OK, kid.
Now what can you do for an encore?
Giants fans everywhere have not yet come off Cloud 8 — Daniel Jones’ jersey number for anyone just landing from Mars — and though he and his teammates have come down from Cloud 8 with the Redskins coming Sunday to MetLife Stadium, a renewed energy and confidence and optimism is radiating through the Giants.
Because no one believes Daniel Jones is any one-hit wonder.
Most importantly, Daniel Jones doesn’t believe he is either.
On a patio outside the Quest Diagnostics Center, I asked Jones if he expects to play better than he did when he took the torch from Manning in Tampa and set the franchise on fire.
“I do, yeah,” Jones said. “I think all of us do. I think collectively and individually we expect to play better.”
It is far too premature for any “Who’s better, Daniel Jones or Sam Darnold?” debate, but no one doubts that it’s coming.
“I think [Jones] can play like that all the time,” wide receiver Bennie Fowler told The Post. “We could clean up some routes, we could clean up some throws, protection … There’s a whole bunch of things.”
Jones has dramatically raised expectations for himself, probably too quickly for his own good, because there will be adversity, there will be growing pains, no young quarterback is immune to them.
But in the meantime, as Same Old Daniel buries his head in his playbook, virtually oblivious to the exploding sales of his jersey now that he is the talk of the town, exactly as Eli Manning seamlessly navigated through the euphoria and disaster, his cumbersome new reality is being cast by Big Blue dreamers as:
The Natural.
“The stage is never too big for him,” center Jon Halapio said. “The day that he got here, you could just tell that he had that ‘it’ factor being a big-time quarterback, and he’s like Eli, he’s the same person every day.”
No one — not even Page Six — spotted Same Old Daniel drinking up the nightlife on Broadway, a blonde on each arm, and he didn’t show up for work with a Fu Manchu or a Gardner Minshew mustache.
He was drafted sixth overall — no longer to the chagrin of apoplectic Giants fans — in no small part because his highs will never be too high and his lows will never be too low, he’ll be easy like Sunday morning, easy like Easy Eli.
“Same guy,” Sterling Shepard said. “That’s what you want.”
How can Daniel Jones follow up a boffo performance like his debut?
“Just be him. Play his game. That’s all we need him to do, that’s all we want him to do,” Shepard said.
Jones would be wise to follow Phil Simms’ advice for Dave Brown, his successor: Just win the game. Alas, Brown didn’t win enough games.
“Nobody’s trying to prove anything to the media or a reporter or anything,” Evan Engram told The Post. “We have to win at the end of the day, and that’s Daniel’s main focus.”Jones chuckled when asked if he feels like a celebrity.
“Not really. No, it’s the same thing,” he said. “I go home and I come into work every day. I don’t feel like it’s changed a whole lot.”
What has changed is the mindset of the 1-2 New York Football Giants.
“It just builds our hunger,” Engram said. “That feeling in the locker room and that plane ride home, it’s motivation. That feeling is really addicting.
“We’re gonna continue to fight like our life is on the line.”
Asked what Giants fans can expect next, Same Old Daniel said: “That we’re gonna compete and fight as hard as we can. Each week the goal is to be a better team, to play better and hopefully that’s what the fans see when they see us play as a team, constantly improving, and constantly competing.”
Big Blue Nation: Jonesing for an encore.