Pittsburgh Steelers star T.J. Watt came up with a huge play late in Monday night’s game to help seal a win over the New York Giants, but it turns out he got a huge assist from Daniel Jones.
The Giants were trailing the Steelers 26-18 late in the fourth quarter when Russell Wilson was strip-sacked. New York recovered the fumble at the Pittsburgh 27 with a chance to tie the game, but Watt returned the favor by strip-sacking Jones on the ensuing drive. Watt recovered the fumble himself, essentially ending any chance of a Giants comeback.
The big question was how or why New York only used one player to attempt to block Watt off the edge on a 3rd-and-7 play. Giants head coach Brian Daboll revealed in his postgame press conference that Jones blew the protection. The quarterback was supposed to motion for tight end Theo Johnson to shift to the right side to help with Watt.
“It wasn’t a check. He was going, pressure situation, the clock. We had a shift with the tight end to get back over to Watt, and we didn’t get the shift,” Daboll told reporters. “We talked about it in the locker room. DJ feels terrible, to be honest with you. I know he’s gonna own it. It was a shift that was accompanying the play. He was kind of surveying the coverage, deciding what he wanted to do, and we didn’t get the shift.”
Daboll said Jones admitted to the mistake and felt “terrible” about it.
Even former Giants quarterback Eli Manning called the disaster in real time. Before the ball was snapped, Manning said on the “ManningCast” broadcast that the Giants needed to “motion this tight end over.”
Watt is arguably the best defensive player in football. Quarterbacks have to know where he is at all times and adjust accordingly, and Jones failed to do that on a crucial play.
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