Jake Ballard PHOTO: Andrew Mills/The Star-Ledger

Today while working, I received a text update from ESPN that read “Giants cut TE Jake Ballard (torn ACL)”.

This was the face I made:

Then I saw the below tweets from Ralph Vacchiano (@TheBlueScreen) from the New York Daily News:

Then I made this face:

Ballard will likely clear waivers and will be placed on the PUP-list and will miss the remainder of the season.

My fellow Giants fans, or really just anyone that knows me well, know my feelings about Ballard, but there is a reason why he has caught my interest.

When the Giants lost Kevin Boss after the 2010-2011 season I wondered what in the world they were going to do in that spot.  Boss, like Steve Smith, was another one of Eli Manning’s most trustworthy players to get to where the ball is placed.  What TE was going to be Manning’s go-to guy now?

Ballard stepped his game up big time last season and made Giants fans, in no disrespect, forget Boss.  Ballard caught 38 passes for 604 yards and four touchdowns in the regular season, one of which was the big game-winner against the New England Patriots.

It’s really a shame that this ACL injury happened.  Ballard was showing great promise for the Giants after last season.  This is one of those times where we are reminded that the NFL is still a business, but at least there is hope for Ballard’s return to the team.

It takes a lot of pieces to a puzzle to win a championship, and Ballard was certainly one of those pieces.  Without him they would have never made the playoffs, and therefore would not have won Super Bowl XLVI.