The Facts: There are many reasons why the Giants' offense sunk from a top-10 unit to near the bottom of the league last season. And while Ben McAdoo wasn't willing to name them all yet, he pointed a finger in the direction of a big one: Manning.
Diehards Line:
According to SNY.com's Ralph Vacchiano, "It was stunning on Wednesday how the second-year Giants coach seemingly blamed the Giants' franchise quarterback for much of the team's offensive struggles. ..." McAdoo cited turnovers as their biggest issue -- and Manning was at least partially responsible for those -- and even cited Manning for causing some of the protection issues that most observes blamed on the offensive line. "We all know that turning the ball over 27 times isn't acceptable," McAdoo said from the NFL scouting combine. "We need to handle the ball better, so we need to catch it better than we caught it, and we need to handle it in the pocket better." As McAdoo noted, some of those issues were on the receiving ends of Manning's passes -- too many passes that could've been caught or bounced off a receiver's hands. Some of them were also due to a breakdown in pressure, which caused Manning to lose his handle on the football or simply rush his throw. As for that protection? McAdoo said it was "an easy blame" to pin that all on his offensive line. "I think Eli needs to do a better job of playing with fast feet, and I think he needs to sit on that back foot in the pocket," McAdoo said. The coach may have been quick to blame his quarterback, but he was also careful not to blame himself -- or at least not his offensive scheme, which was largely the same one that resulted in two top-10 offenses when he was the Giants offensive coordinator in 2015-16. Asked if he saw anything in his scheme that needed to be fixed, McAdoo preferred to point to his players' execution. ... It'll be interesting to see how that goes over.