Daniel Jones is probably the quarterback of the New York Giants for the foreseeable future, and has racked up a lot of praises from the fanbase and from other figures around the team who believe the Giants have gotten a reliable player for the future by selecting him with their first pick in the 2019 Draft, but that doesn’t mean the second year quarterback is without critics.
Sometimes, those critics are even high profile. In this case the criticism is coming from one of the better Giants receivers of the past and a man who holds multiple team records at the position – Amani Toomer. While speaking to WFAN Sports Radio, Toomer voiced some less than popular ideas about Jones and his future prospects.
While Toomer did say that he was excited, he also claimed to not know what the Giants have with Jones. “He had a couple good games early, but most quarterbacks when they get their first start they’re going to succeed because nobody has the book on them. They don’t know what they’re gonna do, don’t know what they like, what they don’t like; basically they’re playing honest.”
“But more film, more defenses are allowed to cheat and take away tendencies, and that’s when usually quarterbacks will have four good games and all of a sudden go in the tank,” he continued.
It’s easily forgotten these days, but that trend held true for multiple quarterbacks in the fairly recent past – there was a time when one of the top rising rookies in the league was Robert Griffin III, and when the read option looked like a dominant strategy. These trends fizzled out thanks to teams getting more film, and every year, there seems to be a number of rookies who look good before dropping in performance when teams get better at facing them.
It’s especially easy for it to happen to quarterbacks, as the position that gets the most attention, which is perhaps part of Toomer’s point.
“I think he had some resurgence toward the end of the season, the injury situation he got with his ankle, you just don’t know,” Toomer said.
Whether Daniel Jones has a sophomore slump or not will be a determining factor in whether the Giants have a bounce back year or not. One can only hope the second year quarterback moves up rather than slowing down once other teams know how to deal with him.