EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- The old Anaheim High School jersey was mailed to the son between the NFC championship game and the Super Bowl two years ago. A ratty, stitched football top tumbling out of an envelope, out of 30 lost years, out of the late Bud Fassel's delicate care. "This was your dad," the note to the Giants coach started, telling Jim the story of a uniform strung together with stitches on stitches, patches on patches. The old man refused to relent on the jersey, holding it together with his tender touch.

Even now, Fassel can see his father passing pads, perspective and pride out of his little cage office near the gymnasium. He was the long-time equipment manager for Anaheim High, a man who left a good paying job as assistant fire chief to work with the kids, clinging close to the dream job he couldn't have without a college education: A high school football coach.

	Fassel

"Although he would've liked to coach, that was the closest thing he could get to it," Jim Fassel said. "I know he'd love to be doing what I'm doing ... A big part of me, and why I'm here, is because of the influence he had."

If people believe Jim Fassel is the ultimate survival tale on the New York coaching scene, they never met his father, Bud, whose own obituary actually appeared in the newspaper when he was 18 years old. After his appendix burst, the family priest gave him his last rites five times, his parents purchased a suit to lay him out in the funeral home, and the funeral director sent the notice to the local paper.

As it turned out, Bud lived to juke Japanese gunners in the Pacific, survive a case of malaria and tell his three children: "God let me live so I could have you."

"Around people, my dad was as good as anyone I've ever known," Fassel said. "He just had a way of handling situations. Whatever happened -- the war, the malaria, the appendix -- he was always able to come through. Whenever there were tough times, he always put things in perspective, always put people back on track. It was a great gift of his."

So, it shouldn't be surprising his son is still standing with the New York Giants. He didn't have a winning record as a college coach, nor a genius guru to pick up the phone and get him a head job. He's a self-made NFL coach, forever underestimated and forever landing on his feet. He had come to New York wearing those big, round glasses, spitting out sayings like, "What in the Sam Hill is going on here?" when getting angry. Coaches considered smoother, sharper and slicker than Fassel have come and gone on the New York sporting landscape, but Fassel pushes past his sixth season, securing himself for a seventh.

Somehow, Fassel is still standing. Somehow, the Giants are still alive. Somehow, this season turned into a referendum on the coach, just two years off a Super Bowl appearance. Between the offense stalling midway -- inspiring Fassel to successfully retake the coordinator duties -- and injuries decimating his too-thin team, this season has been a haphazard journey that still has the playoffs within reasonable reach.

	“	We've got a chance to make a move this year and improve. I want to get us back to the Super Bowl and win it. ”
		— Giants coach Jim Fassel

The way they refused to sign free agents this offseason to clear cap space for 2003, the way they've been devastated with injuries, for the Giants to be 8-6, on the way to Indianapolis on Sunday with NFC wild-card possibilities alive, is a testament to the tenacity of this team. As much as anything, they're a reflection of the coach's relentless resolve.

After the losses to Houston and Tennessee to drop to .500, management's silence on his status inflamed suspicions that Fassel would be fired at season's end. General manager Ernie Accorsi had wanted to hire Michigan State's Nick Saban, currently of LSU, as late Giants executive George Young's assistant GM six years ago, before his fancy turned to old friend Marty Schottenheimer until Fassel's guarantee inspired a late run to the Super Bowl in 2000.

Whatever happens the rest of the way this year, Fassel deserves to return for the third year of his four-year contract. If the Giants are too beaten up and too inexperienced now, they'll be bursting with salary-cap space for the first time this offseason, a chance to climb into the championship chase again.

"We finally got the cap solved," Fassel said. "We have the ability to make some progress. When I came here, we had cap problems and we didn't have a good football team. And without mortgaging the future with the dollars, we got to the Super Bowl.

"And now, we're right on the verge. We've got a chance to make a move this year and improve. I want to get us back to the Super Bowl and win it."

So, the Giants make the trip to Indianapolis, the improbable coach searching for an improbable victory to hold onto January hope. Somehow, the Giants are still in the playoff picture. Somehow, they're still standing. Between now and then, Fassel has one more letter to answer. They still come to him, 30 and 40 years later, old high school football players out of Orange County, Calif., writing the son to share stories of his father.

"Right now," Fassel said, "there's a two-page letter on my desk from a guy living in New York, a guy who went to Newport Harbor High School and came across my father for the first time playing in a high school all-star game years ago. He talked about my father as a savior."

If Bud Fassel wasn't a savior, he was sure a survivor. Just like his son, the against-all-odds coach of the New York Giants. Still.

Adrian Wojnarowski is a columnist for The Record (N.J.) and a regular contributor to ESPN.com.