Jones has best day of camp yet, and Eli was there to see it
Daniel Jones delivered his best practice of Giants training camp on Tuesday. The fourth-year QB unofficially completed 13 of 17 passes with two touchdowns, two interceptions and three sacks. That included 16 plays of 11-on-11 and four plays of 9-on-9.
As Eli Manning watched practice with Giants brass, Jones threw TDs to camp standouts Richie James and David Sills in the two-minute offense. And he connected on deep shots down the right sideline to Kadarius Toney and Saquon Barkley.
“He’s working hard,” coach Brian Daboll said of Jones. “Look, developing an offense or a defense or a team, let’s just say a team when you’re first starting out as a head coach, a new staff, new players, it takes a lot of work. And we’re still very much still a work in progress.” Jones’ practice still wasn’t perfect. Top corner Adoree Jackson intercepted Jones twice: once by jumping a Toney route in 9-on-9, once in the red zone on an overthrown pass to Wan’Dale Robinson.
The defense also broke through for sacks by Jihad Ward, Julian Love and a split between Kayvon Thibodeaux and Darnay Holmes.
But the ball rarely hit the ground, and that was an important step for Jones given the offense’s slow start to training camp.
Sills, meanwhile, caught a whopping five passes from Jones, including a touchdown to close practice on the left side of the end zone.
Wide receiver Kenny Golladay was given a rest day, affording more first-team snaps for players like Sills, James and C.J. Board.
Daboll also took his team out of pads after just one padded practice Monday, though Tuesday’s hot practice featured a significant workload of snaps.
Golladay would not disclose whether the injury that sidelined him this spring had been from the 2021 season or his early offseason training.
“We’re not gonna talk about all that,” Golladay said.
Ben Bredeson also did well in his first opportunity at first-string center while starter Jon Feliciano remains sidelined by an undisclosed ailment.
Jamil Douglas had struggled enough in previous days to prompt Daboll to play left guard Shane Lemieux in the middle at times. Bredeson was steady Tuesday.
Daboll blew plays dead for sacks when the second-team offense was on the field but didn’t appear to be doing it for the first-team offense.
PRACTICE NOTES
Feliciano and tight end Ricky Seals-Jones sat out a fourth straight practice each. Feliciano was on the field in uniform but worked mostly with the trainers. Daboll said Feliciano is “real close” …
Veteran Andrew Adams is the third safety on the depth chart with rookie Dane Belton (broken collarbone) and Jarren Williams (waived/injured, hamstring) going down. Adams sees work with the first-string defense in dime packages …
Collin Johnson made two big catches downfield on Tyrod Taylor passes, including one touchdown. And Darius Slayton made an excellent, all-hands TD catch over Khalil Dorsey on a Taylor deep pass on a busted play …
Wideout Robert Foster got hurt and carted off after making a deep catch and landing hard out of bounds in the end zone on a Taylor pass. Foster was grabbing his back and then wobbly as he walked before getting on the cart …
Running back Antonio Williams came up lame while running routes in 1-on-1s but returned to practice and continued participating. The running back position is something to watch, especially since the Giants recently worked out free agent Devontae Booker, their best back from 2021 who was released in March …
During a walkthrough period, Daboll showed a play that featured Toney at quarterback, taking a shotgun snap, play action faking to Barkley, and throwing to Robinson ...
Edge Oshane Ximines has had some good pass rushes for the first-string defense with Azeez Ojulari (hamstring) sidelined. But Ximines twice has hit Jones’ legs low in recent practices inadvertently, and it is driving Daboll up a wall. The head coach spoke to both Ximines and edge Niko Lalos about staying off the ground and away from the quarterbacks’ legs on Tuesday..