The Giants’ fork-in-the-road moment involving Saquon Barkley came nearly 18 months ago, when they re-signed Daniel Jones and slapped the franchise tag on their Pro Bowl running back minutes before the tag deadline. Another round of negotiations did not produce a deal, eventually leading the former Offensive Rookie of the Year to Philadelphia.
Jones’ four-year, $160MM deal — one that includes a fully guaranteed 2024 salary — changed the Giants’ path with Barkley, as could be expected. GM Joe Schoen expanded on that during the debut episode of HBO’s offseason Hard Knocks effort. As Giants front office staffers met with the third-year GM about Barkley’s status before free agency, Jones’ deal came up with regards to the team’s interest in paying Barkley.
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“We have to upgrade the offensive line and you’re paying [Jones] $40MM, and it’s not to hand the ball off to a $12MM back,” Schoen said (h/t Ryan Dunleavy of the New York Post). “My plan is to address the offensive line at some point here in free agency. We’re sitting at 6, there’s a chance there’s an offensive weapon there. This is the year for Daniel.”
After skimping on guard investments last year, the Giants did beef up their O-line by signing Jon Runyan Jr. to a three-year, $30MM deal and adding Jermaine Eluemunor at two years and $14MM. Both are expected to start at guard, provided Evan Neal‘s rehab process concludes on time and his comeback bid at right tackle commences. They will be blocking for Jones and Devin Singletary, the Giants’ post-Barkley plan who had pre-Giants ties to Schoen and Brian Daboll from the parties’ Buffalo years.
Barkley said in the spring the Giants were not among the four teams who submitted an offer. In a meeting with John Mara earlier this year, Schoen said an offer in the Giants’ ballpark would run the risk of disrespecting the player who had operated as the team’s offensive centerpiece.
“We’re not gonna franchise him. It doesn’t make any sense to franchise him,” Schoen told Mara. “What are we really gonna get unless it got down to $7MM? I don’t want to offer that because I don’t want to be like we ‘disrespected him.’ There’s 31 teams and it only takes one to maybe be open to doing something. If it doesn’t get to that then, hey, we’re going to let you hit free agency. Find out your market, come back and let us know if we can match it. If we can, we’ll have those discussions.
“Daniel’s making a lot of money and it’s the fork. We have to figure out, is he the guy, so we have to protect him. We need to put resources there. … We’ll have to find a running back, but upgrade the offensive line and give him a chance.”
Mara still acknowledged that “in a perfect world” he would like to re-sign Barkley, whom the Giants began negotiations with during their 2022 bye week. The partnership, however, ended with the Penn State alum’s three-year, $37.75MM Eagles deal. After the Giants offered a guarantee in the $22MM neighborhood in July 2023, Barkley will end up pocketing $36.1MM guaranteed between his New York franchise tag and Philly guarantee at signing.
Schoen and his staff pondered the merits of a tag-and-trade move, with Schoen and assistant GM Brandon Brown coming out against due to the $12MM cap hold and trade compensation the latter expected to be low. Giants staffers wondered how big of a gap existed between teams’ RB valuations of a crowded market. Director of pro scouting Chris Rossetti did seem to suggest a value gap existed between Barkley and the other FA backs, pointing to a potential trade market being there in the event the Giants did re-tag the two-time Pro Bowler. This turned out to be an appropriate debate, as a gulf did emerge.
After Barkley’s $26MM full guarantee, no other back received more than $14MM locked in at signing (D’Andre Swift). At the Combine, Schoen called the franchise tag a tool the Giants could use. It does not appear they seriously considered it.
During his conversation with Mara, Schoen did seem to underestimate teams’ interest in adding veteran RBs by indicating the second week of free agency should still feature some quality backs. Day 1 of the tampering period produced a wave of RB deals — for the likes of Barkley, Singletary, Swift, Josh Jacobs, Tony Pollard, Austin Ekeler among the signees — as the bulk of the starter-level players committing to teams within hours of the market’s unofficial opening. The Giants did not end up waiting, locking down Singletary on a three-year, $16.5MM deal ($9.5MM fully guaranteed) less than an hour after the Barkley-to-Philly news broke.
Barkley’s age (27) factored into the Giants’ interest in another deal as well, with Schoen referencing the RB’s college carry total (671) with new 49ers staffer Frank Gore as further reasoning (h/t The33rdTeam.com) for the team’s hesitancy to pay him. Although Singletary is only seven months younger, he has logged 1,063 career touches to Barkley’s 1,489. Barkley reached that total despite missing 24 games due to injury from 2019-23.
Committed to Jones for 2024 (but not any longer, per the QB’s guarantee structure), the Giants are stuck with the 2019 first-round pick. Nearly a year and a half after the team’s Jones-or-Barkley decision, the team’s big-picture choice will play out in the NFC East this season.
Pandering to the New York Sports Media who are constantly bellowing “It’s All About The QB!” is how you finish bottom of the NFC East.
I mean, prioritizing QB is absolutely reasonable, especially compared to RB. The problem was prioritizing QB by taking a guy who’d just had a career year and paying him $92 million in guarantees like they were positive he was going to be even better than that outlying year going forward.
Jones can be a serviceable, middle of the road NFL QB. NYG can’t really expect to get anything better for a while. In their case, pay the QB and upgrading the OL makes sense.
That still doesn’t make $92 million for Jones seem like a reasonable idea. As for the O-line, man has Neal set them back by being so horrible.
Fair, but Barkely’s not much more easily predictable. In Philly, he should share the load much more, and likely with a better line. It’ll be a better move for him, and he’ll produce as such. In New York, it’d bd difficult to guarantee that he finishes those games.
I believe that New York made Barkely offers that he did not like before they pivoted to Jones. Jones’ contract probably ages better than Saquon’s though, hypothetically. While QB contracts have gone up, leaving $40 million or so further behind, a $12 million or so running back deal would still be top of the market. Today, not counting his eventual deal, that Barkley pact would be fourth. Today, Jones is tied for twelfth (Stafford and Prescott being the other two). I do think that Schoen should be held at fault for severely underestimating the running back market. I know that they planned to draft Brooks, but letting Barkley walk and scrambling to sign a journeyman as an unexpected option was poor planning.
As far as “picking” Jones goes…Barkley is of course better at his respective job than Jones is, but between his availability and the impact of a quarterback versus other players, I can’t have too much of an issue with how New York picked one over the other. Neither really are good, solid picks to star for a full season, but neither are bad or unreliable enough to ignore. The offensive line right now still is not ready-and despite every strategy undertaken by New York, of which there have many, it hasn’t been set. That issue predates this regime (Nate Solder, anyone?), back to the last few Manning seasons, but recent developments (Neal being a big one, as Oof alluded to) have not been favorable. You may has well try to fix it now, since Barkley is gone and it’d be a shame to waste another fresh start behind a terrible line.
The counter point, of course, is if you’re okay with those deals, why not offer Barkley $12 million to play (maybe they did, I just know that he didn’t like whatever offer they made-and maybe his expectations were actually too high, who knows). I’d say, if tgat were thd case, a placeholder quarterback makes more sense than a placeholder runningback-though I don’t think that the Giants were planning to have placeholders. They thought that they could build off that year. We’ll see, but it looks difficult-particularly because of that line. If Jones bounces back and improves (like, say, throwing 25 touchdowns at least), then it’s great. If not, your next quarterback won’t have to go through what he did…and Barkley did as well. I’d say that they screwed up a bit, the biggest mistake being undervaluing this past RB market, but none of the options were really going to end well here.
To be clear, I’m judging the Jones deal on its own terms. I don’t think they should have given huge money to Barkley either. I think that only makes sense for a win now team at this juncture. However, I would have franchised Jones if necessary instead of giving him that deal and tried to work out a deal with Barkley. There’s no reason to franchise a running back in this day and age.
I think that that was the first inclination. Barkley apparently balked. Schoen, as I said, underestimated the market for a star back, and as such pivoted completely to Jones. That’s why I say that I think that Schoen’s underevaluation of the back market was the biggest mistake. Now, giving money to Barkley on that scale is still very risky, but I do think that your suggestion would have been more prudent-dependant on the condition that the Giants built their o-line successfully. Throwing a rookie behind that after Jones’ tag ran out would have likely ruined him, too.
Imagine if Barkley rushes for 1200 yards and 13 TDs lol
Well, he’s going to have about 300 of those yards in the 2 games against the Giants. I’m betting that he has those dates etched in cement. Heck, I’m not a fan of either team and I might want to watch those games.
Could just happen lol
If he can play in the games. Lots of injuries in his career.
Barkley rushing for 1200 with 13 TD’s is very possible with the eagles. Not likely with the giants.
I think that there’s a high chance that he plays better in Philly anyway. Less of a load to shoulder, better line, more established offense. It would be odd to see Barkley do worse, provided that he isn’t injured.
It’s easy to imagine Barkley rushing for 1200 yards and 13 TDs. It’s also easy to imagine him missing 10 games. And while it’s easy to imagine him helping to elevate a team from 11 wins to 12, it’s hard to imagine him elevating a 6 win team to 9.
That’s a lot of imagines haha
IF he can stay on the field.
I don’t understand how they can’t afford to pay Jones 40 mil and Barkley 12mil when the Eagles are paying Jalen 50mil, Barkley 12.5, have a premier tackles and paying 2 #1 WRs. Is the Giants just bad at managing the cap??
Would have to look at the whole picture and the breakdown and salary restructures. Plus don’t forget Giants are also paying big money to Lawrence, Burns, and Thomas
It sounds like the Giants didn’t expect a $12+ million a year offer for a veteran running back with injury issues this past year. Schoen seemed surprised by that. And the Panthers probably swooped in and drafted his transition plan in Johnathon Brooks…
Daniel Jones has a cap number of almost $48 million this year. Hurt is about $13.5. The Jones contract is a mess. The Eagles are also very, very good at managing the cap, which is in part due to having a GM with great job security and ownership that doesn’t mind cash spending on dead cap, so they can strategically spread out money. The Giants are also spending top of the market money on two defensive linemen in addition to a top ten pick, while the Eagles took care of business with their tackles a while ago.
While it’s probably more than Jones was worth, it’s not THAT much of a mess. They’ll be clear of it after this year, which is less time than most deals. If the Giants were ready to support a new QB these past two years I would be more against it. But seeing as their line and receivers have both been stagnant, I’m not sure that they would have gained much. If Nabers ends up being what we expect, the approach would have paid off in one part because he’ll offer the next QB (or a developed Jones, which may not happen) more than what Jones had when he began.
Now if only Neal and JMS can block better than holograms.
We’ll probably have to wait to see that one. I loved the pick when they made it, but I was very wrong about Neal. I feel badly for Giants fans to finally get the pick they “needed” and then have it be so wrong.
The entire Giants strategy seems to consist of trying to keep pace with the bad decisions the Jets make.
Aaron Rodgers isn’t the best player on the Jets by far, yet the New York Sports Media froth at the mouth over him like the mouth-breathing a$$holes who constitute the audience.
The Giants have always had gentle treatment in the New York Sports Media even in their derp moments. It may take a full-scale collapse on the level of the 2023 Patriots to change that.
Is this news? These Giant’s “updates” are seen by millions who watch Hard Knocks.
The Giants have made some horrible moves. If they took the capital they spent on Burns and spent it on an actual receiver like Aiyuk, maybe Jones could actually do something. His per-game stats aren’t terrible and are actually really good considering how little talent he has had catching the ball from him.