After Another Blowout, Giants’ Playoff Hopes Teeter

After Another Blowout, Giants’ Playoff Hopes Teeter
BALTIMORE ― Early in the fourth quarter, Baltimore Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco smoothly arced a pass toward the Giants’ sideline, where Dennis Pitta easily pulled the ball in for a 6-yard gain. The play, which came on a third-and-1, gave the Ravens what surely felt like their 50th first down and prompted Giants Coach Tom Coughlin, standing just a few feet away, to spin away in disgust. It was as if he no longer wanted to watch.
Couglin surely was not alone Sunday. Three weeks ago, the Giants (8-7) were a first-place team. They were a force in the N.F.C. They were a legitimate threat to repeat as Super Bowl champions.

Now, after another disastrous performance and another blowout loss, they are on the verge of being irrelevant. The Ravens (10-5) throttled them, 33-14, embarrassing the Giants and sending them to the precipice of elimination. If the Giants hope to sneak into the postseason, they will need a victory next week against Philadelphia and some help from a handful of other hopefuls in the final game of the season.

Of course, at this point it is difficult to imagine the Giants beating the sad-sack Eagles anyway. Over the last two weeks, their offense has been nonexistent, their defense has been constantly punctured and they have been outscored by an incredible 67-14 margin.

Through it all, the Giants’ players and coaches have frequently talked about how they are reassured by the fact that they have been here before, ostensibly referring to their late-season resurgence and run to the Super Bowl title in 2011. In truth, Sunday’s performance was more reminiscent of 2004 ― when the Giants were also blasted by the Ravens here, 37-14, on their way to a 6-10 record.

That season was Coughlin’s first with the Giants and it seems difficult to think of a more disappointing sequence for the Giants since then. Yes, there have been swoons ― with Coughlin’s teams, that happens often ― but the Giants have bordered on noncompetitive the last two games, a damning reality considering the circumstances and the stakes.

On Sunday, they allowed the Ravens to rack up 533 total yards. Flacco passed for 309 yards and 2 touchdowns, while Ray Rice and Bernard Pierce combined to rush for 230 yards. Baltimore converted on a staggering 11 of 18 third downs, many of them seemingly by using a simple strategy: find cornerback Corey Webster and throw in his direction.

Webster, an eight-year veteran, has had an erratic season but has never been exposed quite as badly as he was Sunday. Flacco burned him for a 43-yard pass to Torrey Smith and a 36-yard pass to Pitta, not to mention two other downfield plays in which Webster was called for pass interference. At times, it seemed like he could do nothing right.

That was a common problem for the Giants, though. Manning led them on their December run last season with pinpoint passing in high-pressure moments, but he has been inconsistent ― if not downright awful ― in this season’s collapse. One week after passing for just 161 yards (to go with two interceptions), he mustered just 150 and a quarterback rating of 78.0. To be fair, Manning also spent much of his time trying to avoid the Ravens’ behemoth linemen, who were constantly chasing him in the backfield. Manning was sacked three times and knocked down nine times, leaving his uniform streaked with mud.

Flacco’s jersey, on the other hand, looked as if it was still starched from the dry cleaner’s. Perry Fewell, the Giants’ defensive coordinator, often had the Giants in a new 4-4-3 formation, with four linebackers and three defensive backs on the field, and it was wholly ineffective. If 16 weeks into the season seemed like an odd time to go with an unfamiliar strategy, it was, perhaps, mitigated by the fact that the Giants were battling injuries; both defensive end Justin Tuck and safety Kenny Phillips were inactive for the game.

Regardless, whatever formation a team uses, the importance of tackling remains a basic skill in the N.F.L., and the Giants continued to be poor at bringing down ball carriers. In the days leading up to the game, the players and coaches bemoaned 18 missed tackles against the Falcons and vowed things would be different. When Will Hill and Stevie Brown both dived ― and came up empty ― as Rice zoomed past them for a 27-yard touchdown late in the second quarter, it seemed as if the only difference was that this week the black jerseys that the Giants couldn’t tackle had purple piping instead of red.

There were other mental miscues, too. Penalties doomed the Giants in a bad loss to the Redskins earlier this month and Coughlin hammered his players afterward about how costly unforced errors can be.

One can only imagine what Coughlin said at halftime Sunday, then, after watching his team have Ahmad Bradshaw’s 13-yard run brought back because of a hold on Chris Snee and Domenik Hixon’s long completion negated because Hixon blatantly pushed off before catching the pass. In what was a fitting ignominy, the Giants couldn’t even defend a kneel-down cleanly; they were flagged for having 12 men on the field on the final play of the half as the Ravens were simply trying to run out the clock.