At one point, it almost sounded as if it was a done deal that Daniel Jones will be back with the Giants. Of course, that is not the case, yet, but it sure seems inevitable.
Joe Schoen, having completed his first year as the general manager, responded to a question — Do you view Daniel Jones as a quarterback who can help you win a Super Bowl? — with this:
“We’re happy Daniel’s going to be here,” Schoen said on Monday, before quickly adding, “Hopefully we’re gonna get something done with his representatives. That would be the goal, to build the team around him where he can lead us and win a Super Bowl.”
Building the Giants around Jones, the 25-year old quarterback, is the plan in place for Schoen’s second offseason, his first with a nice amount of salary cap room — around $52 million — to use to improve the roster. He had not previously commented publicly about his intentions with Jones. He observed him in action, on and off the field, as the Giants went 9-7-1 during the regular season, added a 31-24 playoff victory over the Vikings to the list of accomplishments before, as coach Brian Daboll said, “crash landing” in a 38-7 divisional playoff loss to the Eagles.
One day after the Giants were eliminated, Jones said he wanted to return. His rookie deal — the Giants made him the No. 6 overall pick in the 2019 draft — has expired.
“We’d like Daniel to be here,” Schoen said. “He said it [Sunday], there’s a business side to it. We feel like Daniel played well this season, he’s done everything we’ve asked him to do. There’s a business side to it. We haven’t gone down that road yet.”
Schoen was not as encouraging about Saquon Barkley, who is also set to become an unrestricted free agent.
When asked about Barkley, Schoen initially said, “This was a special team, to me, this was my first year, we’d like to have all the guys back, I really would.”
Schoen then pivoted to Barkley.
“Saquon’s a good player and he’s a great teammate,” Schoen said. “I loved getting to know him this season. He’s a guy we’d like to have back. Again, we haven’t had our end-of-season meetings yet.”
There is little doubt the Giants are prioritizing Jones. Barkley’s deal will have to make financial sense.
“We’ve got to operate under the salary cap,” Schoen said. “How are you going to divvy up? We would like to have Saquon back if it works out.”
The Giants and Barkley’s representatives talked about a deal during the bye week but did not come to an agreement on what is believed to be an offer in the neighborhood of $12 million per year.
“We were off on the value,” Schoen said. “We said we would circle back up at the end of the season and continue those conversations, but at that time of year, we weren’t really that close.”
Putting the franchise tag on Barkley would cost about $10.1 million on the salary cap. Barkley said on Sunday he is not trying to set the running back market — that would be the $16 million a year Christian McCaffrey received from the Panthers before he was traded to the 49ers. Still, coming to a multiyear agreement with Barkley could become a sticky situation.
The issue is this: How high is Schoen willing to go on a running back?
“The positional value — we’ll get into how we want to build this team and allocate our resources,” Schoen said. “That’s what it comes down to.”
Jones figures to command a three- or four-year contract for somewhere between $30 million and $35 million per year and the deal could drift a bit higher. Teams can designate players with the franchise tag from Feb. 21 to March 7. The Giants could put the tag on Jones — projected to be $31.7 million — to serve as a placeholder, giving them exclusive negotiating rights with him, if they cannot strike a deal before that. There is virtually no chance Jones plays the 2023 season on the franchise tag.
Jones finished 13th in the league with a quarterback rating of 92.5, a career-high. His interception frequency of 1.1 percent was an NFL-low. He threw only 15 touchdown passes and more quality receivers and tight ends should help inflate that total. His ability to run produced 708 rushing yards and seven touchdowns.
One of Schoen’s first major decisions after he was hired was declining to pick up Jones’ fifth-year option of $22.3 million for the 2023 season. Jones needed to prove he deserved to stay. He did that.
“I don’t know if there was necessarily an ‘ah-ha’ moment or anything like that,” Schoen said. “We just continued to evaluate him throughout the season. I don’t have an exact date or time when we’re like ‘Daniel’s our guy.’ ”
The way this appears to be headed, there will be an exact date when the Giants’ verbal commitment to Jones is stamped official with a financial commitment for 2023, and beyond.