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Eli may well be a bust this year. However, it may be due to several reasons which are pretty much beyond his control:

1) The left side of his OL is weak and he is under constant pressure causing him to throw off his back foot (as he did last year).

2) The Giants once again abandon the ship; i.e., they mutiny against Coughlin.

3) Eli, just is slow to progress due to poor coaching (as he has had poor QB coaching during his first three years). Palmer is a much better QB coach however than the Giants have had

4) Without a running game that is as effective as it had been with Tiki, Eli is under considerable pressure to produce and he just does not have it as yet to fully take the reins.

There have been QBs in the NFL who have been late bloomers. Some needed the right circumstances to develop; some needed maturation. I believe that Eli fits both of the preceding and will bloom later in his career (e.g., Jim Plunkett, YA Tittle, Rich Gannon, etc). Would you have called any of the aforementioned, busts by the end of their respective careers?

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Eli may well be a bust this year. However, it may be due to several reasons which are pretty much beyond his control:

1) The left side of his OL is weak and he is under constant pressure causing him to throw off his back foot (as he did last year).

2) The Giants once again abandon the ship; i.e., they mutiny against Coughlin.

3) Eli, just is slow to progress due to poor coaching (as he has had poor QB coaching during his first three years). Palmer is a much better QB coach however than the Giants have had

4) Without a running game that is as effective as it had been with Tiki, Eli is under considerable pressure to produce and he just does not have it as yet to fully take the reins.

There have been QBs in the NFL who have been late bloomers. Some needed the right circumstances to develop; some needed maturation. I believe that Eli fits both of the preceding and will bloom later in his career (e.g., Jim Plunkett, YA Tittle, Rich Gannon, etc). Would you have called any of the aforementioned, busts by the end of their respective careers?

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Eli would be a lot better off in San Diego. Oh, the irony.

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Eli throws a great deep ball. It's his decision-making that is still suspect.

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New York fans are quick to call a lot of people a bust. There are a lot of different reasons for Eli's progression. Things were going great last year until Pettigout and Toomer went down. Toomer was his security blanket and Whitfield was unable to protect his blindside so Eli was constantly under pressure. NO QB PLAYS WELL UNDER PRESSURE CONSTANTLY. Even the great Peyton stinks when he is under constant pressure. People are just way to quick to slam Eli because of the draft and that he is Peyton's brother. He got a new QB coach and a different OC so that should help a bit. He has a coach that is way to quick to throw him under a bus (Coughlin) and a couple of receivers who were completely self-absorbed (Burress & Shockey). Burress has stepped up to the plate and is working out with his QB this offseason so that should improve their communication. People like to think that Eli is always the one that was wrong but the receivers and the QB have not always been on the same page. One was thinking one thing and the other something else. That is why working out in the offseason is so important. People just need to get off his back. He has shown a lot of composure at times and has shown flashes of brilliance. He just doesn't have the talent around him that a lot of others have. His decision making can be questionable at times but his OC was an even more horrible decision maker. Give the kid some time. Everybody is still giving Vick time to improve and he has been around longer than Eli. Why the heck can't some people give Eli time.

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Too bad you didn't pick "Ben". Good thing for us that you didn't. The way things look now, Eli should have been picked in the second round.

GOOOOOOOO Steelers!!!!

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I think some of the comments above are quite insightful. New York fans are very quick to pull the plug thanks in part to our media (hey, bad news sells) and in part to our frustration over expectations that were set too high initially. If we step back and think about it, have we really been hurt by the slow maturation process of Eli Manning? Did the Giants have the kind of team surrounding him that could have competed for the Super Bowl if he had been an instant phenom? Not with that defense, those special teams, those inconsistent receivers and that coaching staff. The real test is whether Eli will progress significantly over the next two seasons as Reese builds a team around him that is highly competitive. I think back to the period when Phil Simms was having problems in his first three years but Parcells and Young were putting together a ferocious defense and a good offensive line. Then all the pieces came together as Simms matured and the result was two Super Bowl wins. Eli has made plenty of bad decisions on his throws. He has shown bad mechanics on occasion. He hasn't been as accurate as he will need to be. But the Giants are just now moving toward having a strong team with which to surround him, and it will take at least another season (and another draft) to put together a team that can compete at the top of the NFL. So I would say that we have to wait until the 2008-2009 season to see if Eli is the guy we hope. Will he be getting sufficient time to avoid throwing off his back foot? If so, will his accuracy have improved considerably? Will his receivers run good patterns and catch the ball (Smith will be a MAJOR help in this regard)? Will the defense have become a force that can get the Giants decent field position and force some turnovers so Manning can be comfortably aggressive? Will the coaches make proper use of the freaky assets of Shockey (let him get downfield more as Fassel did) and Jacobs (let him batter the defense into submission by late in the third quarter and force safeties up so Manning will have more holes into which to throw on play action passes) plus a good cut-back runner who comes from somewhere? I don't know if Manning will ever become what some fans hoped for, a Saviour. I will be quite happy if he becomes a Phil Simms, and I think he can reach that level and be one of the top 10 QBs in the league and possibly even be better. But based on the team around him so far, no one can reasonably assess what he will become. My bet? A good enough QB to win a Super Bowl behind, and that's plenty good enough for me.

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I would rather have eli than ben anyday. Ben when he was a sucess threw like 15 passes a game and watched the running backs go crazy. Plus hes a total dbag. I say this all the time there are very few qbs that i would rather have than eli, Maybe like 5 not bad for your third year. Just keep hating people the Gmen are better off without that quiter crying baby tiki.

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Sorry New York but he's a BUST. I don't know why they've stuck with him this long. Saving face maybe? How about saving your under-coached, and spoiled brat player attitude of a team.

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how could any giants fan say that e;i is a bust last time i checked his first year he started he went 11-5 and im telling everyone if we dont make the playoffs this year couphlin is gone

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Eli Manning is not a bust. Giant fans abused Phil Simms for years as not good enough, then he led them to the promised land in 86 & 90 before getting hurt, then after he retired they realized how good he was. The same will probably happen to Eli, he's in his 4th year the G-men made the playoffs the past 2 years, he has the tools to be a great NFL QB. Lets give him some more time. If the Giants put him on the trading block today how many teams do you think would be interested. My guess is at least 16 would vie for his services. Be Thankful Giant fans, remembering the good old days or Dave Brown, Kent Graham, Danny Kanell et al, I'll take a still developing Eli Manning ANY DAY. In the past 27 years the Giants can count the COMPETENT QB's on 1 hand Simms, Collins, and Manning be Thankful we have someone with as much potential as Eli Manning. It could be a lot worse. PJH

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This is ridiculous. I agree with PJH. Manning is not a bust. The word should be appropriately used for the Ryan Leafs and Tony Mandarich's of the world. 2 full seasons as a starter and 2 playoff appearances. To suggest that if he can't throw the long ball with accuracy this year or he will be a bust is laughable. Joe Montana didn't have the arm strength to even throw the long ball. He was in a great system that allowed him to use his accuracy and allowed his receivers to take the short slant the distance. Eli is no Montana, granted but to suggest that is beyond preposterous. Intelligent Giants fans expect Eli to win and be productive. No one should expect any one pick to be the savior, regardless if he happened to be the 1st overall taken.

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Alright Alright, Eli is not quite a bust because he has shown improvement and I agree that if Reese can provide Eli with some protection on the O-Line, and if our defense could stop anyone on 3rd down we would be a Super Bowl contender. I am not a big fan of Coughlin, and I would have been satisfied if he got canned this past season. The Giants of 05 and 06 clearly underachieved, and most of that was due to bad defense, and horrible coaching. So, i think Eli deserves a few more seasons to be the Giants QB, i mean who could the Giants get right now that would do any better? The protection needs to get better, and Jacobs needs to be a star for this team to go anywhere next year. Of course, the defense is still suspect, but i think they will play well.

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Giants fans should not expect too much this next season. They are still missing at least two excellent defensive backfield players, one stud on the offensive line, an explosive running back who can mix speed and cutback elusiveness to the mix (yeah, I know, they have a rookie who might fill the bill, but he hasn't taken a snap in the NFL yet and it's a long way from Marshall's opponents to the hitters in this league), and a few more special teams players. They probably don't have enough depth on either side of the ball to survive key injuries. They filled a lot of the other holes in the draft and free agency this off-season, and can probably fill most of the rest in the next off-season. But 2007-2008 is still a building year. By 2008-2009, and certainly by 2009-2010, they should have a team that can go deep into the playoffs and then we will see if Manning is the kind of player who can make the 3-4 plays in a big game that take you from the upper reaches of the NFL into the elite category where the Patriots and a few others reside. Until then, trying to assess him is a waste of time and energy. All you can look at now is his potential. He has the athleticism. He has made some phenomenal throws. He has the intelligence. He has gumption, as he proved with some of his fourth quarter heroics. What we will have to wait to find out is whether he, when given an additional half-second to release the ball (assuming a strong offensive line) will become more mechanically consistent, more accurate, and the kind of leader who will carry a team on his shoulders through adversity and make the big play. Anyone who says he knows the answer to those questions is probably lying or stupid. We won't know until we're there. Just to reinforce the point, remember that Simms was almost run out of town in his first three years and only because Parcells was in a position to stick with him because he wasn't worried about his job did he survive as the QB; and Brady had to share his position at Michigan (with a guy who looked like he had all the tools but hasn't amounted to much in baseball or football) while the Wolverines had the modern incarnation of Joe Montana right under their noses. You just don't know until you're "in the moment". We'll see about Eli in a few years, but we shouldn't continue to give him litmus tests each and every game until he is surrounded by a stronger team.

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