It’s sad to watch Eli Manning talk about his performances, because the drawl and droopy expression makes him look like some guy living in a bad country song, and then it’s made worse when he is compelled to take elliptical voyages around head coach Tom Coughlin’s assessment that his offense was "pathetic."

He won’t deflect the mea culpa, because this is not Eli’s way. Like some of us, he may dismiss facile analyses such as Coughlin’s P-word summation, but when you seek direct answers about how you can shuffle effort, execution, personnel and schemes into the failure equation, he’s coming to dodge.

So he’ll take the hit. Again. Just like he has for every loss this season since Chicago, the only game that was truly his fault. This 23-0 abomination against the Seahawks will be remembered for Manning’s five picks, and his coach’s screed that followed, but as long as Coughlin and countless others have decided that this 5-9 debacle is predominantly an Eli failure, we’ll take one last crack at defending a QB who will never defend himself.

Because in the wake of another great team reducing the Giants offense to a gnarled, hopeless funk (that’s seven in a row, dating back to Week 15 last year), we’d just as soon pass on the weekly debate about whether Eli is a bad quarterback or just an average quarterback having a butt-ugly year.

Our choice is to spin it this way: Someday — we hope soon — we will learn that this is presently the worst-coached quarterback in the NFL.

See, we’ve decided to grab the baton from Archie Manning this week, because the same tin-eared, insta-cliches coming from the head coach never seem to include how this QB is underserved by his staff or sabotaged by his dated schemes.

Mostly, you get this from Coughlin: "Obviously there’s concern — you perform that way and you have those sorts of results, there’s no way around it. I mean, there’s no production, there’s turnovers," he said, before he got around to mentioning that Eli had zero ground game to work around, while leaving it up to us to discern that Hakeem Nicks clearly doesn’t want to be here, judging by the effort he puts into 50-50 balls.

Coughlin never mentioned what regrets he might have regarding game planning, however, or failing to prepare anything that can offset a defense that steamrolls you up the middle. But when you get fewer than two yards per rush, and five of your passes end up in the hands of the wrong team, we’re going to take a wild stab here and suggest that it’s a little more than just effort that has brought the Giants to this point.

The most honest assessment Coughlin gave was in response to the suggestion that the back third of Eli’s prime could be a dumpster dive.

"I just don’t believe that," the coach said. "We’ve had some of these circumstances before. If we had a better running game, obviously we could tighten this up a little bit and not create those circumstances."

Only they don’t, so they can’t. And by now, we’re pretty sure Coughlin and offensive coordinator Kevin Gilbride lack the imagination to "tighten it up" or rethink their methods anyway.

Ask yourself this: Why is a guy like Josh McCown reborn at age 34, completing 67 percent of his passes, after playing for seven NFL teams and one United Football League team over the last nine years? Why is Nick Foles a world-beating, 23-and-2 guy this year who has turned Philly into a likely division champion?

The answer is that they have coaches who know how to coach quarterbacks, coaches who can take systems conceived in Canada and/or the Pac-12 and tailor them to work on this level, with efficiency — safe routes, high completion rates — owning the day. Everyone coaches their QB this way now. It’s the new normal.

In a sport that reinvents itself every four years, the Giants are stuck in a time warp, and nothing is likely to change until the coaches change.

Yes, the other QBs are more efficient. And they have receivers who get separation, their best guys aren’t constantly doubled or bracketed, they don’t have to throw into tight windows every time the ball goes up, they throw to running backs, they run quick-hitters, they have more time to throw when they want to take a deep shot, and they have tight ends who give them something other than empty numbers.

Manning has none of that.

He doesn’t even have receivers who care to break up interceptions anymore.

You already knew opponents don’t respect this offense. Seattle’s Earl Thomas confirmed it when he was asked when he knew Eli was in trouble: "From snap one," he said. But the Giants have receivers who don’t seem to think it’s worth fighting for, either.

The quarterback won’t tell us what he’s thinking; he just shovels stuff like, "Each (pick) has its own story, and sometimes it’s a bad decision or bad throw, or today it just seemed like their guys made plays."

We counted about five more mea culpas between embarrassed grins. It’s become as predictable as the Giants themselves, as they go home after 16 games for the fourth time in five years.