Friday Media Transcript: QB Eli Manning

QB Eli Manning
October 12, 2018
 
 
Q: Why are you getting hit so much?
A: They got a good defensive line. We knew that going in. We got in positions, especially when you get down in the second half, they’re teeing off. They’re not playing the run, and they can do that. We got to do a better job staying in the games and mix in the run and pass. We’ll be fine.
 
Q: Will you and can you get away from this situation for a couple of days?
A: I think you have to. When you play two games in four days, and especially when you lose a heartbreaker in Carolina on a last second field goal, and then come out and don’t play real well versus Philly at home. I think you just got to try to get away for a few days and just come back energized, and ready to do everything possible. Ten games, we got ten games left. Everyone has worked so hard all offseason, all spring, all of training camp, this whole season, and we haven’t been rewarded with the wins, but we got to look at it as ten games left to give it all and do everything possible to make something happen.
 
Q: Where’s your confidence level right now?
A: Confidence is always the same. I know I can play better. I didn’t play well last night. I got to make better decisions, and get back to just doing my job, not trying to do anything more, not trying to force things. Just find completions and move the ball, and try to score more points.
 
Q: With all the changes you all have made since last year, how surprising is it to be sitting here with the same record at this point as last year?
A: You never expect it. You expect to go win games. We’re not playing as well as we need to. We’ll work on fixing that.
 
Q: When you say you have to make smarter decisions, where does that start?
A: Just doing your job and knowing your progressions, knowing your reads, and just sticking with it. Not trying to do extra, not trying to do more, not trying to make plays when they’re not there. Just going through your reads, knowing everything exactly what you need to do, and playing fast, and making good decisions.
 
Q: Do you think you’ve done that a lot?
A: No, I think I’ve been pretty good. I think last night, I made a couple of bad decisions, which I don’t think I’ve done much – and it’s not forcing things, it’s just on some reads and things. Every game, there’s always going to be a few where you misread something, or you misread a coverage, or you got fooled. Those things can happen a little bit, but it’s just a matter of cleaning it up. It’s not just me. That’s kind of the message to the whole offense. We got too many good players. We got good plays, we had some big plays going on, whether it’s receivers, individual efforts, running backs, Saquon (Barkley) making great plays. Some of them might be five yard completions, but it’s making a guy miss, and getting a first down, and then all of a sudden, you hit a big play the next play. It’s just a matter of avoiding the bad plays, or avoiding the plays where you’re trying to do too much, or do someone else’s job, or add something here that’s affecting us or making us go backward. We got to stay on pace and stay in rhythm, and we’ll be able to be more consistent and move the ball and score more points.
 
Q: On long downs, is there any idea of throwing the ball past the sticks, rather than completing it short and hoping for a big gain?
A: That’s a screen, that’s like calling a screen to a back. That’s a receiver screen where we’re throwing it out, we’re getting linemen out, we’re getting our receivers out trying to block. You get it blocked right, you could possibly make 15 yards. We ended up two yards short probably on it. That’s what it is.
 
Q: In Carolina, as a team, felt like you guys were bouncing back. Do you feel as if last night snowballed a little bit?
A: I think offensively, I don’t think we had as many negative plays as we had in Carolina. In the run game, I thought more positive runs. We had a couple of penalties, had a couple sacks. Obviously, that can make you go back, but it could’ve been a different game if we scored touchdowns instead of settling for field goals on the two times in the first half when we were down there. We got the turnover off the start. The next drive, we get a first down, and all of a sudden Saquon breaks a big run. We’re down there close. We just got to do a better job of kind of handling those red zone situations and get touchdowns. It kind of just makes it a tighter game, a closer game in those situations.
 
Q: Scoring is way up in the league, especially passing touchdowns. You guys have six through six games. How do you sort of make sense of that in the big picture?
A: I don’t know, you tell me.
 
Q: You don’t usually rate things this is the best, this is the worst, whatever, but is this as tough as you had it after last year, after this year with a whole new regime in here that you have to take this break and you’re 1-5?
A: It’s tough, it’s very tough being in this situation, but I think it’s different from last year because last year we were banged up and lost a bunch of players, and it was hard to kind of see the bright side of it where this year you see a bright side. You see that it can get better. We have good players, we have good character guys that are going to work. I think there’s a great opportunity for us to improve and win a bunch of football games and that’s what we believe, so I think that’s the mindset going into it.
 
Q: You obviously have confidence in yourself. Does it ever bug you that obviously you’re 1-5 and there are people calling for your head?
A: It bugs me that we’re 1-5. What people say never got to me, never bothered me, but you work extremely hard to go have a big year and you’re excited about things and to be in this situation, yeah, it bothers you and it’s tough, but the only thing you can do is keep working and keep grinding. Try to bring this team together. Like you said, it’s a new scheme, a lot of new players and it’s just a matter of everybody just making those improvements. Everybody just doing their job a little bit better, knowing exactly what your assignments are, knowing exactly what you need to do and working on it and perfecting that craft.
 
Q: Does this feel a little more like a rebuild than maybe you thought it was going to be coming into the season?
A: As a player, I don’t think you ever use that term. That’s not something I don’t think athletes use in talking about your team, so no, I think it’s just about everybody coming together, everybody learning the ins and outs and unfortunately it could take a little time to get that and you hope that you can kind of make enough plays or win some tight games kind of in the meantime until all of a sudden you kind of hit your groove. We just haven’t been fortunate enough to win some of those close games early on before we get things going exactly how we want to do it.