Normally, these #nygmail questions wait until Saturday mornings and our weekly New York Giants Twitter mailbag. But this is one I've been getting a lot, and it's worth its own post:

@DanGrazianoESPN #Nygmail Is Coughlin's uncertain future hurting their chances of bringing in free agents due everything might change in ayr — Ibleedbigblue (@tmerritt51) March 13, 2015

This isn't a terrible question. In my reporting on free agency during the past week, I have heard this expressed as a concern of three players, each of whom signed elsewhere. The sense that Tom Coughlin might only be the Giants' head coach for one more year is a factor in players' decision-making with regard to the Giants, and you really can't blame them. If you're going to sign for three, four or five years, it's completely fair to ask whether you can count on the current head coach being there for more than one of them.

Let me be completely clear on this: I do not believe, based on what I have heard, that Coughlin's job status is the reason the Giants haven't been able to sign a bunch of big-name free agents so far. I do believe it's one of many factors in players' decision-making process. This is a list-the-pros-and-cons process for these guys, and one of the cons on the Giants' side right now is uncertainty about the long-term future of the coaching staff.

There's a sense among free agents that they can't count on Tom Coughlin and his staff being around the Giants beyond 2015. Jeff Zelevansky/Getty Images

Personally, I don't think it's fair if players are holding that against the Giants. There are very few, if any, teams that can promise a prospective free agent anything about the long-term future of their coaches. And if anything, the Giants should be thought of as one of them. The only coaches in the league who have held their current jobs longer than Coughlin are New England's Bill Belichick and Cincinnati's Marvin Lewis. If a prospective signee asks the Giants about stability, their track record gives them the right to laugh as though he's messing with them.

However, there is a sense around the Giants and across the league that another sub-.500 season could mean big changes and even the end of Coughlin's time with the team. And the reason for that is not -- as it might be in other places -- fickle ownership or uncertainty about the quality of the coach. The reason there's uncertainty about Coughlin's long-term status is the performance of the team during the past several years. And that, if anything, is the reason the Giants might not gleam quite as brightly as a desirable free-agent landing spot as they once did.

This is a Giants team that has not finished better than .500 since 2012 and has missed the playoffs in five of the past six years. That's a pretty long track record of disappointment, and the fact a Lombardi Trophy showed up in the middle of it can only go so far in erasing the questions about the overall quality and direction of the team. Yes, the Giants have won two Super Bowls in the past eight seasons. But they've also missed the playoffs in five of them. At some point, that second thing starts to loom at least as large in the minds of prospective employees as the first thing does. Coughlin and Eli Manning are the kind of coach and quarterback who can win you a Super Bowl, yes. They have proved that. But their record also tells you they very rarely qualify for the postseason.

So, in answer to the question of whether Coughlin's job status is having an adverse effect on the Giants' pursuit of players, I'd say yes, but only as part of the bigger picture. If the Giants still were the consistent winner of an organization they hold themselves out to be, then Coughlin's job status wouldn't even be a topic for discussion. But based on the way things have gone the past three years, they're just not.