in 2022. Those insights are fun to see, but we get the feeling those will be few and far-between.

Sex and Skin: None.

Parting Shot: Schoen asks his senior staff about Jones: “Is he going to be our guy for the next ten years, or are we going to have to pivot and find somebody else?” Given his contract status — he’s on his last guaranteed year at over $40 million per — now will be the time to find out.

Sleeper Star: Brandon Brown, the assistant GM, looks like he’s a rising star in the league. He certainly isn’t a yes man to Schoen, and gives his boss some good insight into the team’s needs.

Most Pilot-y Line: Daboll talks to Schoen about Shane Bowen, whom he thinks is the top candidate to be the team’s new defensive coordinator. While rattling off the stats of the defense Bowen ran for the Tennessee Titans, he throws in f-bombs in strange places. Apparently, the defense was 10th in “fucking points,” for instance.

Our Call: STREAM IT. Hard Knocks: Offseason With The New York Giants isn’t going to set the world on fire with controversial moments involving players jawing at each other or arguing with coaches. But if you’re curious about how an NFL front office works in the offseason, this show should give you enough to stay interested.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.