New York Giants: Gettleman, Judge won’t commit to Daniel Jones as starting QB
By Ed Stein
A decent rookie season
By all accounts, the rookie handled himself well and said all the right things leading up to the season. It’s not easy being the anointed successor to a legend who won the franchise two SuperBowls. Facing the fact the team wasn’t very good, Big Blue pulled their incumbent, future Hall-of-Fame, quarterback Eli Manning in favor of Jones in Week 3. Gettleman’s self-fulfilling prophecy came true.
Aside from the cringe-worthy 18 fumbles (11 lost), even I have to admit, Jones had a fairly good rookie season for the New York Giants. He was 3-9 as the Big Blue starter, but his numbers were good. For the year, Jones completed 284-of-459 pass attempts (61.9 percent) for 3027 yards with 24 touchdowns (the same as Tom Brady had in 16 games) against just 12 picks.
Additionally, he showed good mobility, rushing 45 times for 279 yards and two more touchdowns. Jones’ final passer rating was 87.7. That was good for 20th overall, 0.3 behind Brady, and 0.3 ahead of first overall pick Kyler Murray. All-in-all, not a bad rookie season, aside from the fumbles.
Those fumbles can’t be ignored, however. The most basic part of football is to hold on to the ball. Losing it so many times can’t be chalked up to a rookie adjusting to the NFL. Herein lies the problem.
Head Coach Pat Shurmur was supposed to be the guy who could develop Jones and begin the next chapter of New York Giants history. A 4-12 season did Shurmur in. That brings us back to the present.