INTO THE SUNSET
Clock ticking on Giants’ Eli Era
As training camp approaches next week, Post NFL columnist Steve Serby looks at the biggest characters in the world of the Jets and Giants.
THIS isn’t 2004, and it isn’t 2017, and it won’t be Ben McAdoo deciding to take a look at Geno Smith at the end of a nightmare of a Giants season. This is 2019, and a reeling franchise has put Eli Manning on notice by finally launching a succession plan that will usher in the Daniel Jones Era — sooner rather than later if Manning doesn’t remember how to win football games. Welcome to Eli’s Last Stand. The elephant in Manning’s Big Blue room is no longer David Carr or Ryan Nassib, no longer Smith or Davis Webb or Alex Tanney or Kyle Lauletta.
It is Daniel Jones, No. 8, the sixth pick of the 2019 draft.
“I don’t feel like it’s a competition,” Manning said recently.
No matter what coach Pat Shurmur decides to call it when training camp begins, it is now obvious that as much as the Giants are looking for a soft landing for their beloved twotime Super Bowl champion, they have finally recognized that winning that elusive fifth Lombardi Trophy means the winning-isn’t-everything-it’s-the-only-thing approach trumps any and all sentimentality.
Even in the unlikely event the Giants make a playoff run, it is mandatory that Jones plays come hell or high water, because having him rot on the sidelines without getting him prepped for 2020 would be negligent ... far more negligent not to get the kid invaluable experience than it was not letting Webb play two years ago.
A prideful Manning will report in great shape, with great purpose, and a 38year-old right arm he still believes in. Eli versus Time.
A second year in Shurmur’s offense and an upgraded offensive line can only help Manning, but he will miss Odell Beckham Jr.’s dynamic, game-changing gifts more than anyone in general manager Dave Gettleman’s homogenized locker room will be willing to admit.
Gettleman publicly applauding Manning’s career-high completion percentage last season was both a pat on the back to the franchise icon and a smoke screen designed to leave foes and media off the franchise-quarterback trail before the draft.
After going 8-24 over the past two years, ownership and Gettleman decided it was time to stop kicking the can down the road. Gettleman’s Giants legacy hinges on whether Jones, a draft-night reach that infuriated too many Giants fans, is the right quarterback. Gettleman either had more of a conviction on Jones than he did on Sam Darnold ... or more of an urgency one year after Barkley.
When Gettleman first arrived, he wouldn’t have minded one bit if John Mara and Steve Tisch called him Gettlemanning. By the end of last season, he was trumpeting a 4-4 second half following a 1-7 first half and finishing as the highest-scoring team in the division with Manning ... while knowing in his heart of hearts that Quarterback of the Future would more likely than not be his top offseason priority.
The Kansas City model, in which Patrick Mahomes sat for 15 games as a 2017 rookie watching Alex Smith get the Chiefs to the playoffs, seems unlikely. If the Giants are who we think they are, and will be, Manning will be the $23.2 million sacrificial lamb until such time as Jones is deemed ready. This could turn out to be the New York Football Giants model, replicating when Kurt Warner started the first nine games in 2004 before Tom Coughlin started the Manning Era.
Shurmur’s cryptic remarks last month about playing the best quarterback is prepping the battlefield and public perception for a change of field generals.
Darnold was the Jets’ Week 1 starter. Baker Mayfield became the Browns’ starter in Week 4. Josh Allen became the Bills’ starter in Week 2. There is already talk of Dwayne Haskins starting Week 1 for the Redskins.
No matter how Gettleman tries to spin it, the Giants are in rebuilding mode with a 38-year-old quarterback. You can’t always have your cake and eat it too. This isn’t about 2019 for the Giants as much as it is about 2020. You don’t need 20/20 vision to see that Daniel Jones will be the Mann.
There will likely be little outrage this time whenever Manning is instructed to pass the torch to Chosen Jones and stand next to Shurmur on the sideline, more likely an acknowledgment that time waits for no man, or Manning.
A summer like no other awaits Eli Manning. Fall guy for the f irst time in his Hall of Fame life.