LANDOVER, Md. — Abdul Carter didn’t need to dwell on his personal efficiency as a result of the Giants misplaced Sunday.
“That’s all I care about,” the rookie cross rusher mentioned. “I don’t care about how I play, what I’m doing. As long as the team wins, that’s all I care about.”
However Carter saved anyplace from three to seven factors with an enormous deal with and quarterback strain late within the first half of the 21-6 defeat. And he additionally deflected a Tress Method punt to forestall Washington from pinning the Giants deep with 9:18 remaining within the third quarter.
“My first NFL experience, I enjoyed it,” the No. 3 total decide within the NFL Draft mentioned. “I just wish we got the win at the end.”
Carter led the Giants with three quarterback pressures, recorded a half-sack of Jayden Daniels with Kayvon Thibodeaux and made three tackles in 35 snaps, per NFL NextGen Stats. That meant he performed on 53.8% of the protection’s snaps and nonetheless made his mark.
His largest play got here with the Giants trailing 14-3 and the Commanders deep within the crimson zone with 28 seconds remaining within the second quarter.
Carter tackled Daniels on the 4-yard line on a designed quarterback run to forestall a primary down and perhaps a landing.
Then as Washington scrambled again to the ball with no timeouts, Carter pressured Daniels into an intentional grounding throwaway. The penalty was a 10-second runoff, and the Giants escaped down by solely 11 at half.
“That’s what we always try to do,” Carter mentioned of disrupting Washington’s offense. “But we didn’t get the win, so none of it matters in the end.”
Carter additionally introduced a harmful aspect to the punt block staff, practically blocking one within the first half and getting his hand on certainly one of Method’s boots within the second.
“I’ll do whatever my coaches ask me to do,” he mentioned. “So wherever they need me, I line up and do it to the best of my ability.”
So Carter was an thrilling vivid spot on a darkish day for the Giants. However, that’s what he noticed it as: not adequate.
“It don’t really matter,” he mentioned. “If I play actually good, actually unhealthy, on the finish of the day it’s nearly getting the win… We had alternatives within the recreation we didn’t benefit from.
“We gotta win that game.”
