There’s no denying that it’s been hard being a New York Giants fan over the last few years. A small sliver of hope emerged when running back Saquon Barkley was drafted second overall by the Giants in 2018 from Penn State. That sliver was quickly destroyed once the Giants went 5-11 for the 2018 regular season and 4-12 this past regular season, however.

Anyone that’s a football fan knows who Eli Manning is: arguably one of the best football players of all time. He started 210 games straight, ranging from 2004-2017, which is the third-longest consecutive starts streak for a quarterback in NFL history. He also is the seventh all-time leader in passing yards and seventh in touchdowns.

An impressive career, no doubt, which is why football fans everywhere were so shocked and upset when Manning announced his retirement last week after 16 seasons with the Giants and two Super Bowl wins.

However, there was a slight turn of events in the past few days once Manning announced he would be joining the University’s football coaching staff as none other than the head coach.

“I’m just so confused,” Peyton Mathewson ’22 said. “We’re a much better program than the New York Giants. How is he even qualified to coach our team? I mean, our win percentage this year was 27.27 percent, while the Giants’ was 25 percent. You’re telling me he’s coming here and he’s not going to drag us down? I don’t think I’m convinced.”

Other football fanatics on campus shared Mathewson’s disdain about the new head coach news.

“First of all, I’m a Cowboys fan so this really sucks for me,” Chris Tee ’21 said. “I just hate to see the University’s program being tainted with someone as inadequate compared to someone from the Cowboys as Manning. I can only hope our team won’t suffer this year. Maybe someone should talk to Dak Prescott about helping him out.”

Cowboys fans are truly the worst breed of people ever and Tee is perfect evidence to support this statement that is universally accepted among all football fans except for Cowboys fans, by some strange coincidence. Patriots fans are a close second.

Hopefully, football fans of all kinds can put their differences aside next season and allow Manning to find a way to not ruin the University’s program.