In 60 gridiron minutes, Daniel Jones has mushroomed into the most important athlete in the most important city in the world. He has risen from punchline and punching bag to the darling of talk shows, Big Blue fans, and football fans who marveled at his storybook performance last Sunday.
And this is why we groaned when the G-Men bagged a halfback so high in last year's draft. Saquon Barkley turned out to have every bit - if not more - of all the sterling qualities projected upon him. From his modesty to his marble-hard physique to his dancer's feet, Barkley is everything you want in a player and a person.
But even as fun and fine-tuned as Barkley is, he was an afterthought after the high-wire win against Tampa last week. In the first half, the world moaned over his twisted ankle. In the second half, we forgot he was missing.
That's the power of the quarterback. Jones turned a gloomy first half into a glorious victory, by the sheer force his F-Bombing will and surprising skill. Jones strutted into a splintered huddle and barked his way into becoming the alpha male.
At the end of the 32-31 shootout with Tampa Bay, a gleeful Barkley, crutches glued under each arm, was hopping around the field to find someone to hug in the aftermath of a game that saved the Giants season and kickstarted a most unlikely career.
Even those of us who chided the Giants for taking Jones - a little-known QB from a basketball school who hardly set the ACC on fire - in this year's draft, were actually proved right in regretting the selection of Barkley in last year's draft.
There's no way, in today's game, a halfback can summon the kind of team-wide excitement and esprit de corps that we saw from those 30 magical moments from Jones. When you need a quarterback, you take him. Unless, of course, you can somehow buy the RB now and put the QB on layaway, as the G-Men may have done.
Just six days ago, Jones was the perfunctory play. He replaced a listless Eli to lead a lifeless team. The Giants had lost their first two games for the sixth time in seven years. And already we were crafting eulogies for a team with two recent Super Bowl wins that now felt centuries old.
And just like that, a hard-charging, hard-throwing, and sleek-running QB can turn an NFL tanker around. And with one home win against the hapless, winless Washington Redskins, Big Blue would be 2-2.
An even record after Week 4 is pretty realistic when you thumb through the numbers. The Redskins are 23rd in total offense and 30th in rushing, with a woeful 48 yards on the ground per game, and a Mesozoic Adrian Peterson in the backfield. On defense, they hemorrhage 402.7 yards per contest, including 142 yards rushing, fifth-worst in the league. 94 points they've allowed are tied with the Giants for the second most in the NFL through three games.
After three weeks we thought the Giants and Redskins would both be 0-3, battling to post a crooked number in the win column. But with their shiny new toy under center, the Giants have the aura of a team reborn.
Maybe the Giants, mired in years of 0-2 starts and visits from the grim reaper well before Halloween, got it right. Maybe they got their all-world runner and high-grade passer while passing on the players we thought they should pick. Maybe Dave Gettleman, with all his ham-handed pressers and generous self-appraisals, is better at this GM thing than we thought.
Either way, Daniel Jones has owned the back page and bold ink in a way none of us imagined. One game is not a career make, but if Jones keeps this up, we cynics will see the wisdom of passing on a QB last year while gorging on some humble pie before the QB they grabbed this year.
Twitter: @JasonKeidel
