Eli thanks Redskins' Hall for 'giving' him game-winning TD pass

Eli Manning sounded more than amused in his response to Washington Redskins DeAngelo Hall's claim that the Redskins gave the New York Giants quarterback and the Giants the game-winning  touchdown pass to Victor Cruz in the final minutes of last Sunday's 27-23 victory at MetLife Stadium.

In fact he sounded downright grateful.

"I appreciate him giving it to me ... thank you," was the snide reply by the usually reserved Manning on Wednesday.

Hall tried to cold throw water on Manning's heroics by claiming the 77-yard Cruz catch-and-run touchdown had nothing to do with what the quarterback did but what the Redskins defense didn't do.

"I don't feel like he made that play, Hall said earlier.  "I feel we gave him that play.  We just had one guy set his feet and one guy not do this.  I could have thrown the ball and he would have scored.  It wasn't something where he was a rocket scientist and he figured some thing out.  We just played that as bad as possible."

The Giants QB saw Hall's comments after practice and was uncharacteristically chatty.

"I didn't say it took rocket science to figure it out, either," Manning said.  "You got a guy running open and you hit him.

"I wasn't offended by it.  I never claimed it was some great read or something we planned or figured out.  Hey, Vic ran a good route, he was open, you hit him and that's all I really think about it."

Manning, who hasn't been this glib since his Saturday Night Live monologue, suggested he was more of a football tactician than a NASA scientist.

"It doesn't bother me," Manning added.  "If that's the way they want to put it in their heads that is fine.  The fact is that was a coverage they messed up, that's what you got to do as an offense, you got to take advantage of it, if a team wants to give up some plays or they don't want to play well on a certain day it's our job to play better and make the plays and take advantage of that opportunity."

Still, there is a connection between Manning and rocket science.  After all, the Giants game-winner was scored with a Cruz missile.