SAD SHOCKING NEWS: NEW YORK GIANTS HEAD COACH BRIAN DABOLL HAS ISSUED A RESIGNATION SPEECH TO PUT AN END TO HIS CAREER STATING THAT…

One of the big takeaways from the Giants’ schedule is that they have two manageable games to open coach Brian Daboll’s hot seat Year 3 — home against Minnesota and then at Washington.

But after that?

Well, there’s a six-game gauntlet — before the Nov. 3 home game against Washington — that could doom the 2024 Giants before Halloween.

And that might prove too much of a hole for Daboll to overcome, as he tries to rebound from last season’s 6-11 disaster.

After visiting Washington, the Giants travel to Cleveland and then host Dallas in a short-week Thursday night game. The Giants do have extra rest before Week 5 — but they have to play in Seattle that week. And while the next two games are at home, they’ll both be brutally tough — against the Bengals and Eagles. That Sunday night Bengals game could get especially ugly.

The Giants close out this six-game gauntlet with a Week 8 Monday night game, on Oct. 28, at the Steelers. What will their record be at that point, just shy of Halloween?

The Giants’ next two games before their Week 11 bye are both winnable — at home against Washington and then against pitiful Carolina in Munich. Still, it’s easy to imagine the Giants entering their bye at 4-6 (or maybe worse), with wins over Minnesota, Carolina, and Washington (twice).

Daboll impressed as a rookie head coach in 2022, when the Giants went 9-7-1 and won a wild-card playoff game in Minnesota, before getting crushed in Philadelphia in the divisional round. While the Giants sputtered to the finish line that regular season, closing 2-5-1, they gave themselves wiggle room with a hot start — 7-2 (which followed 6-1).

The exact opposite happened last season. The Giants opened 1-5 and then 2-8. There was no way they could overcome that. Their season was essentially toast on Oct. 15, when they fell to 1-5 with a loss in Buffalo on a Sunday night. This season, the Giants once again have a tough Week 6 Sunday night game — against the Bengals. Could they emerge from that 2-4? Or maybe 1-5?

(For what it’s worth — and for some context — here is where the Giants’ six-game gauntlet opponents stand in CBSSports.com’s latest power rankings: Browns 14th, Cowboys 13th, Seahawks 25th, Bengals seventh, Eagles 10th, and Steelers 19th. The Giants are 29th, while the Vikings and Commanders are 26th and 31st.)

A 1-5 (and especially 2-8) start is almost impossible for any team to overcome. The Giants did close last season 4-3. But after starting so slowly, they had no margin for error.

And ultimately, all that 4-3 finish did was wreck their draft position — and their chances of easily being able to pick quarterback Daniel Jones’ replacement. They had to try to trade up for Drake Maye, but the Patriots stayed at No. 3 (three spots higher than the Giants) and took him.