That opinion, though, seems to be written in pencil
The biggest question surrounding the reeling New York Giants right now is whether GM Joe Schoen and head coach Brian Daboll will be the decision-makers in charge of the decision to select or not select the team’s next quarterback in the 2025 NFL Draft.
Sports Illustrated NFL insider Albert Breer believes they will be, even though with the Giants careening toward a 2-15 record and a potential No. 1 overall pick, Breer writes “it’s probably best to wait before saying that with complete certainty.”
Of course it is. As I wrote Monday morning, Daboll is currently auditioning for a fourth season as head coach, and there are arguments to be made for both keeping him and for moving on to a new coach, and possibly a new GM. Tony DelGenio and I spent much of our Monday podcast discussing this topic:
The Giants know, and appear to have known for a while, that their quarterback for 2025 and beyond is not on the current roster. Breer writes:
And the reality is the Giants have been moving on, really, for the balance of the season. Two weeks ago, pictures surfaced of Giants GM Joe Schoen, assistant GM Brandon Brown and director of player personnel Tim McDonnell visiting Colorado practice. The three were in Boulder to get an up-close look at Buffaloes QB Shedeur Sanders on their way to the team’s Thanksgiving game in Dallas.
In a vacuum, it was an opportunity to see Sanders. In reality, it was part of a bigger effort.
The Giants got their high-end evaluators multiple live exposures to seven different college quarterbacks—Sanders, Miami’s Cam Ward, Georgia’s Carson Beck, Texas’s Quinn Ewers, Ole Miss’s Jaxson Dart, Alabama’s Jalen Milroe and LSU’s Garrett Nussmeier—headed into the week they went out to see Sanders in a practice setting. Over Thanksgiving weekend, they sent guys out again to get one last live look during the final full weekend of college games.
So what does this show? To me, it’s two things. First, the Giants were under no illusion that they should bank on Jones breaking through to another level—the way he did in 2022—again, to justify picking up the $30.5 million on his contract for next season. Second, it makes it apparent that the plan has been, as John Mara has said, to stay the course with the current regime and give Schoen and Brian Daboll the chance to draft a quarterback.
Breer, as I have been saying, indicates that it is clear Mara does not want to go through another regime change.
Will they still? It’s a fair question. There are the aforementioned eight consecutive losses, and the lack of a win at MetLife Stadium, a stadium over which some colorful commentary on the team’s season flew Sunday. But there’s also the fact that the Giants have, as I’ve mentioned a few times, pulled the plug quickly three times in the past decade, and the premise that Mara most certainly doesn’t want to do it again.
Anything can happen, of course. Rightly or wrongly, though, I still believe Mara’s preference is to play it all the way out with Schoen and Daboll by giving them a chance to draft their own quarterback.
