That’s what the Giants had on their back Monday night. Cleveland, playing for their season and coming off a bye, really took it to the Giants by dominating the line of scrimmage, particularly against the Giant front four. Defensively, the Giants were pushed around and never got close to Derek Andersen. Tuck, Kiwi, et al. were no where to be found. Aaron Ross has a rough go of it versus Brayland Edwards as well. It was so bad, Cleveland was not forced to punt a single time during the contest. To complicate matters, the Giant offense never got into its own rhythm. There were no excuses in this one; Cleveland was clearly the more prepared and better football team from top to bottom on Monday night.
Still, despite the lackluster effort, the Giants still had chances. After pulling to within 17-14 at the half, the Giants opened with a bomb to Plax on the first play of the third quarter. Plax ran a post and looked wide open, but Manning threw it towards the sideline resulting in his second pick. Not a good way to start the half and it clearly fueled more momentum to Cleveland. In the fourth down by 13, the Giants diligently drove to the Cleveland nine yard line (with some exceptional running from Derrick Ward) only to have Manning throw his third interception of the game, a forced throw which was returned for a TD and sealed the win. All three turnovers by Manning were bad decisions on his part. But I’ll tell ya, he is out tough SOB. Twice Sean Rodgers took cheap shots at Manning. That 350 pound load of crap should be fined by the league.
This was certainly a game that had trouble written over it. Despite Cleveland’s inadequacies so far this year (hell they only scored 46 points coming into the game), there is talent. And playing in front of a national audience with their season hanging by a thread, a good effort was almost predictable. The Giants weren’t going to win every game this year but the loss is particularly difficult to accept because Cleveland beat the Giants at their own game: being physical. Furthermore, with events from the weekend regarding the NFC East, this was a game where the Giants could have put some space between themselves and their competition. The Giants didn’t make it happen. I don’t think the Giants were reading their press clippings, but this assures they won’t start.
