Trying to sell a fanbase on hope when your team is 2-8, doesn’t have a quarterback and has regressed on the field in Year 3 of a regime is an exercise in futility. So the reality is that any of the words that general manager Joe Schoen spoke Tuesday during his first press conference since the Giants started training camp in July would ring hollow. “I believe in the process. I believe where we’re going,” Schoen said. “Building it, sometimes it hurts and it’s painful and it’s hard to go through it. But we’re going in the right direction.” But it’s become harder and harder for fans to trust that process. Despite the Giants posting a 6-11 record last year, Schoen and head coach Brian Daboll essentially ensured themselves a third year by going 9-7-1 with a playoff win in 2022. They also had the excuse of not having their starting quarterback due to injury for 11 games last year. That excuse is gone now. Daniel Jones, the player that Schoen gave a four-year contract to after that playoff win, has been on the field for all 10 games of this disgusting season. And with even more time to bring in his own players, Schoen’s product is getting worse — not better. Is it possible that this season is an outlier? That this is all just a speedbump on the way to long-term success once the Giants find a legitimate quarterback? Sure, there’s a chance. But the question that co-owners John Mara and Steve Tisch have to ask themselves is if they truly believe in Schoen’s vision given all the miscalculations so far. Giving Jones that contract — even with the ability to cut ties relatively painlessly after this season — was a massive mistake. Two of Schoen’s four first-round draft picks in right tackle Evan Neal and cornerback Deonte Banks look like busts. None of his 24 selections have turned into Pro Bowlers. Schoen said he would love to “bat 1.000,” and no one is suggesting that a GM can or should hit on every single roster move. But swing-and-misses on franchise cornerstones cannot simply be shrugged off as part of the process. Time is running out for Schoen to provide proof that he can turn the Giants back into a winner. “We’re better in a lot of areas,” Schoen insisted, without offering specific positives aside from noting that the rookie class and two other recent draft picks have performed well. “We just got to figure out how to finish games.” This is where Schoen sounded ridiculous. He noted that the NFL has had a record number of games decided by seven points or fewer through Week 10 — 83 to be exact — and that the Giants are 1-5 in those scenarios. But since close games are the norm in the NFL, the fact that the Giants have simply played in six of them isn’t noteworthy. Losing them consistently is a sign that the talent and coaching are not good enough. Schoen was also caught contradicting himself when he said “I don’t think so” in response to being asked if he didn’t build a good enough roster for the coaches this season. Yet he also wouldn’t concur that coaching has been an issue. “It’s not players and it’s not one individual,” Schoen said. “That’d be an easy fix if we could say, ‘Hey, it’s this.’ Everybody’s got their hand in this, myself included. It starts with me.” Obviously we’ll never know Schoen’s true feelings because it wouldn’t make sense to throw anyone under the bus during a press conference. But it still spoke volumes that he wouldn’t endorse Daboll as coach or Jones as quarterback, even if he didn’t have much choice given the lack of success this season. Schoen wouldn’t specifically say whether re-signing Jones was a mistake, although he did acknowledge that the front office tried to “accelerate” the rebuild because of how Jones’ contract was structured, and mistakes were made. You can argue that the Giants’ hands were tied when it came to quarterback after the 2022 season because they weren’t picking until 24th in the 2023 draft. The top options on the free-agent market were Derek Carr and Jimmy Garrapolo, who would’ve been stop-gaps at best. Still, Schoen and his team clearly believed they could build around Jones. They handed him big money rather than a one-year franchise tag. Maybe the neck injury and ACL tear that Jones sustained last year have doomed his pocket presence, but the contract hasn’t worked out, and that failure is on Schoen. So this is where the Giants are at: They have seven games left and won’t be favored in any of them. If they win none and finish 2-15, it will be impossible for ownership to justify retaining everyone. At the very least, Daboll would likely be shown the door. But Schoen can’t be out of the woods, either, even though he confidently said he expects to be back next year. After they conclude this bye week, the Giants will likely turn to Drew Lock at quarterback, another player signed by Schoen last offseason. Schoen said the staff will make “football decisions” and “look at solutions and evaluate everything.” So if the Giants can’t win at least a couple games down the stretch, ownership will have to think long and hard about whether these are really the people that they want drafting a new quarterback and trying to find multiple new starters on both sides of the ball. “We have a really good relationship with ownership, and we communicate constantly with them,” Schoen said. “There’s confidence in the plan and where we’re heading.” But time is running out.