Giants and QBs: How do the top three in NFL Draft fit into their plans?

 INDIANAPOLIS

Joe Schoen had a very recent conversation with a young quarterback regarding what he looks for when scouting the position.

“Completions and a winner,” the general manager of the Giants said at the NFL Combine this past week, noting that he wasn’t as impressed by the deep balls that the player loves to chuck. “I want a winner and a guy who can complete passes. That’s the most important thing.”

It wasn’t Cam Ward or Shedeur Sanders or any of the other would-be Giants at the NFL Combine who received that message from him, though. It was Schoen’s teenage son, Carson, who also plays the position.

No matter. The rule still stands, whether it comes from him as a dad or an evaluator. And while Carson Schoen is not draft-eligible (yet), the Giants know what they want to see from the prospects who could be selected in April.

That’s what this week was all about. Schoen and the Giants already had seen what the players can do on the field as college stars, so the on-field portion of the Combine was a non-factor. Ward and Sanders didn’t even throw a pass in Indianapolis, and the Giants were fine with that. Here during interviews and for the coming months at other access points (pro days, private workouts), they’ll see what makes them tick . . . and if their make-ups fit the unique job requirements that come with playing quarterback in the metropolitan area.

“There is a lot that goes into the quarterback position, and this time of year is where we can find that out,” Schoen said. “We’ve seen the film evaluation, how these guys perform under pressure, how they do on third down, fourth down, money situations. Now we need to figure out who they are as people. It’s a unique media market . . . Can they handle adversity, can they handle people talking negatively about them — hopefully not for an extended period of time if we take him. How can they handle all those things? That’s what we need to try to find out.”

So how do each of the top three quarterbacks — Ward, Sanders and Jaxson Dart of Ole Miss, all very different people and players from one another — fit into that rubric? Here’s a look at each of them:

CAM WARD

Ward is widely considered to be the top quarterback prospect in this draft class, but he was the biggest mystery for the Giants coming into the Combine because they hadn’t spent much time with him off the field. In his interviews with the media, he painted himself as a cross between Sanders and Dart.

He was confident — asked to name the top five quarterbacks in the NFL, he said he wouldn’t include himself, not because of any modesty but on the technicality that he isn’t in the league yet — but also insightful.

“I’m no rah-rah guy,” Ward said of his leadership style. “At this point in your career in the NFL, you shouldn’t need somebody to motivate you every day. You’ve got to be self-motivated.”

Unlike Sanders and Dart, both highly touted prospects for a long time, Ward had an uphill journey to get to the NFL. He was a zero-star recruit out of high school who received one offer to play in college at Incarnate Word. He won the Jerry Rice Award as the top player in FCS and led that subdivision with 24 touchdown passes during the shortened 2020-21 season. The next year he threw 47 touchdown passes as a sophomore before transferring to Washington State. He initially declared for the 2024 NFL Draft after his season there but rescinded it, returned to college and transferred to Miami.

The Hurricanes went 10-2 with him in 2024 and he completed 67.2% of his passes for 39 touchdowns and seven interceptions. Those numbers figure to look good to Schoen, but the thing that really stood out to him was Ward’s performance against Cal in October. That was the game in which Miami trailed by 25 points before Ward led four straight touchdown drives to win it.

“They dug themselves a little bit of a hole,” Schoen said. “Some of it was they were in a hole because of him, but he also was able to get them out of it, and they won the game because of him. Those are traits that you look for. The gotta-have-it moments . . . When everybody in the building knows you’re going to throw it, that you can throw it.”

Schoen finds himself in something of a similar position now. The Giants are without a quarterback, and a lot of it is because of what he’s done or hasn’t done as general manager. The whole football world knows he has to find someone to lead the Giants out of their doldrums. It’s a gotta-have-it moment for the general manager.

Maybe Schoen and Ward can help each other in that regard.

SHEDEUR SANDERS

Sanders is unapologetically who you would expect the son of Hall of Famer Deion Sanders to be: Brash, confident, swaggy. Those are things Giants coach Brian Daboll likes, too, and it’s probably why they seemed to hit it off so well during their interactions at the East-West Shrine Game in January.

“I’m most proud about my mental [abilities],” Sanders said at the Combine. “I know nothing can faze me, no pressure, no situation. These cameras? Nothing fazes me. I grew up with it.”

He was the same way in his interviews with teams.

“It’s easy meeting with people because I’m going to just be myself,” he said. “So it’s like you either like it or you don’t.”

Sanders also has a relationship with Giants receiver Malik Nabers and even gave him some advice during their well-publicized football catch in Manhattan in December.

“We have relatability because the media painted him a certain way when he said [things],” Sanders said. “I went through scrutiny also. So I told him, ‘Bro, certain things you can and you can’t say because they want to paint a certain type of picture of you, and don’t let that happen.’ So since then he’s been good, he’s been smiling, he’s been fun. Even when he’s frustrated, I just said, just take it day by day. But I was able to understand him.”

Winning and completions? In his two years at Colorado, Sanders went 13-11, but he led the nation in completion percentage in 2024 (74.0) and was at 71.8% with the Buffs.

“If you ain’t trying to change the franchise or the culture, don’t get me,” Sanders said.

The Giants have 100 seasons of franchise and culture. They will have to decide how much of that they are willing to shake up.

JAXSON DART

Dart seems to be the kind of quarterback who runs his own race.

“Look, there’s a lot of people who say a lot of different things, so I’m not trying to tie my head into anything like that,” he said of being compared — and usually ranked below — the other two. “I’m somebody that’s process-driven. I just want to take it one day at a time. This has been a dream for me since I was a little kid to be in this position that I’m in today. I’m really just trying to improve. I know that if I control things that I can control, everything’s going to play out the right way. I’m not even too nervous about that at all.”

That aligns very well with Daboll’s philosophies.

The Giants had a good opportunity to get to know Dart at the Senior Bowl when their offensive coordinator, Mike Kafka, was his head coach, so meeting at the Combine was a bit of a reunion.

“Coach Daboll is somebody who brings a ton of energy anytime you step into a room,” Dart said. “Being able to sit and talk ball again, it’s been a lot of fun. They’re great people and, at the same time, great coaches.”

Dart said he’s never not started but added that if that is the plan for him as a young NFL player, to sit behind a veteran for a while, he’d use it as the learning experience it is intended to be. He also understands what is going to be expected from him once he does ascend to the starting role.

“The higher you get at this level, there’s a lot of things that are on your back,” he said. “There’s a lot of great quarterbacks out here. We all have different skill sets and things that separate us. But for me, I feel like the intangibles of what I bring to the organization are kind of what set me apart.”

As for the Schoen Metric on completions and winning, Dart went 29-10 during his three years at Ole Miss with a career completion percentage of 65.7, including 69.3 in 2024.

By Tom Rock

tom.rock@newsday.com@TomRock_Newsday

Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.