What others are saying: Reactions to Giants’ 23-16 loss to Packers

If you have been reading, and if you haven’t been I have to ask why, then you have seen much of our opinion regarding Sunday’s 23-16 loss by the New York Giants to the Green Bay Packers. To summarize, this was an ugly loss.

Kudos & Wet Willies | Offense lets Giants down again | Nine takeaways from the loss

Let’s digress from out opinions and see what others are saying about the Giants this morning. Warning — it is obviously not pretty.

Eli Manning getting hammered

The Giants’ quarterback wasn’t good Sunday, and has been downright awful for the past two weeks.

Manning has been failing the Giants for past four years | ESPN

ESPN’s Jordan Ranaan didn’t mince words about the veteran quarterback:

Manning is the team’s highest-paid player by a wide margin at $18 million this season. He’s paid and treated as the superstar quarterback, even if he's not playing like it this season, or for the better part of the past four years. ...

The cold reality is that Manning has been an $18 million middle-of-the-road quarterback for much of the past four years, incapable of carrying his team to a single notable victory. It’s disappointing, much like the effort on Sunday night when the Giants were out of sync again.

Manning’s struggles continue | Newsday

It is still too soon to make any definitive conclusions about whether Eli Manning is in decline, but the fact that the question is even remotely relevant is a testament to how disconcerting the 35-year-old quarterback’s level of play has been through the Giants’ three-game losing streak.

In Sunday night’s 23-16 loss to the Packers, there were more hurried and inaccurate throws, more skittishness in the pocket, more plays that made you wonder if this is simply the culmination of a variety of issues beyond his control, or if we are seeing a 13-year quarterback showing at least the initial signs of a descending player.

This was Eli Manning at his worst | New York Post

Eli Manning could not get the ball to his targets, did not trust his protection and could not maneuver his offense down the field. ... Manning has overcome obstacles before, but he is struggling mightily as the Giants are sinking. He did not make nearly enough franchise quarterback-type throws against a suspect Packers secondary and at times looked a bit rattled when the action was getting threatening around him. His greatest sin was an inability to produce a single touchdown until the final three minutes, which will get you beat most every time.

Justin Pugh defiant after loss

The Giants’ offensive guard told reporters he still think the last-place Giants are the best team in the NFC East.

"I think we're the best team in our division, even though we sit at the bottom," the left guard declared in a mostly-empty locker room after the game. "I think every team doesn't want to play us. But we have to go out and prove that. We've got to go out and prove that.

"I can say it all I want, but we've got to go prove it. We've played some good teams the past two weeks, and we've got to take a hard look at the tape and get better from it. And get better quick." ...

"We've played Dallas (a 20-19 win), we've played the Redskins (a 29-27 loss), and I know how they are," Pugh responded. "Obviously Philly's done some good things; we've got to go play them still. But go ask Dallas and go ask the Redskins how they feel about us."