New York Giants quarterback Daniel Jones had a roller coaster rookie season in 2019. There were a lot of things he did well, and then there were some things he didn’t do so well (see: turnovers).
While Jones’ fumbling issue has been the center of attention this offseason, there have been several positive evaluations that have come out, but they’ve been overshadowed by the negativity (one sells, one doesn’t).
But we’re here to try to sell you a little optimism courtesy of NFL Network’s Nick Shook, who recently broke down the top 10 quarterbacks under pressure based on Next Gen Stats.
Although he just skated in under the line, Jones did manage to make the list, coming in at No. 10 overall.
UNDER PRESSURE: 73.3 passer rating, +0.2% completion rate above expectation, 53.1% completion rate.
Welcome to Next Gen Stats, rookie! Jones was a surprise pick, but only because, well, he’s Daniel Jones, a first-year pro forced in by a lame-duck coach as Eli Manning’s successor — and he somehow made the most of it while playing behind a sieve of an offensive line (that doesn’t include you, Kevin Zeitler). Jones’ numbers were comparable to those of Matt Ryan, which should signal to Giants fans that, hey, they might have another guy like Eli! Manning secured two Super Bowl rings, of course, while so far we’re talking here about Jones’ 8:6 TD-INT ratio under pressure and nearly 1,000 passing yards. Many rookies have fared much worse when the blindingly fast NFL pass rush threatens to swallow them whole on a per-down basis. Kudos to the kid from Duke. Who’d have thought this khaki-wearing fella would’ve been so cool amid the heat?
The nine quarterbacks who ranked ahead of Jones were Josh Allen (Buffalo Bills), Dak Prescott (Dallas Cowboys), Matt Ryan (Atlanta Falcons), Matthew Stafford (Detroit Lions), Kirk Cousins (Minnesota Vikings), Lamar Jackson (Baltimore Ravens), Derek Carr (Las Vegas Raiders), Drew Brees (New Orleans Saints) and Ryan Tannehill (Tennessee Titans).
Tannehill, oddly enough, ranked No. 1 overall.
That’s some interesting and predominantly solid company Jones is keeping, but as we noted earlier, none of it will matter unless he can cut down on those turnovers here in 2020.
Still, it’s hard not to be impressed by Jones’ ability to handle the pressure. But we all hope he faces a bit less of it behind a now revamped offensive line.
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