New Jersey native and Don Bosco Prep star, Tommy DeVito, made his first NFL appearance on Friday night for the New York Giants. And while that came in a 21-16 loss to the Detroit Lions, DeVito has no reason to hang his head.
The undrafted rookie free agent made his case to stick this season, completing 15 of 24 passes for 155 yards, one touchdown, and one hail-mary interception with time winding down in the fourth quarter.
It wasn’t a game-breaking performance for DeVito by any stretch, but he played with a lot of poise and produced despite being under constant pressure.
“I thought he did a nice job. He operated well,” head coach Brian Daboll said after the game. “He had a play, obviously we threw the interception there at the end, but it was fourth-and-15, and he hit a play like that in camp early on. Where it was fourth-and-15, and he threw checkdown for five yards. And obviously he threw it up to try to give him a chance. They made a play on it. But I thought he operated well. Made some good decisions. Used his legs. He was under some pressure sometimes there. Took care of the ball on some of those sacks. So definitely a performance to work off of.”
“Now look, it’s basic stuff you’re seeing in the preseason. There’s no gameplan and there’s not a lot of coverages but he went where he was supposed to go with the ball most of the time. He did a good job for his first time.”
DeVito exceeded expectations. That’s not an easy thing to do when your family is in the stands and you’re going up against NFL-quality players for the very first time. He actually credits Daniel Jones and Tyrod Taylor for helping him quell the nerves.
“(They told me) just to enjoy it,” DeVito said. “D.J. told me he was nervous the first time going out for his first preseason game. Obviously, Tyrod’s had a million of them, so he’s sort of helped me with certain situations like, ‘Be weary in case the headset cuts off.’ Because I’ve never really had a headset on before, it’s not something I’ve really thought about. So little things like that that they’ve helped me with coming into the game, really just taking a deep breath and enjoy it. That’s what I tried to do.”
DeVito was obviously upset that his final pass was picked off and the team left the field with a loss, but the blame can hardly be placed on his shoulders. He did as well as he could have given the circumstances.
“I think it turned out well at times. There were a lot of things to clean up, a couple throws that I missed that will haunt me tonight, that I’ll be sitting up thinking about. But I think it’s just a step in the right direction and I look forward to getting up tomorrow and watching the film,” he said.
“I mean, honestly I don’t know what the future holds, but for me (it’s) just showing improvement day-by-day and week-by-week and obviously game-by-game. It was the first preseason game so when I look at the film tomorrow, the next preseason game, I want to be able to take that leap and really just see what I did wrong and what little things I can clean up, ball placement on some things even if it might’ve been completions, it could’ve been better and gotten a couple more yards. At the end of training camp, show the growth that I’ve made from the time that I walked in the door.”
DeVito, who was given one of the game balls, may have helped solidify his uncertain future a bit. Jones and Taylor are obvious locks to make the 53-man roster and it’s unlikely the Giants carry three quarterbacks, but the 25-year-old made an early case for a practice squad spot. And if that’s not in the cards, he put solid play on film for all 31 other teams who were watching.
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