Monday Media Transcript: QB Eli Manning

QB Eli Manning -- November 26, 2018

Q: What’s the mindset coming into this week after a tough loss?
A: It’s the same. You always look at the game. There’s good things. There’s always things you can improve on. I think we’ve been preparing well. We’ve been playing good football. Get ready for the Bears, and expect to go out there and build off the good things we’re doing, and fix a few of the things, but overall, we had a great opportunity to win that game. We got the ball. We’re down in the red zone with a chance to score a touchdown and take a four-point lead. We can’t covert on the third and three. It’s close, we got the matchup we wanted. We got (WR) Odell (Beckham Jr.) matched up one-on-one with a corner, and we got to hit that. We got to make that play. You make that play, you go up four, it’s a little tougher. You put a little more pressure on Philly’s offense where they have to score a touchdown. You’d be feeling good right now in those situations, possibly.

Q: Did you ask the officials why there was no flag for pass interference?
A: No, I didn’t ask. Sometimes, you don’t see everything, and that’s football. We got to convert on that. We got to fight through it. We got to make the throw, make the catch. You can’t rely on the officials. Unfortunately, you get some and you don’t.

Q: When you looked at that play, was the grabbing one of the big reasons why that play didn’t work out?
A: You always look at it. It’s close, we’re right there, we got a little inside breaking route. We got to execute. It comes down to Odell and I making that play. We’re good enough to make that and fight through, if there was holding or not, and make the play.

Q: What’s the concern now in terms of the optimism of the team moving forward?
A: No concern. I think we’ve been practicing wel.l We’ve been playing tough games, and being competitive. All the games we’ve played, they’ve been close. The ones we’ve won have been close and down to the wire. The same last week. In this league, you got to make the plays in the critical moments, and we didn’t do it this past game, unfortunately, and didn’t get the win. We’ve got a good group of guys. It’s important to guys. We feel like we’re going to keep fighting, we’re going to keep preparing, and going out there and still chase that feeling of that locker room after a win. That’s a good feeling. It makes the week go easier. It makes Mondays feel better. It makes Tuesdays, it makes everything just easier to take when you’re winning football games. So, that’s what we’re chasing.

Q: Do you expect to start the last five games? Have you given any thought about it?
A: I expect to start until I’m told not to. I expect to start this week. I expect to play. Looking forward to playing, and go from there.

Q: Do you understand how mathematically challenging it is to make the playoffs now?
A: I want to play. You often speculate, you often what if. It’s not my decision.

Q: Is there anything they did after halftime to slow you guys down?
A: No, I don’t think they changed anything. I think it’s just a matter of – each possession has its own story. The first possession, we’re backed up a little bit. They covered the play well. I had to throw it away and avoid the sack, but you get stuck in a third and 17. The next drive, we had a holding and get stuck in third and 18. We just kind of had some negative plays. We had a drop. Just didn’t get things going. Missed on a couple – there was another play where I thought I had Shep. I thought the guy was holding him a little bit on that one that we missed. You get stuck in a third and 10. We just didn’t execute. Just couldn’t have the positive plays we were having earlier and couldn’t overcome some of the bad plays. We finally settled down. We’re down three, and we know we kind of needed a drive. We needed to get things going. We put a great drive together. We converted on third and eight on a seam down to (TE) Rhett (Ellison) for a big play. We get in tight, a touchdown would’ve been helpful there. We weren’t able to get the touchdown. I think the guys have responded kind of in critical moments of the game when we needed something. All year long, we’ve been able to get those drives and kind of make some of those plays. We were able to tie it. We kind of responded to the situation.

Q: How much did losing (TE) Evan Engram during pregame affect what you guys wanted to do?
A: Yeah, it always affects. Evan, obviously, has been making a couple of big plays for us late in games, and doing things. So, you like to have him in there. We had a couple of plays for him, but I thought Rhett did a great job. The first third down, made a nice catch and run for the first on a third and 10. I thought Rhett did good things, but yeah, you’d like to have all your weapons out there.

Q: In the locker room last night, there were some players grumbling about the play calling and wanting to attack the battered Eagles secondary a little bit more. Do you feel like you need to step in and talk to people?
A: I thought the game plan was good. Came out in the first half and moved the ball well. We’re running the ball, passing the ball, combination. We had seven explosives in the passing game and threw it for a bunch. In the second half, we had some sacks, had some negative plays where we weren’t able to take advantage of the coverage and things. We got to do our job, play better, execute better, and that’s what it comes down to.

Q: Does it feel like the offense wasn’t on the field very much in the second half?
A: We didn’t have many plays in the second half. We had some three and outs. They had some long drives. I don’t know what we ended up having. We didn’t have a whole lot of possessions in the game. I think we had four or five in the first half. Maybe five in the first half, five in the second half. So, you get 10 possessions, you’re scoring on a lot of them, but second half obviously had some three and outs. Had a nice drive there at the end to tie the game, but yeah, didn’t have the ball a whole lot.