FOXBORO, Mass. – Daniel Jones was not up to date with the other Jones. There were some significant differences with the two quarterbacks on Wednesday as the Giants and Patriots clashed and the heat intensified in a joint practice.
There were two adjacent fields. On the one hand, the offense of Daniel Jones and the Giants was against the defense of the Patriots, headlines against headlines. On the other side, rookie Mac Jones led the Patriots ’offense against the Giants defense. Two fields, two led by Jones, two different results in a 91-degree day.
“Yeah, a little up and down,” Daniel Jones said. “I did some plays, I didn’t do some things very well. We need to look at some things and clean them up. Sometimes that’s the practice, you have to be able to move on. “
The Giants have to get there and get there by September 12th and the real thing, the opening of the regular season against the Broncos, looks much better on offense than they have shown so far this summer.
There is no doubt that the absences of receivers Kenny Golladay, Kadarius Toney and John Ross, who deal with hamstring problems, and the tight Kyle Rudolph – who withdrew from the list physically unable to run on Wednesday after the foot surgery – significantly reduces the quality of the passing game. And, of course, Saquon Barkley has not participated in any live drills that come from ACL surgery. So this is hardly an appearance of the firepower that the giants hope to put on the field when all the sick are healed.
However, the whole operation must be collected.
Daniel Jones threw touch-back-to-back passes to tight end Evan Engram in a 7-on-7 period, but failed to get the Giants into the end zone in the next session.
In the first period of the team, Jones completed a pass to Darius Slayton, had to throw the ball down and run when no one opened and then looked for Slayton in the middle, but was intercepted by defensive end Kyle Dugger : the ball goes directly into his hands.
In a series of two-minute drills, Jones started strong, connecting twice with Slayton before throwing himself over Sterling Shepard. There was a pass down the closed end Nakia Griffin-Stewart and, to end the “pilot”, a shot at the closed end Jake Hausmann that fell on the grass, with Adrian Phillips for the entire intended goal.
“I felt like we were going out here and competing,” Engram said. “We could compete more. We need to run more.
“I think the most important thing is to start fast, this has been a great goal for us for the last two weeks, start fast and move forward. This has been a big point of emphasis for us. We must continue to improve it and continue to have a more consistent pace and execution.
“I think we started fast, I think we have to continue fast. I think we started quickly and let go a little bit of gas, that we are the ones to find out the mistakes and fix it. “
Another offensive series included a false starting penalty and a pass to Alex Bachman that was deflected. The series ended with Jones in what was basically a throw, shooting the ball over Slayton.
One positive thing that came out of the day: Jones used to have time to scan the field, as the Giants ’offensive line resisted the Patriots’ defensive front.
“I thought we made a few plays, a few plays in the red zone, we were able to move the ball in two minutes,” Jones said. “Some things we need to clean up and some works that we need to look at and correct to move forward.”
Contrast this with what Mac Jones and the Patriots were doing for the formidable Giants defense. At one point, the Alabama rookie had 21 of 23, completing 14 consecutive passes. Mac Jones fell to the NFL draft and the Patriots got him to No. 15. With Cam Newton out of the team after breaking the COVID protocol, it was Mac Jones ’show to show up at the first practice against the Giants. He made the most of it. Newton is expected to return to practice on Thursday, but has a novice ready that poses a challenge for the initial job.
“I didn’t get a chance to see much of his offense,” said Daniel Jones, who asked if he had a vision of Mac Jones in action. “I’m more focused on what we’re doing and I’m trying to prepare for the next series.”
Good plan. There’s a lot that giants need to focus on to get their offense where it needs to be.