Eli Manning is not going to pick up a football again until Monday, and he insists he’s not planning on thinking much about it, either.
“Probably not,’’ the slip-sliding Giants franchise quarterback said yesterday. “It’s a time I’m going to try to catch up on some rest and some sleep and being around my family a little bit and really just try to take some time off and put it away, so when we do come back I’m ready to go.’’
How ready Manning is for the final six games of the season largely will determine whether the Super Bowl champions make it back to the playoffs to make another title run.
At 6-4, the Giants have lost two straight but own a 1 1/2-game lead on their closest rival in the NFC East, the Cowboys. Based strictly on math, the Giants have the best shot at winning their division, but based on the product they have put on the field in November, the Giants as a team and Manning as a player look nothing like contenders.
A day after an alarmingly listless and ineffective 31-13 loss to the Bengals, Manning was probed and prodded by question after question — about his mental and physical status, his glaringly poor play of late and the state of the team he’s carried to two Super Bowl triumphs in the past five seasons. Despite the skid, Tom Coughlin did not change his mind and gave the players off until Monday — six full days.
“If you said after 10 games at our bye week we’ve be winning our division, you’d take that every time,’’ Manning said. “That’s where we stand. We’ve been through stretches before when he haven’t been playing our best, but we’ve bounced out of them. We got time to rest up this week, get back healthy, get refreshed. We got a six-game season. It’s all going to come down to those last six games.’’
The Giants and Manning have been here before, following up an October to remember (30-6 under Coughlin) with a November to forget (13-21). They have pulled out of their doldrums more often than not.
“I think it definitely helps,’’ Manning said. “It reminds guys we can’t get down on ourselves. We’ve lost two in a row. There’s a lot of teams this year in the NFL have lost two games in a row. That’s nothing we have to worry about, we’re not going down, we’re not sliding.’’
Manning, though, is sliding.
He has committed five turnovers since his last touchdown pass. He had 11 touchdown passes and five interceptions in his first five games and one touchdown and six interceptions in his last five, a dramatic reversal of fortune after he was hearing (but likely not listening to) suggestions he was a legitimate MVP candidate.
And this: He hasn’t thrown a touchdown pass in three straight games. The last time that happened was back in his second, third and fourth NFL starts. Those were Eli’s bad old days.
Coughlin used the words “terrible’’ and “foolish’’ to describe Manning’s first interception against the Bengals, when he was getting yanked by the jersey and should have simply taken the sack.
“I know he’s always trying to make a play and he has done things under those circumstances in the past that have worked out, but the percentages were not with him there,’’ Coughlin said.
There’s a theory Manning has a “tired arm’’ or “dead arm,’’ but all parties involved were so quick to dismiss that it almost seemed like a cover-up.
“I haven’t seen a deadening of the arm,’’ offensive coordinator Kevin Gilbride said. “I don’t think that’s a problem at all.’’
Neither does Manning.
“I don’t react,’’ he said about the insinuation that he’s arm-weary. “No one’s watched me practice. I thought I had good velocity, threw the ball well.’’
Coughlin said he saw signs against the Bengals that his quarterback is on the way back.
“I thought he threw the ball better,” Coughlin said. “Many times he zinged it in there. I think there were signs that he’s improving, he’s getting back on track.”
Manning said he won’t throw the ball again until Monday. He also said these struggles do not bring about any self-doubt.
“You trust your skills, you trust your past experiences, you know football is a crazy game and it’s tough,’’ Manning said. “It’s hard, and sometimes as a player you forget that. Sometimes you need to be reminded of that. We’ve had a good reminder.’’