New York Giants Suffer a Giant Loss, But Not a Giant Surprise

BUST! Pretend Peyton! Inconsistent!

These are just few things that have been said about Eli Manning in his young career, even though he is 45-29 as a starter. Now, the Giants started off the season Red Hot, with a four-game winning streak followed by a seven-game win streak, but now they are on a two-game slump.

Everyone is probably now thinking how is this great team going down so quickly?

First things first, they have lost a lot of their great players this year. Plaxico Burress has been in and out this year, and was finally taken out for the season since he almost literally shot himself in the foot.

Brandon Jacobs has been fighting injuries for most of the season and has been for the most part unavailable for the past two games.

Next reason that I'm seeing is the fact that they don't have much to play for since they clinched their division. The only other thing they really need to play for now is home-field advantage, but to get that, all they need to do is beat Carolina this week.

The third and final reason I see for this downturn is aided by a look at the last three Super Bowl winners. In 2005, the Pittsburgh Steelers played their worst football in the month of December as they had to fight to the very last game just to get the wild card.

The 2006 Indianapolis Colts had to fight through a very rough schedule, losing two of their last four games, including their only franchise loss to the Houston Texans. Then came the New York Giants in 2007, losing two of their last four games in the month of December.

They all rode a magic carpet to the Super Bowl and proved their critics wrong.

So, if history continues to repeat itself, the Giants may just repeat their success from last year and be one of six teams in the Super Bowl Era to pull off a back to back Super Bowl win.