What Does the Russell Wilson Signing Mean for the Giants?
Just days after signing Jameis Winston, the Giants added quarterback Russell Wilson, who presumably will be the starter for the 2025 season.
While I’ll never say never, this is probably a decent indicator that they won’t be taking a quarterback early in the Draft.
And if that’s the case, I think it’s the right move.
Perhaps the Giants have learned a lesson from what the rival Philadelphia Eagles have done over the last decade.
Philly has made it to three Super Bowls in eight seasons, winning two of them. And they’ve done so with a back-up quarterback in Nick Foles and a player like Jalen Hurts who is a talented runner but somewhat limited as a passer.
The Eagles built strong teams around the quarterback position (particularly in the trenches) that have been able to win without relying on whoever is under center.
It seems like the Giants are pivoting to this approach after plans A and B (Matthew Stafford and Aaron Rodgers) fell through.
They’re likely looking at this year‘s quarterback class, their draft position (they hold the 3rd overall pick), as well as the state of their team, and concluding that it doesn’t make sense to reach for a player just because he’s in a key position of need.
No quarterback is going to come in and be the savior for this team with all of the holes that they have. A rookie quarterback sure as heck isn’t going to solve their problems.
So instead, they’re now aiming to build up the team as much as possible around the quarterback position. Wilson (and Winston for that matter) won’t cost them much long-term and are good stop-gap options that can provide at least a competitive performance at the position.
Joe Schoen and Brian Daboll are hoping that this will help the team show enough progress in 2025 to keep them from losing their jobs.
And now that there is no desperate need at the position this year, the Giants have more options. They can use that 3rd pick to bring in a dynamic pass rusher in Abdul Carter, or select Travis Hunter to pair with Malik Nabers (and potentially have him continue playing both ways).
They could trade down to get more picks and better address the wide variety of holes on the roster. Or they could trade back into the first round to take a quarterback after selecting Carter or Hunter.
Perhaps they wait until the 2nd round or later to take a quarterback and see if they can get lucky like the Seahawks did with Russell Wilson in 2012, and the Cowboys did with Dak Prescott in 2016, and the Eagles did with Jalen Hurts in 2020.
Or perhaps a quarterback they do like falls into their lap with the 3rd overall pick.
Either way, they can be patient and not waste such a valuable piece of team-building capital on a quarterback who might not be worth it.
What Russell Wilson Brings to the Giants
And that brings us to Wilson, who will now get to play his home games in the stadium where he won the Super Bowl back in 2013.
The thing Wilson is most known for at this point in his career is his deep ball - both his desire to throw it as well as his ability to do so:
In his only season in Pittsburgh, Wilson continued to lean on this strength. He finished first in the NFL in both completion percentage (54.0%) and yards per attempt (17.0) on passes traveling 20 yards or more from the line of scrimmage, according to PFF. Both of those were career highs for Wilson.
That Wilson-to-Nabers connection should be fun to watch. And can you imagine Wilson with Nabers and Travis Hunter?
Another area where Wilson doesn’t get quite enough credit is the savvy with which he plays the position. While there are certainly issues with the way he plays from the pocket (we’ll get to that in a bit), he has started 216 NFL games in his career. He’s seen a lot and has the poise to manage most situations. And that does serve him well at times.
That was evident last year on one of the biggest plays of the Steelers’ season.
Trailing 27-21 to the Commanders in Week 10 with just 2-and-a-half minutes remaining, the Steelers faced a 3rd-and-9 from Washington’s 32-yard line.
The Commanders started this snap in a 2-shell look and would ultimately rotate to a cover-1 blitz. That meant man coverage across the board:
