CLOCK IS TICKING

Time already starting to run out for Manning

THE GIANTS are a franchise in No Mann’s Land. Bills 28, Giants 14 means John Mara’s pipe dream of Eli Manning playing the entire season while Daniel Jones watches and learns is quickly going up in smoke. The Giants are in No Mann’s Land because there are more troubling, ominous indications they cannot win with Manning, and they would not win with Jones either, such is their current state. At 0-2, the Eli Watch has begun much too early. Because it is getting late early around here once again. This has become Deja Boo all over again for disenchanted, disillusioned Giants fans who deserve better than losing three consecutive home openers, and losing period. It is not yet time for Jones — not at 0-2, not with Golden Tate suspended for two more games — but the clock is now ticking on Manning, and the queries about Jones for Pat Shurmur won’t be stopping. “I don’t think that’s a conversation for right now,” Pat Shurmur said. The Giants, even with a defense that once was feared and roughneck and played with so much pride and can now only be described as deplorable, have winnable games on the road in Tampa and at home to the Redskins next, but all bets would be off at 0-4. That would be a conversation for then. Then games at home against the Vikings and on the road on Thursday night against the Patriots would likely loom as sacrificial-lamb games for

Manning, who by then would be Dead Mann Walking. And if the Giants found themselves at 1-5, the Cardinals at home on Oct. 20 would give Jones a softer landing spot for his debut following 10 days between games.

Manning was sacked only once on 45 attempts, so at least the improved offensive line wouldn’t turn Jones into a skittish, shell-shocked basket case.

They always want to see the new kid, especially when the old guy’s recent winning percentage compelled the decision-makers to draft the new kid, and especially when the new kid was unexpectedly one of the Boys of Summer.

The Giants came into this season thinking — hoping — they could win while they build, when the reality is they are not winning while they rebuild.

They traded away Odell Beckham Jr. — Manning sure could have used him, ya think? — and then Tate was tackled by a fertility doctor and Sterling Shepard was too concussed to play against the Bills. Evan Engram (6-48) was blanketed and Saquon Barkley (18-107-1 TD rushing, 3-28 receiving) provided a reminder that franchise running backs, even the best running back in the league, cannot lift a franchise the way a franchise quarterback can.

Poor Manning (26-for-45, 250 yards, 1 TD, 2 INTs) is asked to gallantly hold the fort, except it is a fort that continues to crumble all around him.

Here is a frightening thought: until the Giants figure out who they are and what they are, if they ever do, they are wasting the early years of Barkley’s prime.

Manning, following three consecutive three-and-outs in the first half, found TJ Jones with a 4-yard TD pass at the end of a 12-play, 76-yard drive to cut the deficit to 21-14 early in the fourth quarter.

This is where the Big Blue of yesteryear would have unleashed a Lawrence Taylor or a Michael Strahan or an Osi Umenyiora or a Justin Tuck on the quarterback and made life easy on a lost young cornerback (DeAndre Baker) or veteran cornerback (Janoris Jenkins) and made a stand. Instead: The Deplorables surrendered a 13-play, 75-yard drive that would have ended with a field goal if Dexter Lawrence hadn’t unnecessarily roughed the center on the kick and ended instead with a 1-yard Frank Gore TD run.

At the end of the first half, from the Buffalo 21, Manning had a pass tipped by Ed Oliver and intercepted by Trent Murphy.

“When you’re 0-2, there’s pressure with everybody, that’s just the way it goes,” Manning said. “But you can’t have that affect you, you can’t let that change the way you prepare, the way you play. I gotta make better throws and better decisions and find ways to convert on third downs. That’s a quarterback’s job.”

Drafting Jones with the sixth pick of the draft was a move with the future in mind. A future that is closing in on Eli Manning.