Big Blue View
Russell Wilson makes the 200th start of his NFL career Sunday against the Washington Commanders, having started every game he has ever played in since being drafted in Round 3 by the Seattle Seahawks in 2012.
As the New York Giants season begins, it is already time to wonder how many more starts Wilson is going to get before the franchise turns the reigns over the Jaxson Dart.
The Giants already listed Dart as QB2 ahead of Jameis Winston on their “unofficial” depth chart for Sunday’s game. Yes, that chart is unofficial. It doesn’t tie the Giants’ hands or mean things will play out exactly the way the chart says they will at every position.
No PR intern, though, is going to stack a piece of information like that, send it to the media and as a result out into the NFL universe, without the head coach of the football team knowing that was about to happen. There’s zero chance that was done on a whim. It is impossible to think the Giants as an organization did not understand the attention that move would get.
I have said again and again that I do not believe the Giants should be in a rush to play Dart. No NFL quarterback has ever been ruined by having to sit, whether for a few games or a few seasons, and wait his turn. Plenty have been ruined by being thrown to the wolves too soon, asked to carry a franchise long before they were ready, or their teams were ready to support them.
Ask Anthony Richardson. Ask Zach Wilson. Ask Sam Darnold. On the flip side, ask Patrick Mahomes if waiting and learning behind a quality veteran was a bad thing.
Wilson is not a great quarterback at this stage of his career. He is, though, still a capable one. He and Winston provide security for Dart, they give the Giants the ability to shield him from the wolves until the young pup is fully ready to defend himself.
Make no mistake, though, it is crystal clear that Giants head coach Brian Daboll — who professes “great appreciation” for Wilson — is itching to turn Dart loose.
Why else would Dart have taken nearly all of the second-team reps, ahead of Winston, since early in training camp? Why else would Daboll spend so much time practically glued to Dart’s hip on the practice field? Daboll’s future employment with the Giants is tied to Dart’s success or failure.
There is no chance Daboll lets the season, and perhaps his one chance to be an NFL head coach, go completely up in smoke without his choice for quarterback of the future getting a chance to do something about either of those. It doesn’t do Daboll any good to draft Dart, work with him, then watch him win for somebody else.
GM Joe Schoen said recently that “the timeline [for Dart] will be the timeline however it works out.”
The clock is ticking.
Dianna Russini of...
