New York Giants vs Minnesota Vikings: Reality check for Daniel Jones

Minnesota cannot afford another L

It is not because there would be the end of the world if they fall to 2-3, after the first five games. There is still a lot of football left to be played until the end of the regular season. It's more because it seems like the atmosphere in the Vikings locker room is pretty tense at the moment. After losing to Chicago Bears, a lot of criticism fell on Kirk Cousin's shoulders and his inability to make things happen in the passing game. Adam Thielen had a pretty harsh response after the game, commenting that. Stefon Diggs was absent from practice this week for reasons that were not injury-related. Rumors around the league were saying that he is unhappy about the way coaching staff is using him this year and he wants out.

If you ask me, Mike Zimmer should take the blame for all of this. Last year, their passing offense was doing pretty well. Both Thielen and Diggs were having a great season. But Zimmer was unhappy about the playcalling that was not run-heavy enough. In my opinion, John DeFilippo was doing the right thing. That OL was not good enough to dominate in a run-heavy offense. Instead, his offense was highlighting his best playmakers and help set up everything else when the defenses started to cheat towards their receiving duo. Zimmer fired DeFilippo after that loss in Seattle, replacing him with Ken Stefanski. They are struggling to get their passing game going now, while DeFilippo is doing a great job with a 6th-round rookie Garden Minshew II, in Jacksonville.

Danny Dimes

You can't get a nickname like this after just two starts if you're not doing something right. Giants were criticized for reaching in this year's draft and taking Daniel Jones 6th overall, but so far he is proving them right. After replacing Eli Manning as a starting QB in Week 3, he led his team to 2 wins in a row. There is a lot of excitement surrounding the organization at the moment and it seems like every other position group on the team raised the level of their game. Obviously, they are impressed by Jones' potential and believe that he can lead them to the promised land.

But, I'd still be cautious before trusting him vs elite defensive units and Vikings are certainly one of them. I'm not very fond of Zimmer as a head coach, but he is brilliant when it comes to coaching up defenses and scheming against opposing offenses. They will disguise coverages and where the pressure is coming from, which should throw Jones off. Some advanced metrics are showing that a high percentage of his throws in the previous two games was in tight coverage. It shows that he's accurate and can throw into tight windows, but will also give an opportunity to Vikings' corners to make a play on the ball. Something that they are pretty good at.

Vikings vs Giants best bet

Even though I think there will be some solid spots to go against Minnesota later, I believe this is not one of them. The defense should force a couple of turnovers and create some short field situations for their offense and help them out. Also, the struggles of the Vikings' offense happened against two pretty tough defenses. In the other two games, they were doing just fine. Giants' defense, despite raising the level of their game is not capable to rattle Cousins the way Bears did it last week. Laying 6 points on the road is not something you should do very often when betting the NFL, but I think that Minnesota wins easily in this one. The defense should dominate and once Giants are playing from behind and become one-dimensional offensively, this game could turn ugly for them.