Can Brian Daboll and Joe Schoen help make Giants' Daniel Jones a star, too?
Daniel Jones of the Giants against the Eagles in the first half at MetLife Stadium on Nov. 28, 2021. Credit: Getty Images/Elsa
You can thank Josh Allen for sending Joe Schoen and Brian Daboll to the Giants.
There are other reasons why Buffalo’s top front office and on-field lieutenants came downstate to try to rescue a franchise in need of plenty of life preservers. And no, Josh Allen might not be Josh Allen had Schoen and the other Bills executives not had the foresight to select him in the 2018 draft and had Daboll and the rest of the Bills’ coaches not developed him into one of the most prolific passers and dynamic players in the NFL. Their role in this was not passive.
But their arrival with the Giants is yet another signal in a month filled with them that the NFL is a quarterback-driven league. Not just on Sundays, not just in the postseason, not just on the field, but 365 days a year.
Schoen has been working his way up through organizations for years, starting as a ticket salesman for the Panthers and moving over into scouting. Daboll has been a coach all his adult life, paying his dues and winning championships in the NFL and college.
They didn’t win a Super Bowl in Buffalo. Didn’t even make a conference title game. But as soon as Allen became a star, so did they in the spheres of their professions. Great quarterbacks are not only winners, they are kingmakers and career-changers for those around them.
Schoen and Daboll are here not because the Bills all of a sudden became good after nearly two decades without a postseason appearance, but because Josh Allen became great.
Allen, though, must remain in Buffalo. And so the first stanza of Schoen’s and Daboll’s stay with the Giants will be defined by another quarterback: Daniel Jones.
Schoen already has said he expects to build the offense around Jones, who will be entering his fourth season. Daboll, it is said, also has an affinity for Jones. It would make sense that the two big decision-makers in the process be aligned on the matter, having worked together the past four seasons. During the past week, they undoubtedly held numerous conversations, both formally in the interview process and privately as potential co-workers, regarding their plans for the Giants (while also commiserating over the 13 seconds that kept the Bills from the AFC Championship Game).
Jones has some of the same qualities that Allen possesses: Strong arm, quick feet, sharp mind. It’s everything one looks for in a quarterback, which has been the description of Jones’ skill set since he entered the NFL. Everything except wins.
Enter Schoen and Daboll, and the question of whether they have enough pixie dust left from their time in Buffalo to sprinkle some on Jones and alchemize him into something close to what they forged in Allen.
This won’t be Josh Allen 2.0. That’s not what they’re trying to do. But it could be Daniel Jones 3.0.
After working with two head coaches, three different coordinators and more offensive linemen and O-line coaches than are countable, Jones will get a fresh start. His last one. If it doesn’t click this coming season, the Giants almost certainly will be moving on. This may not be a very quarterback-rich draft class in 2022, but 2023 figures to have some better options.
Schoen and Daboll are not tied to Jones. They didn’t draft him, have yet to coach him. They will not receive blame if he flunks out of the Giants’ plans. They have the luxury of wiping their hands clean and starting anew next year if they decide that is the best option.
Right now, though, Jones is their best option, and they are going to try to make it work.
"We’ve done everything possible to screw this kid up since he’s been here," co-owner John Mara said on Wednesday.
This week, though, was all about trying to fix this kid. To get the best out of him. To see if there is a best out of him in him.
Schoen and Daboll did that with a young quarterback in Buffalo.
Turn water into wine just once, and suddenly everyone invites you to their wedding.
In his first three seasons with the Giants, Daniel Jones has given the team glimpses of greatness but more moments of disappointment. Here, a look at the ups and downs of Jones’ career thusfar:
THE GOOD
- No game better exemplifies Jones’ skills than his first career start against the Bucs on Sept. 22, 2019. He led the Giants to a comeback 32-31 victory, throwing for two touchdowns and rushing for another two.
- Jones’ best game in 2021 was the Oct. 3 overtime win against the Saints in New Orleans. Jones threw for 402 yards (his only game over 300 in the past two seasons) and two touchdowns. “You watch that New Orleans game, that’s a game I reflected upon where some of their better players made good plays down the stretch,” Joe Schoen said.
- Despite missing the final six games of the final six games of the 2021 season with a neck injury, Jones remained around and involved with the team, attending practices in which he was not permitted to participate, and displaying leadership qualities that are integral to success at the quarterback position.
THE UGLY
- Jones has yet to play a full season in the NFL, missing at least two games in each of his first three seasons and the last six of 2021 with a neck injury. He’s expected to be cleared for contact soon and back on the field without limitations to start 2022, but has yet to prove he can withstand the punishment that a quarterback – a quarterback who runs as often as he does – often takes.
- Jones has yet to win a primetime game for the Giants, going 0-8 in front of national TV audiences, which is the worst record of any quarterback to start his career since the advent of primetime games. Beyond that he and the Giants are also 0-4 in nationally broadcast games that start at 4:25. In other words he has yet to win a game when most of the country is watching.
- While Jones has somewhat curbed the penchant for turnovers that plagued his earlier seasons, he still has given the ball away (29 interceptions, 20 lost fumbles) nearly as often as he has scored with it (45 passing TDs, 5 rushing TDs). With those decreased turnovers though has also come a lack of scoring production. After 24 touchdown passes and 2 rushing TDs as a rookie in 2019 he has had only 22 and 3 of each in the past two seasons combined.
Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.
