MINNEAPOLIS -- The one reliable truth about this latest miserable New York Giants season was that they were in every game and gave top-level effort. That is no longer true.
With nothing to play for Sunday night, the Giants played like a team that didn't want to be on the field. Without top playmaker Odell Beckham Jr., who was serving a one-game suspension for his aggressive, violent actions in last week's loss to Carolina, the Giants' offense was sluggish, slow and out of options. Eli Manning threw three interceptions in a game for the second time this year, and one was returned for a touchdown. He didn't complete a pass in the first quarter. He was under extreme pressure all night and was sacked four times. By the time anything good happened for the offense, the Vikings had a 32-3 fourth-quarter lead, and it was too late to do anything about it.
The Giants fell to 6-9 with a 49-17 loss that wasn't as close as the score makes it look, and they'll drag themselves through one final week of a sad, meaningless season finale at home against the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday.
What it means: Not a lot, as the Giants were eliminated from the playoffs with Washington's victory over Philadelphia on Saturday night. But this will now be the Giants' third straight year with a losing record. They haven't had three years in a row with losing records since they had eight such seasons in a row from 1973-80. That, plus the fact they were not competitive, bodes ill for coach Tom Coughlin, who looked overwhelmed by the Beckham situation last week and couldn't find a way to motivate the team to play this game.
What were they thinking? Linebacker J.T. Thomas threw a post-play punch at MyCole Pruitt in the fourth quarter and was ejected from the game. It wasn't anything worse than what we saw from Beckham on multiple plays last week, but after last week's officials took so much heat for not ejecting Beckham, you had to think they were going to be extra sensitive on the issue of ejection this week. Thomas' timing was bad.
One reason to get excited: For much of the game, the defensive line looked pretty good. Jay Bromley held up well in run defense against the best running back in the league for the entire first half, and Robert Ayers had 1.5 sacks to bump his season total to eight. The defense wasn't as terrible as the score makes it look. The turnovers obviously put them in bad spots.
One reason to panic: Just one? OK, well, the offensive line was in shambles and made you wonder whether it can keep Manning upright and safe for the four quarters that remain in this latest lost season.
Fantasy watch: There wasn't much to like from the Giants' end other than Rashad Jennings ... until Manning hit Rueben Randle for a 72-yard touchdown right at the end of the third quarter. If you went into this game just needing something, anything from Manning to win, you were freaking out before that play. And if you got stuck having to play Randle because you didn't have a better fill-in for Beckham or Dez Bryant, that play might well have won you a title.
Ouch: Safety Craig Dahl and right tackle Marshall Newhouse both left the game with concussions. Thomas went out in the first quarter with an ankle sprain. He returned to the game in the second half but was ejected in the fourth quarter for that post-play scrap.
