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Riotmaker
Join Date: Jun 2007
Location: South Burlington, Vermont
Posts: 5,717
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Amani Well Dressed Toomer.
Quote:
EAST RUTHERFORD - He finally has his long-awaited championship, he holds almost every important Giants receiving record and he’s been hit who knows how many times in his career. But Amani Toomer is ready for more..
WR Amani Toomer is looking forward to the 2008 season!
In 2007, Toomer came back from knee surgery the previous year to have another outstanding season. He caught 59 passes in the regular season and was the Giants’ leading receiver in their four-game postseason. After 620 catches, 8,917 yards and 50 touchdowns – plus franchise postseason records in each of those categories - no one would have questioned Toomer had he taken his championship ring and ran a fade pattern away from the Giants and the NFL.
“I never felt that way,” Toomer said. “I don’t know, I just haven’t felt that way. I don’t feel like I have had enough here. I know when I feel like I have had enough I will have had enough, but I don’t think I have had enough.”
So after a break that included a two-week trip to Ghana, Toomer is back in the weight room and supplementing his workouts with yoga and Ta-Kwon Do.
“I enjoy it,” said Toomer, whose listed weight of 203 is just a pound more than when he was drafted on the second round in 1996. “It doesn’t bother me to work out. I am here (in New Jersey), so why not come here and show my face and get a little workout at the same time?”
Toomer waited 12 years to win a championship, longer than any Giants player except Michael Strahan, who won a ring in his 15th season. The Giants had made five previous
trips to the playoffs during Toomer’s tenure (he did not play in the postseason game in 2006), including an appearance in Super Bowl XXXV. He also played on five sub-.500 teams.
“It seems like I came full circle,” he said. “When I first got here we weren’t very good and there was not much buzz about the Giants. Then we had some success my second year and it started to feel really, really good to be around here. We had a couple of slumping years and it has been up and down. Now to finally get to the top with a Super Bowl win – it is just good to see how excited the town really gets over this team.
“I think most people took the Super Bowl to such a personal level because we came from so far behind. We didn’t have the perfect season, but we came together at the end and that is how people who followed us kind of saw it. It became a more personal thing, because not everybody was on our bandwagon. Our people were very loyal and it paid off for them.”
Toomer made a huge contribution to the cause with team-leading totals of 21 catches, 280 yards and three touchdowns in the Giants’ four-game postseason. He opened the playoffs with seven receptions for 71 yards and a score at Tampa Bay. The next week he scored a pair of touchdowns at Dallas. Toomer caught four passes in the NFC Championship Game in Green Bay and was the team’s leading receiver in the Super Bowl with six receptions for 84 yards, including two big catches on the game-winning drive.
“I just feel like that is type of player that I am - I am going to always find a way to do something,” Toomer said. “That is the only way I can have it. If I didn’t contribute as much as I did and lead the team in receiving in the playoffs, I wouldn’t have felt right. I feel like I am a guy that is always there and when the money is on the line I am going to be there to perform.”
Some Giants have said that their 38-35 loss to the Patriots in the regular season finale helped propel them to postseason success. Instead of resting their regulars, the Giants went toe-to-toe with an undefeated New England team that did not lose until the Super Bowl rematch. While nobody associated with the Giants felt good about losing the regular season game to the Patriots, some felt there were positives to be taken because the game showed that the Giants could compete with the NFL’s best team.
Toomer, however, dissented from that opinion.
“I was really ticked off about that,” Toomer said. “I felt we should have beaten that team that time, and everybody was so happy and giddy. I remember being really upset the whole week. I was thinking some people were happy just to be in the game.”
Toomer didn’t convey those feelings to his teammates, because, “I am not one to get up there on a soapbox and do little speeches or anything. I feel like I am more of a leader by example.” So the following week, after the Giants fell behind Tampa Bay, 7-0, Toomer caught three passes for 40 yards on the touchdown drive that tied the game. In the fourth quarter, he picked up a key first down, then scored the touchdown that put the game – and his concerns after the New England loss - away.
“I must have totally misread (the team's reaction to the New England loss) because everybody came out the next week with just so much confidence,” Toomer said. “I was definitely pleasantly surprised. I felt like we came out and played hard and we knew that we had a tough opponent and we went out and took it to them, so I was pretty excited about that. Then we went to Dallas and I was so excited about our chances, because we played them twice and both times I felt like we let them off the hook. We were up, something went wrong, penalty here, penalty there, and they capitalized on it, which most good teams do. We felt like we weren’t going to give them anything to capitalize on and we didn’t and we beat them.
“That was a great win for us, that really sling-shotted us in terms of emotion to the next level. Then to win the conference championship the way we did, when nobody really gave us a shot to even win the first game, was great. Once the Super Bowl happened I think there are a lot of teams that went on good runs like us and got to the Super Bowl - like Carolina and the Bears and a couple other teams - but I don’t think there is any team that had as good an opponent in the Super Bowl and performed as well in the Super Bowl, had such a great game in the Super Bowl as we did. And we won with a touchdown, not with a field goal.”
After chilling out for a few weeks, Toomer headed to Africa as part of a group that included several surgeons. His offseasons are usually highlighted by extensive travel. In Ghana he toured the country and observed several operations.
“I went with two groups of doctors that did eye surgeries and some did hernia surgeries,” Toomer said. “I actually helped with one of the surgeries, which was very nerve-wracking. But the doctors assured me that I couldn’t do anything (harmful).”
Whether he’s on the football field or in an African hospital, Toomer always seems to do the right thing.
NOTES
*The Giants today waived defensive tackle Manny Wright.
Wright signed with the Giants last August 15. He played in six regular season games and was credited with four tackles (three solo). Wright was inactive for all four postseason games.
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http://www.giants.com/news/eisen/sto...story_id=27042
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Amani Well Dressed Toomer.
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