Manning era may be over in New York
Jones named Week 3 starter, supplanting veteran Giants QB
Eli Manning’s nearly uninterrupted 16-season run as the New York Giants’ starting quarterback is over.
And the Daniel Jones era has begun in the Big Apple.
Giants head coach Pat Shurmur announced Tuesday that Manning has been demoted to second string and Jones — a rookie drafted sixth overall in April — is the team’s new starting passer.
The Giants (0-2) and visit the Tampa Bay Buccaneers Sunday.
The move had been expected sooner than later this season, ever since the Giants drafted Jones.
“Eli was obviously disappointed, as you would expect, but he said he would be what he has always been, a good teammate, and continue to prepare to help this team win games,” Shurmur said in a statement. “Daniel understands the challenge at hand, and he will be ready to play on Sunday.”
Shurmur telegraphed the move at his Monday news conference, when he quite purposefully leaked that such a move was possible when he refused to confirm Manning as this week’s starter for the 232nd time in New York’s last 233 games.
“Ultimately, this is a move that I felt was best for this team at this time,” Shurmur said. “I have said it since I got here (that) I am very fond of Eli. His work ethic, his preparation, his football intelligence. All those attributes are as good as I have ever seen in a player. And Eli worked as hard as you could ask of anybody to get ready for this season.
“This move is more about Daniel moving forward than about Eli.”
It wasn’t that Manning was terrible in New York’s opening losses. In a 35-17 loss at Dallas in Week 1 and in a 28-14 loss in the Giants’ home opener Sunday against Buffalo, Manning completed 63 per cent of his throws for two touchdowns and two interceptions for a substandard passer rating of 78.7.
As has been the case for several seasons now, it’s not so much that Manning’s stats are bad, it’s that he isn’t consistently completing top-shelf passes down the field as he once did.
Sure, a lot of that has to do with the terrible pass protection he has received since the moment he last put down the Lombardi Trophy in February 2012. It’s also a fact his receiver corps since then — outside of Odell Beckham Jr., when he was healthy — has been particularly poor.
No matter, he’ll now watch Giants games from the sideline as Jones’ backup.
The 22-year-old completed 85 per cent of his pre-season throws for two touchdowns and without an interception. Shurmur and anyone else you can put a microphone to inside Giants HQ will try to assure you Jones has been progressing far faster than they expected.
That’s fine.
But now Jones has to prove it and against real NFL-level competition, meaning against coaches and starters game-planning specifically to defend him — which typically is not the case in August.
In a training camp interview in July, I asked Jones how much pressure he felt, given everyone who cares about the Giants expected him to take over from Manning this season.
“I see it as a tremendous opportunity for me to come into a situation with someone like Eli, a future Hall of Fame quarterback who has played very well for a long period of time,” Jones said. “Being able to watch him and learn from him is a huge opportunity.”
As for Manning ’s future, outside of a one-week benching for Geno Smith in November 2017, he had been the Giants’ starter since Week 11 of 2004, when he supplanted Kurt Warner.
Manning’s career record as New York’s starter is 116-116 in the regular season and 8-4 in the playoffs, including those two Super Bowl championships following the 2007 and 2011 seasons, when both times he was named Super Bowl MVP. JoKryk@postmedia.com Twitter.com/JohnKryk