Giants reportedly could make massive Joe Schoen decision this week

A report from the middle of April suggested that a New York Giants team that has head coach John Harbaugh serving as its true head of football operations could part ways with general manager Joe Schoen shortly after the 2026 NFL Draft concluded. 

The draft has now come and gone, and it sounds like people within the NFL believe that Harbaugh may be ready to show Schoen the door.

Will the Giants have Joe Schoen news to announce before May arrives?

"When you talk to people in the league, it feels like anything’s on the board right now," Giants reporter Pat Leonard of the New York Daily News said about the club's handling of Schoen during an appearance on New York's CBS 2 that aired on Sunday night, per Chris Franklin of NJ Advance Media. "There are people in the NFL who think Joe Schoen could be fired this week. There are people who think that, based on the positive returns publicly of this draft, that maybe he sticks around, but (head coach) John Harbaugh moves on after the season because this is Joe Schoen’s final year of his current contract."

The Giants went 13-38 under Schoen's leadership from the start of the 2023 season through the 2025 campaign. Brian Daboll, Schoen's hand-picked head coach, was fired by the Giants this past fall. After the franchise hired Harbaugh, it was reported that Schoen had been "basically relegated to handling scouting" for the organization. 

Will the trade of Dexter Lawrence II impact the Giants' Joe Schoen decision?

Earlier in April, the Giants surprisingly traded wantaway defensive tackle Dexter Lawrence II to the Cincinnati Bengals for the No. 10 selection in the 2026 draft. According to Franklin, Leonard said that "Harbaugh viewed the need to trade defensive tackle Dexter Lawrence to the Cincinnati Bengals as a byproduct of a deteriorating relationship with Schoen and the current front office."

Leonard added that Harbaugh is "still pouring concrete on the foundation of a roster that he knows wasn’t good enough, and the operation that he inherited wasn’t good enough" earlier this year. 

"[Harbaugh] has made a lot of drastic changes," Leonard continued, "and remember, at the beginning, he wouldn’t even take the job until he had final say. So now he has to decide how he uses that final say on the general manager he’s going to spend time working with."

Perhaps that final say will come before April wraps up on Thursday.