The Giants need to be saved, but a commissioner won’t do it this time

The alliance between the Mara Family and the Tisch Family has, by and large, been the gold standard for all such partnership agreements. From the moment Wellington Mara and Robert Tisch entered into their 50-50 arrangement at the top of the Giants’ organizational flow chart on Feb. 21, 1991, this has been a model affiliation.

That’s extended for almost 35 years, as the original partners’ sons, John Mara and Steve Tisch, inherited their fathers’ respective mantels. There have been no public squabbles. Nothing is decided without input from both. Tisch, in fact, has occasionally gone way above and beyond the spirit of the collaboration by serving as a human shield at public events when Mara — for better or worse, the public face of the union — was surely to have been loudly booed off the field.

“It’s been the perfect partnership for a lot of years, and it still is,” a long-time football executive with close ties to the NFL offices said recently. “And that’s the kick, isn’t it? It might almost have been a hindrance to the franchise the last few years more than a help.”

How?