Giants Ripped for 'Wild' Daniel Jones Contract by NFL Exec; 'Better Off' with Saquon

You aren't alone if you thought the New York Giants overpaid to keep starting quarterback Daniel Jones.

"They would have been better off doing a bad deal with Saquon Barkley and [franchise] tagging Jones rather than the other way around," an NFL executive told The Athletic's Mike Sando. "Who was going to step out and pay Daniel Jones? That one was wild."

On March 7, New York agreed to a four-year, $160 million extension with Jones, which gave the team the flexibility to use the non-exclusive franchise tag on Barkley.

The broad logic behind the plan made sense. A long-term extension for a quarterback is a better value play than giving a running back a big contract.

But Jones is earning an average of $40 million annually despite having one good season in four years, and his 2022 campaign arguably wasn't even enough to put him into the elite tier of QBs. He threw for 3,205 yards and 15 touchdowns and ran for 708 yards and seven scores.

Of course, pointing to the overall total of Jones' contract is a bit of a misnomer. He got $92 million guaranteed, and New York has a fairly easy out in 2025 if he regresses. The organization could designate him as a post-June 1 cut that offseason and save $30.5 million, with $9 million in dead money on the books for each of the next two years.

Still, you can't help but wonder whether the front office was bidding against itself and might have actually saved some money by allowing Jones to hit the open market or placing the franchise tag on him and going from there.