The Surprising Emergence of Daniel Jones

Date: October 31, 2022

By: Joe Morales

This article was written on Oct. 27, 2022

Al Bello/Getty Images

There isn’t a Giants fan in the country who predicted a 6-1 start to the season. First year head coach Brian Daboll has brought a new brand of football back to this franchise that was once a premier organization across the league.

The gutsy, gritty, “never say die” style of football has rejuvenated Giants fans once again. Watching Giants football on Sunday is no longer a chore, but something we can look forward to week after week.

Daboll has done plenty to improve a team that won four games last year, but none are as impressive as how he fixed quarterback Daniel Jones and turned him into an elite game manager.

The end to the Eli Manning era was sad. Following the Giants fourth Super Bowl in 2011, the team was mediocre until 2016 when they won 11 games under first year head coach Ben MacAdoo.

Long time general manager Jerry Reece knew the upcoming year was the last chance to win one more Super Bowl with Manning, who was entering the season a 36-year-old veteran.

However, the team regressed mightily, and Reece and MacAdoo were both fired after Week 13. Manning was also benched in Week 13 in favor of Geno Smith, snapping his 210 consecutive games started streak.

After the Giants cleared house, Steve Spagnola took over and Manning was reinstated as quarterback. The Giants later took Daniel Jones with the sixth pick in the 2018 Draft, which all but ended Manning’s career.

Head coaches came and went, but still nothing changed. The Giants went 22-59 from 2017-2021, the worst in football over that span.

New General Manager Joe Schoen and Brian Daboll were hired by owner John Mara to dig this franchise out of the mud, as the previous regime left the giants a mess: no salary cap flexibility, a lackluster group of players, and a quarterback that looked lost on an NFL field.

Matthew Swensen/New York Football Giants

I, like many others, figured the Giants would play this year with house money. It would be a bridge year where the Giants racked up enough losses to draft either one of the top two quarterbacks in this year’s draft class.

The Giants didn’t pick up Jones’ fifth year option, which indicated they would do just that, and rightfully so; his record as a starter was an abysmal 12-25. He lacked the necessary decision making an NFL quarterback needs to thrive. He had 36 fumbles in 38 games and led the league with 19 fumbles in his rookie season. As I said before, he looked lost.

So, what’s different this year? How has this quarterback who was written off turned the Giants and his career around?

He finally has the right people telling him what to do. Brian Daboll and offensive coordinator Mike Kafka have allowed Daniel Jones to be comfortable on the field. Instead of trying make Jones into a player he isn’t, they are designing plays that adhere to his strengths.

Gone are the long throws downfield to receivers who belong on practice squads. The Giants have lived off checkdown passes all season long. Until he was injured, Daniel Bellinger became Jones’s best friend. Who could forget the Week Four game against Chicago when the Giants ran bootleg after bootleg and brutalized the Bears defense.

Jones’s best quality is his ability to run. Whenever receivers are covered and the play seems dead, Jones makes things happen with his legs, a great weapon to have in your back pocket. Just last week in Jacksonville, Jones rushed for a career high 107 yards.

Daniel Jones is first @Giants QB to rush for 100+ yards in a game since... 1934 pic.twitter.com/KvX1Jj0WBG

— CBS Sports (@CBSSports) October 26, 2022

This has all developed Jones into an elite game manager overnight. There hasn’t been a big drive this season where Jones hasn’t come up big. He leads the league in game winning drives with 5, and fourth quarter comebacks with 4.

Daniel Jones is the first QB since 1950 with 5 game-winning drives within the first 7 games of a season.

— Robert Griffin III (@RGIII) October 27, 2022

This new brand of Giants football is thrilling. They have the chance to be 7-1 going into the bye when they visit Seattle this weekend to take on the Seahawks. Beware National Football League, this is Daniel Jones’s world, and you’re just living in it.

Joe Morales can be reached at joseph.morales@student.shu.edu.

Posted in: Sports, Football, NFL