NY Giants Rush: Monday Morning Manning – Week 12
By: Marco Imperati
After a Thanksgiving slate of games where the Giants watched the division lead get served to them on a silver platter, the team came out and laid an egg in Washington. Bye week hangover, let down, flat. Call it whatever you wish. It all applies. It was almost too easy to believe. Before touching on the Giants offense, I have to tip my hat to the Washington Redskins.
Everything was made going into this game about what this would do for the Giants. What many failed to talk about was what this win could do for the Redskins. They are very much alive in the NFC East. Fittingly, the Giants decided not to take the smooth road to the postseason. With four very tough games to play, the two-man race to the NFC East crown is tight and alive.
For three-quarters, the Giants offense was pretty much unwatchable. Eli Manning finished with a stat line of 26 for 51, 321 yards, 2 touchdowns, and 3 interceptions. Each interception was their own story, however the big one was in the 3rd quarter when Eli targeted Reuben Randle and the play was cut off in the end zone. Not only would that have put the Giants on the board, but it ended up being the difference in points.
Aside from what the loss does in the playoff scenario, Giants fans should be most concerned about the injuries that pile up week-to-week. Geoff Schwartz is the latest offensive lineman to go down. He fractured his leg and will be lost for the season. The shuffle of the offensive line brought pressure all day long at Eli. Additionally, there is zero pop out of the running game.
This offense is one-dimensional with Eli looking for Odell Beckham Jr. basically every down and sprinkle in a little Will Tye to get the chains moving. It’s not enough and won’t be enough to get this team over the hump.
Up next: The Giants will meet the Jets in the next biggest game of the year. There are two areas I will be focused on heading into this Metlife showdown. The first is if Darrelle Revis makes it back healthy for this game to lock in on OBJ. After getting lit up by DeAndre Hopkins last week, Revis will be looking to shut down the Giants star player.
The second area, and probably most important, is what kind of offensive line the Giants put out vs the tough Jets defensive line. Hopefully, Justin Pugh can get out of the concussion protocol and Weston Richburg can tough it out on a high ankle sprain.