Daniel Jones has been  providing answers to Giants' QB questions

If this season is to be a referendum on Daniel Jones’ long-term suitability as the Giants’ quarterback, then the third-year passer is a quarter of the way there in convincing the team he indeed is up to the job.

Yes, there still is plenty of time to prove otherwise, especially if he reverts to the turnover-prone habits that had cast doubt about his future. And it’s not as if he suddenly has turned into John Elway, not with only four touchdown passes in four games.

But if what we are seeing from Jones is legitimate improvement — and nothing suggests otherwise — then the 24-year-old quarterback is doing everything possible to earn his way into the Giants’ long-term future.

This team may be 1-3 and barely hanging on after an early-season wobble, but Jones has not been part of the problems that left the Giants 0-3 after what should have been the easiest part of their schedule. Poor defense, a lack of discipline and Joe Judge not having his team fully ready were the root causes, not Jones’ play.

And it is precisely because of Jones’ heroics in Sunday’s 27-21 overtime win over the Saints that the Giants still have a pulse. He was brilliant in throwing for a career-high 402 yards and two touchdowns. Embattled offensive coordinator Jason Garrett trusted Jones to throw the deep ball consistently, and both men responded with their best efforts of the season.

You don’t sign Kenny Golladay to a four-year, $72 million contract to turn him into a possession receiver. You send him downfield the way Garrett did on Sunday. You saw the result: six catches for 116 yards, including a critical reception to set up Saquon Barkley’s winning touchdown in overtime.

You don’t draft Kadarius Toney in the first round without trusting him in big spots; you feed him the ball on third down and you watch him bob and weave the way he did against the Saints to the tune of six catches for 78 yards.

And you use Barkley the way Garrett did on Sunday. He split the running back out wide in a big spot in the fourth quarter, then watched as Barkley beat Pro Bowl cornerback Marshon Lattimore and Jones hit him in stride for a 54-yard touchdown to get the game back to within one score at 21-18.

Jones answered the call time and time again when the Giants needed him most, when their season was on the verge of potentially collapsing after one month.

And though the odds remain slim that the Giants can fully recover from 0-3 to make the playoffs, Jones’ performance most likely will not be what stands in the way of that.

If they don’t make it, an underperforming defense, a Cowboys resurgence and a dismal September will be the three factors responsible for their failure.

"This team, everyone’s been battling, and we haven’t [previously] gotten the results," Jones said in the afterglow of Sunday’s win. "Hopefully we can build off it. That’s the goal, to use the momentum as we prepare for [the Cowboys] next week."

Jones is not thinking in big-picture terms. He is a day-by-day player — as he should be, given the massive responsibility he has — and he is not into making any sweeping proclamations.

In some ways, he is like Eli Manning: boring by design. Manning never made any guarantees or looked too far ahead; he simply took it a game at a time and saw what he had at the end.

For too many years after his 2011 Super Bowl run, Manning didn’t have much by the time the Giants reached January. And by the time he retired, he’d been to the playoffs only once since his second Super Bowl MVP run.

Jones can only hope to come close to Manning’s career achievements, and he’s on a team that is not yet Super Bowl material. The personnel around him isn’t collectively good enough to keep up with Tampa Bay, Green Bay, Kansas City, Buffalo and the league’s other elite teams.

But Jones is at least providing a glimmer of hope at the team’s most important position. And he will get another big test on Sunday at AT&T Stadium when he faces a revitalized Cowboys team off to a 3-1 start thanks to Dak Prescott’s return and a defense that is flourishing under first-year coordinator Dan Quinn.

If Sunday in New Orleans was a statement-game moment for Jones, this week will be an even bigger opportunity. If the Giants do pull off an upset in Dallas, it won’t be in spite of Jones. It will be because of him.

By Bob Glauber

Special to NewsdayBobGlauber

Bob Glauber retired in 2022 after covering the NFL for nearly 40 years. He was selected in 2021 for the Bill Nunn Career Achievement Award by the Pro Football Writers of America, and is a three-time winner of the New York State Sportswriter of the Year by the National Sports Media Association. President of the PFWA for the 2018-20 seasons, he is the author of “The Forgotten First” and “Guts and Genius.”