Eli, Giants Come Up Small in Loss to Pittsburgh

The Giants went into their game against the Steelers on Sunday riding a six-game winning streak and left Pittsburgh with their tails between their legs after a sloppy, 24-14 loss that clearly illustrated the underlying issues that have been plaguing them all season.

QB Eli Manning continued to make critical mistakes that baffle the mind and WR Odell Beckham, Jr. once again whined about the treatment he’s been getting from the outside world.

The Giants ran the ball just 14 times and threw it 39 in another unbalanced performance that falls squarely on the shoulders of head coach Ben McAdoo, who is more engrossed in calling the offensive plays than he is in trying to get his team under control on the sidelines. He needs to delegate that responsibility or at the the very least, pick his head up once in awhile.

But is was Eli, once one of the game’s top deep throwers, who once again underperformed. His two interceptions were costly underthrows that had they had more air under them, could have been touchdowns.

Manning had TE Larry Donnell open in the end zone and did not get the ball over Steelers’ LB Lawrence Timmons, who picked it off and took it back into Pittsburgh territory. Another red zone chance, a fourth down pass on the goal line to TE Will Tye, was slapped away.

Then a broken play had WR Sterling Shepard wide open down the field. Manning hoisted the ball which fell short into the arms of Steelers’ safety Sean Davis.

“It really came down to those two red zone trips,” said Manning. “We had no points off of it. The interception and then the fourth down, it’s tough out there, but we got down there. We have been really good scoring touchdowns lately, the last three or four games we have been one hundred percent scoring touchdowns, but not today. Not just scoring touchdowns, not getting anything on two drives, that was kind of the game right there.”

Beckham complained after the game that the officials were biased against the Giants. True, he was grabbed and molested for a good part of the game and was flagged on weak offensive PI penalty but the calls went both ways in this game. Sorry Odell.

OBJ went as far to suggest that referee Terry McAulay’s crew no longer handle the Giants’ games.

“It’s not like I’m sitting here saying the refs are the reason we lost the game, but there’s plenty of (bad) calls in the game and anybody can go watch the film. Anybody,” Beckham said as per SNY.tv. ”Anybody can go watch the film and see exactly what was going on. I don’t know. I don’t really think that we should have this crew any more when the Giants are playing with the past history and everything that’s gone on.”

The bottom line is the Giants are not what many thought they were after rattling off six straight wins. Those games were against the have-nots of the NFL. The Steelers are a serious contender, and they made the Giants pay for their mistakes.

“It’s just consistency,” McAdoo said. “We need to be more consistent. We need to take care of the ball better. That showed up again today. We had two turnovers. One of them was on fourth down, but we need to take care of the ball and play with consistency.”

That consistency might have to start with McAdoo himself. He has to balance out this offense, which is too pass-heavy at the moment.

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