Giants performance against Cowboys will be telling message to John Mara

ARLINGTON, Texas — There is nothing the Giants can do to salvage their season, but there is plenty they can do to stop, momentarily, the most important person in the franchise from dwelling on all those bad thoughts that must be swirling around his head.For all concerned, especially head coach Brian Daboll, the best advice for this Thanksgiving is to make sure co-owner John Mara is able to muster some sort of holiday spirit at a time when there is nothing to feel good about with a team in free fall.There are certain games that resonate differently.Losing to a bad Panthers team on an international stage in Munich was one of those games.

Coming off the bye week, returning home and putting on an embarrassing — yes, soft — display Sunday against the Buccaneers was another one of those games.That was an anomaly, not that the Giants lost, but that they looked as if they were not interested in competing at a respectable level.

That 30-7 defeat turned a dismal season into a dangerous one, as far as repercussions that might await Daboll and general manager Joe Schoen after the Daniel Jones saga left a bitter aftertaste for all concerned.Now comes this: Of all the teams in the league Mara wants to beat more than any other, the Cowboys are near or at the top of that list.His father, franchise patriarch Wellington Mara, once said, “It’s nice to see arrogance humbled’’ after a Giants upset victory in 1996 over the Cowboys — then the defending Super Bowl champions — after Dallas owner Jerry Jones irritated Mara by parading across the end zone during the game at old Giants Stadium.

Wellington Mara was not exactly a trash-talker so this was quite a public expression of animus, a sentiment about the Dallas owner handed down from father to son.John Mara’s Giants are in bad, bad shape and this is a vulnerable, reeling and possibly unraveling team that arrives in AT&T Stadium on Thursday to face Jones’ Cowboys.This is an unusual spot for the home team, pre...