Giants fans chanted for rookie quarterback Jaxson Dart to play after Russell Wilson’s second interception in Sunday night’s 22-9 home opener loss to the Kansas City Chiefs.
Then they booed when Daboll briefly put Dart into the game and went back to the veteran starter.
“We want Dart! We want Dart!” a large section of MetLife Stadium cheered.
On the visitors’ sideline, Chiefs coach Andy Reid charged Travis Kelce, chest bumped his All-Pro tight end and screamed in his face.
This is what desperate 0-2 teams look like in prime time. Emotions run high when seasons are on the line.
There was a dramatic difference, however, between how the Giants and the Chiefs responded to that adversity on Sunday.
Kansas City (1-2) found solutions to undo their ugly. The Giants (0-3) were their own worst enemy: from a pre-game injury to kicker Graham Gano to a poor offensive game plan and one huge defensive gaffe.
That is what Joe Schoen’s and Brian Daboll’s Giants do, though. They find ways to lose.
They find different ways every week, but it’s always the same result.
The Giants have lost 14 of their last 15 games as a franchise, nine of their last 10 at home, three straight home openers (2023-25) and eight straight to NFC East foes.
Now they’re winless with a full-blown quarterback controversy on their hands and the undefeated Los Angeles Chargers (3-0) on deck.
Meanwhile, Indianapolis quarterback Daniel Jones — whom the Giants gave up on and released last season — is playing like Johnny Unitas for the 3-0 Colts.
This is what co-owner John Mara gets for showing confidence in Schoen and Daboll: more of the same.
Wilson’s offense stunk Sunday night. So did Daboll’s and Mike Kafka’s offensive gameplan.
Wilson was 17 of 29 for 151 yards and two interceptions.
Malik Nabers had no targets on the first 15 plays of the game. He had no catches on three targets through the game’s first three quarters. And he finished with two catches for 13 yards on seven total targets from Wilson.
Gano’s pregame groin injury immediately hamstrung the Giants’ ability to get points on the board when their poor red zone offense couldn’t convert.
It also continued a trend of Daboll’s Giants losing on the margins by failing to have healthy kickers available in critical moments the past three years, from a 2023 overtime loss to the Jets to a 2024 road defeat at Washington.
The end of Sunday’s second quarter, though, reinforced how broken Schoen’s and Daboll’s operation is.
With the game tied 6-6, Patrick Mahomes threw a backwards pass at the feet of running back Isiah Pacheco.
Middle linebacker Bobby Okereke raced to pick up the loose ball, but Mahomes stripped the ball right out of Okereke’s hands to stop the Giants from taking over inside Kansas City’s 10-yard line with 1:24 to play.
Kansas City still punted. But Wilson followed that up with his second interception of the first half on a lollipop into the end zone intended for Nabers with 49 seconds to play.
That allowed Mahomes and the Chiefs to drive downfield for a third Harrison Butker field goal for a 9-6 lead at half – the 10th time that the Giants have trailed at half in their last 12 games.
Then Mahomes came out of the halftime locker room and engineered an 11-play, 74-yard touchdown drive, capped by a 5-yard TD pass to Tyquan Thornton, to take a commanding 16-6 lead with 8:22 to play in the third.
Schoen and Daboll now have to decide whether Wilson is an acceptable starting quarterback for an 0-3 team that is in constant rebuild because this GM and coach don’t know how to build a team that competes.
Making Dart the starter against the Chargers might buy them more time, since their team isn’t able to get any wins to do so.
Then again, if they break glass and go to the rookie as their starting quarterback for good, they’ll have no other recourse to protect their job security if Dart is unable to rescue this disappointing franchise.
This is just more of the same. More losing.
That’s what Mara and the Giants get for running back a 3-14 team into 2025.
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