Exclusive: 2x Super Bowl champion Phil Simms on Jaxson Dart, John Harbaugh and the Giants prospects

NFL insider Jason La Canfora, on behalf of casino.org, caught up with New York Giants legend, Phil Simms, on the eve of the veterans return to training camp.

Key quotes from Phil Simms:

• “They are going to run the hell out of the ball with Greg Roman.”
• “They know Harbaugh is the man; everyone sits up straight and they’re a little bit nervous.” (when he enters the room)
• On Jaxson Dart: “He makes all the throws. I think he’s the real deal.”

By Jason La Canfora, NFL insider

Like every other New York Giants supporter, legendary quarterback Phil Simms watched the video of running back Cam Skattebo attempting an awkward backflip on a stage – possibly tipsy – not that far removed from season-ending ankle/tibia surgery and held his breath.

It’s been an outsized offseason for this long-suffering franchise with hopes riding on this upstart, rugged running back who quickly outperformed his draft slot and an equally rambunctious, daredevil first-round quarterback in Jaxson Dart who seemed equally hellbent on constant contact and already has a growing medical report as well.

The Giants, in a twist for them, have a rebuild predicated on offense, with these two, and potential superstar receiver Malik Nabers (recovering from ACL tear) and amazing-when-healthy (but often hurt) left tackle Andrew Thomas forming a potentially special core. There are a lot of ifs involved in this, and Simms, who still lives not far from the team facility and keeps a close eye on them as an NFL analyst, is trying to stay Zen about it all and understand that sometimes kids just gotta be kids.

“Jaxson Dart and Cam Skattebo; this is who they are,” Simms said, sounding a bit like a new-age parent, “Everybody’s got to wait and see how they grow up – me included. 

“We’ve got to stop grading them like it’s 20 years ago and, ‘This is how you must always present yourself and this is what quarterbacks do.’ So much has changed with social media now and all of that. It’s just different.”

These Giants are indeed quite different. An uber-conservative franchise, always buttoned up, with an old-school owner has been turned on its head. 

Good thing for the first time since they fired Tom Coughlin a generation ago, they have a proven, winning head coach at the helm, hiring John Harbaugh after nearly two decades with the Ravens where he won one Lombardi Trophy.

This team needs some guardrails and structure and to have hired another first-time head coach, given this organization’s track record of failure in that regard, would have probably courted disaster. Especially with this locker room and with them starting to have The Big Apple eating out of their hands.

Harbaugh’s intro speech to the team at the start of training camp is getting panned on social media – and he can be corny – but he knows how to build a staff, prepare a team for a season and through each work week and there is a level of professionalism there that’s been lacking. 

Much of this job has long been rote to him, and even if he doesn’t reinvent much in New York it’s a vast departure from their string of hiring guys who mostly had no business as head coaches in the first place.

“It’s huge,” said Simms, who used to clash with Hall of Fame head coach Bill Parcells during his time winning Super Bowls there, but always respected him. 

“It’s so huge to have that guy. I’ve been over there, and when John Harbaugh is in front of that group and they sit in that little theatre there with the lectern in front and Harbs comes in through that side door, trust me, everyone sits up straight and they’re a little bit nervous, because they know he’s the man and he is in charge.

“He coaches them that way and drives them and he understands how to create those bonds between him and the players. He practices them hard and trains them hard and those things carry over into the season.

“But how he presents himself to the team, I’m just a big believer in him. He’s like Parcells. It didn’t matter if I had a great game or not; he’d come walk in that side door and he’d throw a pen on lectern and it was, not really fear, but he commanded your attention. What he’s creating there is a really good thing for that team.”

The Giants have a real leader atop their coaching staff, but whether Dart proves to be a real winning quarterback or not will dictate the path of their future. 

He is a throwback in the rugged department and it’s clear the locker room has fully embraced him after winning the job from Russell Wilson last year. But his renegade style running the ball makes him susceptible to massive hits, he does not seem inclined to back down and durability could be a real issue.

Simms was skeptical at first but was watching him incredibly closely in practice and game settings and is a believer. Simms went from wondering if Dart was doing too much and saying too much, to coming around to accept him.

“I was like, Jaxson Dart, I kind of wish he would settle down a little bit,” Simms explained, “and then my wife and I were talking about it this morning, and I decided, ‘I’m not going to say that anymore.’ 

This is who he is and he’s not afraid to speak his mind and the players love him and he’s not a good-looking quarterback, he’s really good looking – and I’m talking about throwing it and running it.

“He’s faster than I thought he would be running the  football, and he’s a really dynamic runner and it’s not just straight ahead. He is a big damn dude now, too. 

“He makes all the throws. It’s hard for me to even think of a pass where he missed an open receiver the whole year. He’s extremely accurate throwing the football. I think he’s the real deal.”

Simms was originally puzzled by Dart at practice and he was unsure if this was going to be a fit in the NFL. Things looked off and he seemed a bit manic with his presence and how he operated and the way he would scramble. That was Day One. The second day watching him Simms was keeping his fingers crossed that the rookie was still nervous and working through the jitters.

“By the fifth day, it was, ‘Holy Christ, he is good,’” Simms said. “He played every play at practice like a game, and you know how it is in pro football, when the play is about to be over you just throw the pass anyway, or throw it away, but he didn’t do that. 

“If he didn’t like the read, or like the play – he would run, and practice running for a gain. That’s just as important for him at practice as passing and I finally said, ‘God, that’s the way he should practice.’

“He just put it all together – what he learned in college and watching that film and then seeing him run up close. He put it all together man and he just accelerated his growth. I just can’t say enough about him.”

If Nabers can come back – avoiding the Physically Unable to Perform list at the start of camp was huge – and stay healthy and Thomas holds down the left side, this could be a potent offense. 

Harbaugh brought longtime assistant Greg Roman to coordinate the run game; Roman helped Lamar Jackson to his first MVP in Baltimore with zone-read plays that fit Dart expertly and this team will pound the ball on the ground whether Skattebo holds up or not.

“You and I both know they are going to run the hell out of the football with Greg Roman,” Simms noted.

The defense remains very much a work in progress, but numerous top executives around the league believe Giants young defensive coordinator Dennard Wilson is a head coach in the making. 

Wilson was a big part of the secret sauce in Baltimore in 2023 when that defense became the only in NFL history to lead the league in sacks, takeaways and points allowed.

The Giants have won just seven games over the last two seasons, and more than six games in a season once in the last nine campaigns (and even that was a modest 9-7-1 mark). They’ve been to the playoffs just twice in the last 14 years and won a postseason game once in that span.

Harbaugh will get them to loftier regular-season terrain than that, especially if Dart is able to play as frequently as Jackson did for him in Baltimore. The Giants shouldn’t be an afterthought anymore, at the very least, and if they do come up short of expectations it will probably be an entertaining ride with these characters either way.