The Daniel Jones fantasy football rollercoaster has carried over into 2023

For much of this season, now three games, New York Giants quarterback Daniel Jones has not looked very good. If not for the second half of Week 2 against the Arizona Cardinals (259 yards, two touchdowns; 44 rushing yards), he'd be doing nothing for his fantasy football owners thus far.

To be fair, and as noted by John Hansen of Fantasy Points, Jones has faced two of the best defenses in the league in the Dallas Cowboys (Week 1) and the San Francisco 49ers (Week 3). Running back Saquon Barkley also missed the game against the 49ers, and he may miss more with a high ankle sprain.

Jones' schedule will naturally get easier, starting in Week 4 against the Seattle Seahawks, who enter Week 3 allowing the 11th-most fantasy points per game to quarterbacks (Yahoo! scoring). Week 5 against the Miami Dolphins and Week 6 against the Buffalo Bills could bring some volume-based appeal as a fantasy starter. Week 7 against the Washington Commanders and Week 8 against the New York Jets aren't good matchups, but then it gets easier again in Week 9 against the Las Vegas Raiders.

Jones has been QB28 and QB1 in fantasy in the two completed weeks this season, and his 4.98 fantasy points (Yahoo! scoring) on Thursday night will yield another dismal ranking for Week 3. But, inconsistency is nothing new for the Giants' signal caller.

The Daniel Jones' fantasy rollercoaster has rolled right into 2023

Jones finished as QB9 in fantasy last year (QB7 with a Week 17 cutoff, since he didn't play in Week 18). Here's a look at his weekly finishes.

Week 1-QB16
Week 2-QB22
Week 3-QB20
Week 4-QB8
Week 5-QB20
Week 6-QB17
Week 7-QB3
Week 8-QB25
Week 9-Bye
Week 10-QB14
Week 11-QB3
Week 12-QB20
Week 13-QB12
Week 14-QB11
Week 15-QB26
Week 16-QB9
Week 17-QB2

Three top-five finishes, five top-10 finishes (including well-timed back-to-backs in Week 16 and 17) and seven top-12 (QB1) finishes-with another that missed top-12 by less than one point (Week 10). Jones also had six finishes as QB20 or worse, though four of those were before his bye.

From Weeks 1-8 last year, driven by a couple spike weeks, Jones was QB9 in fantasy. From Week 10-17 - with better consistency but still a couple duds in there - he was QB4.

The Giants' offense will be greatly impacted by any further absences from Barkley, but it can't get much uglier for Jones than it's been for much of the first three games. Fantasy managers who drafted him had to know what they were getting. The "Danny Dimes" fantasy rollercoaster rolled at a pretty good pace in 2022, and it remains unchecked into 2023.