Giants rookie Jaxson Dart betting on himself to have Eli Manning's career (and then some)

New York Times

4 days ago

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — Jaxson Dart just might be The One. The player who might finally save the New York Football Giants from themselves.
The quarterback who can match Eli Manning's standing as the only two-time Super Bowl MVP in franchise history.
Why do I suggest this? As Dart sat in the shade after a hot and sunny opening day of his first NFL training camp, I asked him a question that I thought amounted to an uncontested layup.
Would you sign up for Eli's two championship rings right now and call it a career, or would you decline to put that ceiling on your ambitions and just play it out?
Advertisement
I mean, what 22-year-old kid and 25th overall pick in the draft wouldn't sign up for a pair of Super Bowl rings in advance?
'Eli is an incredible player,' the rookie answered. 'He's a future Hall of Famer, and it would be a privilege to have a career like that.'
And then Dart took that layup and turned it into a rim-rocking dunk.
'But if somebody asked me that question, I'm going to tell them I'm going to bet on myself,' he said. 'And I see a bright future here of us winning a lot of games and us playing at the highest level.
'I'm going to bet on myself with that answer.'
As it turns out, the Ole Miss quarterback who broke Manning's records in college believes he's capable of breaking Eli's records in the pros.
The Giants need Dart and his extreme confidence in the worst possible way. They are 53 games under .500 since Manning beat Tom Brady and Bill Belichick for the second time in the Super Bowl in February 2012. The Giants have a grand total of one playoff victory — one! — over the last 13 seasons, and they are coming off a 3-14 season that followed a 6-11.
Russell Wilson deserves to be respected as a former Super Bowl champ who remains a competent starter in the league. But the handoff will be made at some point. The whole Giants operation teeters on the right shoulder of young Mr. Dart, who is fearlessly embracing every hope and expectation you can throw at him.
'Ever since I was a kid, that was something that enticed me; I wanted to play on the biggest stages in the biggest moments,' Dart said. 'I want to feel that pressure. It's addicting, being able to get that adrenaline, being able to slow the whole game down and execute something in front of a lot of people. It's almost like modern-day gladiators. It's definitely exhilarating and you live for that.
'I just think (New York) is a really unique place, and you never want to think that you're bigger than anybody else, and you want to be able to rally a community. You saw it with the Knicks this year and what they did in the playoffs, and you got to see the support and the fans in the streets. That's what I want to be a part of. I want to celebrate with the city and New Jersey as well.
Advertisement
'If you want to be the best, you have to be elite at the (quarterback) position. People are just looking for answers and they're looking for some hope, and that's what I feel like I can be here.'
Dart praised Wilson and Jameis Winston for being great role models and for forming what he called 'an amazing room' of quarterbacks. But everyone knows the deal here. The Giants are facing the league's toughest schedule, and coach Brian Daboll and general manager Joe Schoen are facing certain termination if the season goes sideways AND Dart doesn't look like the answer (or at least the future answer) when he inevitably gets the ball.
Funny how things work out. In the context of a franchise reboot, Arch Manning was once the faraway dream of Giants fans and executives.
Arch is a Giants quarterback out of central casting, even before he opens his first season as a full-time starter at Texas. His game includes traits of the three men to win championships for the Giants in the Super Bowl era.
Arch has Uncle Eli's bloodlines and poise.
He has Phil Simms's toughness.
He has Jeff Hostetler's wheels.
But in the business of low-level football, it's impossible to line up your lousiest season with the upcoming draft that could provide you with the perfect franchise player. And even when the fates do align, well, Bill Parcells refused to guarantee Tennessee's Peyton Manning that he would take him No. 1 overall for the Jets in 1997 (Parcells was afraid the league would find out he encouraged the junior to leave school), Manning stayed in Knoxville, and the 1-15 Jets picked Keyshawn Johnson instead.
Things happen. Though the Giants would have traded last season's 3-14 record for a future 2-15 and a chance to draft the nephew of Eli and Peyton in 2026 or — if Arch follows his uncles' lead and remains in college for four years — 2027, the game just isn't played that way.
Advertisement
The team needed a young quarterback ASAP, which brings us to the next best thing to another Manning in New York: Dart, a graduate of the Manning Passing Academy and Ole Miss, the school that produced Eli and his father Archie, the patriarch of football's first family.
'Archie is awesome,' Dart said. 'Archie has been a huge asset of mine. I knew him before I knew Eli, and quite honestly, when I first got to Ole Miss, I talked to Archie a little more than Eli.'
Speaking by phone the other day, Archie weighed in with one piece of advice for the quarterback destined to take his son's old job.
'If I was him,' Archie said, 'I would follow Eli's path in New York of just laying low with the media, laying low with his comments. That's what I tell my grandson Arch when he does interviews. Less is best. And I especially believe that when you're just getting started, because the transition to the NFL is really big.'
DAY ONE ENERGY 📈 pic.twitter.com/VRbZPS0OaV
— New York Giants (@Giants) July 23, 2025
It doesn't seem too big for Dart, who, for once, doesn't appear inclined to take Archie's advice.
In fact, Dart said he plans on taking Eli's advice of embracing the market and everything that makes it unique. The rookie calls himself 'a relationship person.' On his first minicamp presser in May, Dart said he took the uncommon approach of asking media members to identify themselves because he wants to get to know the people asking him questions 'so I can build a trust with them.'
This guy gets it.
Now, when he'll get the ball is the million-dollar question. As a rookie in 2004, Eli sat behind veteran Kurt Warner for nine games before taking over. Manning was dreadful in his early starts before finally looking competent in his final few.
In his first year with the Giants, Tom Coughlin didn't have to worry about how awful the No. 1 overall pick looked back then. Eli couldn't get him fired if he tried.
Advertisement
Twenty-one years later, Dart and Daboll are in a much different position. Same for Schoen.
This is the sole reason Daboll and Schoen didn't get run out of their jobs after last year's debacle: John Mara, team president and co-owner, was tired of firing people. He preferred to give his coach and GM a shot with a new quarterback after sticking too long with another regime's failed QB, Daniel Jones.
If the Giants turn to Dart in the middle of the season, and he looks the way Eli looked out of the gate, everyone is getting fired … except for Dart.
And then he'll be a leftover quarterback for a new coach/GM partnership that has no allegiance to him.
So the stakes were sky high for everyone as the Giants opened their training camp Wednesday. Daboll, former offensive coordinator in Buffalo, waved from the field in the direction of some fans before one of them shouted, 'He's going to turn Dart into the next Josh Allen.'
A few minutes later, another fan in the same area cried, 'We need to win. I'm tired of losing.'
Dart completed his first couple of passes in a 7-on-7, including a touchdown to fellow rookie Cam Skattebo. He later rolled left on a misdirection boot to find Theo Johnson for an 11-on-11 score.
Jaxson Dart hits Cam Skattebo in the end zone! pic.twitter.com/vgYA3jbIv5
— Giants Videos (@SNYGiants) July 23, 2025
In between the touchdowns, Dart drew gasps from the crowd when he tried to beat Nic Jones in traffic, only for Jones to intercept the pass for a pick six.
'That's just the closing speed of the NFL,' Dart explained. 'You do your best to try to get used to it because there are a lot of really, really good athletes out here. … It's definitely something to learn from.'
The kid isn't afraid to get better. He was under-recruited in high school before forcing his way to USC and then to Ole Miss for a chance to compete in the nation's best conference, the SEC. Dart wasn't supposed to be a first-round pick in the spring, but he willed that into existence too.
Advertisement
'I saw a lot of things that (Giants) fans wanted a lot of different people in the draft, even out of my draft class,' Dart said. 'People here want to win more than anything. It's different here, and when that (quarterback) piece was missing, obviously the most important piece of the team, you have to fill that role.'
Dart is placing a big bet on himself to be The One. On the first day of his first NFL training camp, he wasn't ready to settle for a career defined by two Super Bowl victories, never mind one.
From the sound of it, Jaxson Dart is exactly what the sadsack Giants need.