The New York Giants drafted Andrew Thomas No. 4 overall last season to protect Daniel Jones’ blindside. Unfortunately, this season, because of injuries to both, they only got a handful games together this season, and what they have now will be all thanks to Jones being shut down for the season.
“Daniel is a very talented quarterback, very hard working and a good leader for us. It sucks not being able to finish out the season with him, but definitely you want him to take his health seriously and make sure he's 100 percent before he steps back on the field,” Thomas said Monday of Jones’ situation.
Tough news for the team, but it isn’t affecting them in one way you might think: the Giants have kept preparing the same way every week, ready to protect whomever happened to be under center.
“We prepare the same every week. We have the next man up mentality, like we've had the same issue on the offensive line,” Thomas said. “We've had a lot of injuries, myself being down, some other guys, so our mentality is just whoever's in, do whatever we can to perform the best for the team.”
That said, Thomas is upset for his teammate that his season is now over.
“I didn't know much about the situation with the doctors and like the diagnosis and things of that nature. In my mind, I trust the trainers and the coaches and their decision for whenever he was going to come back,” he said. “But obviously, he's not, so like I said earlier, I just wish him the best getting healthy. He's just one of the hardest workers I know. He loves the game. He loves his teammates, and he goes all out for us, so that's why we try to do our best for him.”
Thomas, who is still battling through injuries of his own, wouldn’t talk too much about college teammate Jake Fromm, saying only that he thought “Jake did good for coming in in a short amount of time that he had” on Sunday.
The quarterback “competition” to replace Jones will go on this week, and while the Giants do have the luxury of seeing the Eagles coming off a very short week due to playing Tuesday night, there’s no time to relax or worry about what’s going on.
“It's definitely something you're not excited about, but we still have a game to play – a division opponent coming up this week, a road game,” Thomas said. “We know what we have to do and the work we have to put in to be prepared for that game.”
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