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After going just 3-14 a year ago, the New York Giants are one of the top preseason candidates for the most improved team in 2025. However, with the influx of talent the team brought in over the offseason, a few notable veterans could find themselves as surprise roster cuts as the Giants finalize their 53-man unit in the next week.
Few teams were as aggressive and effective in the offseason as the Giants, who came out on top of free agency and the draft. But despite the plethora of high-profile names the team brought in, New York is currently slated to begin the season with just four new starters. The team's unofficial roster has hardly budged through three weeks of the preseason, but it is potentially on track for seismic changes at the end of August.
Teams have until Aug. 26 to finalize their rosters, and the Giants have several positional battles worth monitoring. New York's offense has been a fun watch throughout the preseason, but most of its rotational questions come on defense. The team surprisingly has just one new offensive starter — quarterback Russell Wilson — after re-signing Darius Slayton and Greg Van Roten in free agency.
Cornerback is the most pressing matter, with the team currently listing its CB2 as “Deonte Banks or Cor'Dale Flott.” The defensive line has also raised eyebrows, with Kayvon Thibodeaux listed as a starting defensive end, joining Dexter Lawrence II and Rakeem Nunez-Roches up front.
Roster cuts are a notoriously difficult time of year, but the Giants face a particularly challenging situation in 2025. The team could cut ties with a few surprising names once the decisions are official.
CB Deonte Banks
Two years into his career, Deonte Banks has not been the player the Giants thought they had. After impressing as a rookie, Banks took multiple steps back in 2024, putting him in danger of losing his starting job ahead of his third season. If he is not careful, Banks could lose more than just his place in the starting lineup.
Statistically, Banks improved in some areas in 2024. He recorded 13 pass breakups, two more than he had as a rookie, and forced a fumble for the first time in his career. Regardless, he was much more of a liability in coverage than he was an asset, allowing a 124.7 passer rating when thrown to.
However, even with Banks' struggles in coverage, Brian Daboll's biggest issue with him seemed to be a lack of effort more than anything else. Banks missed four tackles on the year, but one particular whiff against the Pittsburgh Steelers put him in the most trouble. After completely blowing a tackle against Najee Harris, Daboll benched him for the remainder of the team's Week 8 loss.
Despite the benching, Banks returned to the starting lineup the following week. Yet, he now finds himself in a positional battle with Flott, who has been his backup for the last two years.
Banks is clearly the better player with the much higher potential. If that were not the case, this battle would have arisen much sooner. But two years into his career, the Giants clearly seem to have issues with him behind the scenes. The team continues to suggest that it might not be too pleased with his work ethic — or lack thereof — with assistant general manager Brandon Brown saying that Banks is only “starting to adopt” the habits Daboll requires.
Whether the positional battle is a ruse or not, Banks should begin the year as New York's starting cornerback opposite Paulson Adebo. However, if he loses the job to Flott, the Giants could cut ties with him completely and leave him off their 2025 roster.
OG Greg Van Roten
The Giants made multiple changes over the offseason, but one of their biggest shocks was the front office's decision to retain all five starting offensive linemen. Of the returning group, veteran guard Greg Van Roten was the only player Joe Schoen had to re-sign in free agency. New York inked the 35-year-old to a one-year deal to keep him in the starting lineup.
Re-signing Van Roten was the outcome the Giants wound up with, but it was more of a backup plan than the team's primary goal. They could certainly do worse than Van Roten, who played 100 percent of the offensive snaps in 2024. New York had no choice but to return to the well after striking out of an uninspiring free agency period.
The Giants' current depth chart suggests that their offensive line will remain stable, but the team is clearly aware that changes are needed. Daboll semi-desperately converted former first-round pick Evan Neal to tackle before the team added James Hudson III, Stone Forsythe and Marcus Mbow.
Neal has garnered some attention, but Mbow has been the biggest head-turner throughout the preseason. Mbow joined the team as a fifth-round pick, but one that Schoen was delighted to find available to him on day three. The rookie has lived up to the hype thus far, catching coaches' attention all summer.
Rookie OL Marcus Mbow was putting people in the TURF yesterday 😤
Love to see it. pic.twitter.com/rQCCRg0yKS
— SleeperGiants (@SleeperGiants) August 10, 2025
The Giants have been using Mbow at tackle, but he was a guard at Purdue. With Andrew Thomas returning, New York has much less of a need on the edge than it does on the inside. Perhaps a shift back to his normal position could land Mbow a spot in the starting lineup.
Even if the Giants demote Van Roten, they are unlikely to immediately cut him. He is a durable and reliable veteran on a team-friendly deal with a roster that otherwise lacks those traits. However, given Van Roten's age, there is a chance that New York will turn to Mbow and be content with Neal and Aaron Stinnie as his backups.
DE Rakeem Nunez-Roches
Ten years into his career, Rakeem Nunez-Roches looked like a completely different player in 2024. Despite being a rotational player for most of his career, Nunez-Roches started 15 games and recorded a career-high 52 tackles, two sacks and six quarterback hits.
The revelation was encouraging, but it primarily emerged out of necessity. The Giants' defense fell apart midway through the year, making Nunez-Roches a de facto fixture of the starting lineup.
Injuries are never predictable, but none of those issues should be prevalent in 2025. New York invested heavily up front, poaching Chauncey Golston from the Dallas Cowboys and signing Seattle Seahawks washout Roy Robertson-Harris. The biggest additions came from the draft, where Schoen nabbed Abdul Carter and Darius Alexander.
The changes prompted the team to make a foundational adjustment, shifting Kayvon Thibodeaux to defensive end. Many projected that the team would trade Thibodeaux upon drafting Carter, but it instead exercised his fifth-year option. Daboll seems content with shifting him inside, which only further muddies the interior rotation.
The Giants still have Nunez-Roches atop their depth chart, but it is hard to imagine that remaining the case for long. Two of the team's biggest offseason investments, Golston and Alexander, remain behind him. Also buried behind the 32-year-old journeyman is incumbent starter Elijah Chatman.
Since shifting Thibodeaux on the depth chart, New York currently has 13 interior linemen on its roster. Nearly half of them will be victims of final roster cuts. It would not be much of a surprise if the rebuilding Giants valued the youth of players like Chatman and D.J. Davidson and gave Nunez-Roches his walking papers.
