Washington Football Team backup quarterback Taylor Heinicke might just cost Daniel Jones his starting job.
If Jones gets outplayed by Heinicke In tonight’s Thursday Night Football matchup in Washington on national television, he may never be able to recover the narrative on his career.
While Jones is undefeated against the WFT in his three-year run so far, the task won’t be easy for him, because he’s going up against a Washington defense that has a front seven anchored by Chase Young and Jonathan Allen — who relish getting after the passer.
Heinicke has proven that he can step up during big moments. Everyone remembers the performance he had against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers defense in the playoffs last season. He was a few plays away from beating the eventual Super Bowl champs.
When he came in for Ryan Fitzpatrick against the Chargers in the first game of the 2021 season, he completed 11/15 passes for 122 yards and a touchdown. Heinicke left that game with a passer rating of 119.3.
He’s playing against a Giants defense tonight that gave up over 420 yards of total offense in their first matchup against the Broncos. Teddy Bridgewater completed 77 percent of his passes and threw for two touchdowns in the matchup. While that isn’t Jones’ fault, it means the play on his side of the ball has to be better than his pedestrian Week 1 performance of 267 yards and one TD on 22-for-37 passing.
The odds of Heinicke making Jones look pretty bad tonight are very high. For the sake of Jones’ career, he needs to play well on this stage. A poor performance in front of the nation will only up the pressure on the Giants organization to make a change at the most important position on the field. Journeyman Mike Glennon would be the next available option.
Tonight is huge for Jones — he may not be able to save his career tonight, but he definitely could watch it falter.
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