As he so often does, Steelers pass rusher T.J. Watt made a game-changing play in the fourth quarter on Monday night, blowing past Giants right tackle Jermaine Eluemunor, knocking the ball out of Daniel Jones’ hand and jumping on the fumble. And that raises an important question: Why did the Giants have Eluemunor blocking Watt one-on-one in that situation?
The answer is because Jones screwed up, failing to signal to tight end Theo Johnson to go in motion to be on the other side of the line and help Eluemunor with Watt.
Giants head coach Daboll said after the game that Eluemunor was supposed to get help from a chip block on Watt, but a miscommunication resulted in the wrong pass protection being called. Daboll said Jones was supposed to call for Johnson to shift to the other side of the formation to help out with Watt, but Jones never made the call.
“He was supposed to be chipped,” Daboll said. “DJ was looking at the coverage, communication, but Jermaine was anticipating a chip. . . . We had a shift to the tight end to get over to Watt and we didn’t get the shift. . . . DJ feels terrible, to be honest with you. I don’t know if he’s gonna own it. He came up here to say he’d 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.”
Jones did own it.
“I needed to shift, needed to shift Theo,” Jones said. “I was looking at the coverage, didn’t chip him, Jermaine was expecting a chip and didn’t get that, so that was my fault.”
That’s the kind of mistake the Giants just can’t have from their franchise quarterback, and it’s sure to renew calls for the Giants to make the decision now to move on.