How Daniel Jones Must Get Better in Year 2

Daniel Jones had a decent rookie season, but he still has a lot of work to do this off-season to take his game to the next level. With an assist from his college coach and mentor, David Cutcliffe, here is a look at what Jones needs to focus on.

Sixteen NFL seasons is a long time for anyone to remain active, let alone a quarterback trying to play at a high level.

But like so many other lessons he has shared with his teammates, Eli Manning's 16-year NFL career has given Daniel Jones, his successor, something to aim for not just in terms of length, but more so in terms of production.

"You know, Daniel, all season when we talked, could not say enough about Eli," said David Cutcliffe, who coached Jones at Duke and Manning years earlier at Ole Miss.

"He, he's a fast study. He knew to take advantage. We talked a lot about that. So there's a lot of lessons that Eli Manning taught him that will be with him his entire career."

Since the 2019 season ended, Jones has been in North Carolina working with Cutcliffe on preparing to take his game to the next level.

Cutcliffe has liked what he's seen of Jones' work ethic at the pros. He shared that when he and Jones were flying to New Jersey to attend Manning's retirement press conference, Jones, instead of sitting back and enjoying the flight, was hard at work, asking questions and studying diagrams.

"I love that," Cutcliffe said. "I don't know if you've noticed, but any time these guys get up there, they always talk about their work ethic, and rightfully so," Cutcliffe said.

"Daniel has that; he's got these physical skills. He looks like a quarterback. He is a quarterback, but what separates these guys is the ability to work every day with an increased focus every day. It can't be what it was yesterday; it's getting better every day."

Although Cutcliffe declined to get into specifics as to what Jones was working on, here are just a few based on his rookie year performance. (Unless otherwise noted, stats and advanced metrics are from the 2019 Pro Football Focus Quarterback Annual.)

Ball Security

One of the most obvious areas Jones has targeted has been ball security, a glaring hole in his game last season where he lost the handle on 17 balls (most of which while as a runner), 11 of which were recovered by the other team.

But those numbers don't tell the full story. Approximately 33% of Jones' plays were turnover worthy, meaning that were it not for some external factor (a dropped pass by a defender, a penalty, etc.), Jones' turnover rate might very well have been higher.

Processing Time

According to PFF, 71% of Jones look distributions were his first read, with 67% of his throws made to that read having an accuracy rate of 56%.

These stats aren't too surprising as coming from Duke, the majority of Jones' throws required only one read. As he progresses in the NFL, he's going to have to be able to go through multiple reads.

Not surprisingly, this is a trait that Hall of Fame quarterback Kurt Warner observed is a critical element in Jones' development.

“There were a lot of times (when) it seemed like it was tough for him to see, process information, and react to it,” Warner said last week at the Super Bowl, per NJ Advance Media. "That’s what you see with a lot of young quarterbacks. It’s really hard to practice that. That’s where he needs to make the biggest strides.”

Release Time

People will look at the 38 sacks Jones absorbed and likely blame the offensive line for playing so poorly. However, not all the sacks and pressures jones took were the faults of the five blockers. Jones must take his share of the blame, especially during those times when he held the ball too long while waiting to make a play.

Last year, Jones averaged 2.85 seconds from dropback to attempt, the 13-longest average time among quarterbacks.

Breaking down that number even further, when Jones held the ball for 2.6 seconds or more, he completed 47% of his pass attempts versus the 53% he completed when he took 2.5 seconds or less to throw the ball.

While that in itself isn't a cause for concern, that Jones' pass attempts mainly came on his first read is a concern. Per PFF's 2019 Quarterbacks Annual, Jones threw to his first read on 67% of the pass attempts, only going to his next read on 13%.

The Deep Ball 

 Any lingering post-draft questions about Jones' arm were immediately put to rest when he demonstrated an ability to sling the deep ball. 

According to PFF, Jones completed 16 of 54 deep pass attempts (20 or more yards) with three drops and four interceptions to nine touchdowns, an adjusted deep completion percentage of 35.2%, which put Jones 20th out fo 23 quarterbacks with at least 50 deep dropback attempts. 

That breaks down to 33.3% of Jones' interceptions and 37.5% of his touchdowns coming on deep pass attempts.

The Bottom Line: The Arrow is Pointing Upward

For anyone expecting Jones to be the second coming of Eli Manning in his prime, that wasn't going to happen.

Just about every look Jones saw when under center was brand new to him, and the speed of the game took some getting used to. But the good news is that Jones is a fast study, as Cutcliffe said, and the coach believes that Jones showed the requisite mental and physical toughness to take his lumps as part of his NFL initiation.

"They're going to be tough days, but guess what? That's what the NFL is all about," Cutcliffe said.

"But Daniel, he'll be all right. I wouldn't want him to be here (in New York) if I didn't know he wasn't tough enough. Well, he's tough enough, for sure, and I can't wait to watch him become that man I know he's going to become. I'm convinced he's going to have a great long career here and that I can remain a New York Giants fan."