Big Blue Quandary

In the post Eli era, the New York Giants are still searching for a worthy QB successor

(The 2018 Daily News back page projected great hope and promise for the Giants after they used their top draft pick to get RB Saquon Barkley. The missing puzzle piece for one more Eli Manning-led Super Bowl run? Didn’t exactly go as planned)

Maybe Russell Wilson will be the quarterback savior for the New York Giants this upcoming 2025 season. Or maybe Jameis Winston will emerge as a Big Blue threat under center and pull a Geno Smith renaissance act in the Big Apple. Or maybe Tommy DeVito…

Yes, Giants fans have been stuck in QB purgatory ever since A.E. – After Eli – when two-time Super Bowl champion Eli Manning retired after the 2019 season. Daniel Jones was already on the roster then, and was hailed as Manning’s successor. The club drafted Jones earlier that year with the sixth overall pick, but the Jones-Giants era, and all its initial promise and optimism, ended with a whimper.

Jones, 27, requested a release last fall and owner John Mara granted the quarterback his wish. Mr. Jones didn’t have to worry about smiling in the bright lights anymore.

Now the Giants turn to Wilson, a former Super Bowl winner with Seattle, but whose star has been on the decline since the Seahawks traded him to Denver in 2022. Wilson was a colossal bust in the Mile High City, and then lasted one season in Pittsburgh.

When Wilson was in Denver, NFL Network host Kyle Brandt famously called the quarterback a “poser” in a 2022 “Good Morning Football” episode. Brandt said that he thought the QB is “one of the least authentic personalities” in the NFL, and that Wilson and his celebrity wife, Ciara, “think they’re Jay-Z and Beyoncé.”

Ouch. But spot on.

https://x.com/KyleBrandt/status/1578347405342539776

Not long after the Giants signed Wilson to a one-year deal, a 2018 video of the quarterback went viral again. In the one-minute clip, Wilson films himself and talks about how “everybody has to have an alter ego,” before announcing that he thinks his other self is, “Mr. Unlimited.”

“I’m un-liiiimmmmited, you know what I mean?” Wilson says with a smirk.

https://www.tmz.com/watch/russell-wilson-mr-unlimited-ciara-1996996-258/

Before the ink was barely dry on his new Giants contract, Wilson was courtside at Madison Square Garden for a Knicks game against the Clippers, seated between his wife and actor Matthew Modine. Wilson sported a baseball cap with the word “Real,” while Ciara’s cap read, “The New York Football Giants.” Both were in Johnny Cash all black attire. Wilson soaked up the klieg lights and tossed a spiral to the fans.

The Giants were reportedly in the hunt for Jets bust Aaron Rodgers at the same time the Wilson rumors started to churn, and you have to wonder if Giants fans were scratching their heads on that strategy.

Rodgers, of course, was the Big Apple man about town two years ago, also sitting courtside at MSG for a Knicks playoff game not long after he was traded to the Jets. Then there was Rodgers attending a Taylor Swift concert at MetLife Stadium with actor Miles Teller. And then there was Rodgers dining at Village hotspot Carbone. Rodgers, 41, was also a regular on the wildly popular “Pat McAfee Show.”

Once his day job began, however, Rodgers lasted four snaps his first season with Gang Green. His second year wasn’t much better, as the Jets stumbled to a 5-12 record. A new Jets front office took over, and Rodgers became the odd man out.

For their sake, Giants fans have to be thankful the club took a pass on a Rodgers flyer. But even the arrivals of Wilson and Winston have not quieted the talk that the Giants will try to snag a quarterback in the upcoming draft. The club has the No. 3 pick, and Hall of Famer Deion Sanders’ son, Shedeur, could be Big Blue’s target. Cam Ward, the University of Miami quarterback, is expected to go No. 1 to the Titans.

Should the Giants use their first-round pick for a QB, well, it could be déjà vu all over again. Back in 2004, the team had signed another Super Bowl winner, Kurt Warner, to a one-year deal. Warner was 33 at the time, and only four years removed from his MVP performance against the Titans in Super Bowl XXXIV, and two years removed from a second Super Bowl appearance, a loss to Tom Brady and Co.

The Giants also drafted Manning in 2004, and Warner only lasted nine games in a Big Blue uniform before he was benched in favor of Manning. Warner never played for the Giants again after that move. Turns out the Manning decision was pretty good.

After two Super Bowl titles, and with Manning’s playing clock winding down, the Giants used their top pick in the 2018 draft to get running back Saquon Barkley. (The team also drafted QB Kyle Lauletta in the fourth round — who?).

Barkley was the possible missing piece for one more Manning-led playoff run? Nope. Barkley tasted the postseason once – with Jones as the starter – but the Giants got bounced by the Eagles in the 2022 divisional round.

Then the Giants let Barkley go in free agency — to the Eagles.

Then they let go of Jones.

Now Giants GM Joe Schoen and coach Brian Daboll roll the dice with Wilson holding the QB reins until further notice.

Your move, Mr. Unlimited.