Giants' Dexter Lawrence likely out for  rest of season with dislocated elbow

To add injury to insult, the Giants not only lost a game on Thanksgiving, their seventh in a row, but also lost their best player.

In what likely was his last game action this season, nose tackle Dexter Lawrence suffered a dislocated left elbow in the third quarter in a 27-20 road loss to the Cowboys.

“Well, he’s got an elbow, and I would say that I anticipate it being a long-term injury, the rest of the season,” coach Brian Daboll said on Friday. “Still going to have to take a look at a few different things, but not very optimistic about it.”

Lawrence was hurt on a run by the Cowboys’ Rico Dowdle. He extended his left arm in an attempt to impede Dowdle, at which point linebacker Bobby Okereke came up from behind to tackle Dowdle, crashing into Lawrence’s exposed arm in the process.

Lawrence, who has nine sacks and 42 tackles this season, is widely seen as a disruptive force in the middle. He made the Pro Bowl the previous two seasons and didn’t play in fewer than 16 games in his first five NFL seasons.

Lawrence spoke to reporters after Thursday’s game wearing a heavy bandage on his arm, which was held in place by a sling.

Asked how he would feel if his season were over, he said: “I’d be hurt. I’d hate to not be able to go out there.”

Linebacker Brian Burns said after the game: “Big loss. That’s a big guy inside. He calls for a lot of attention, so that’s a big loss for us. But more important, I’m worried about his well-being.”

Compounding the problem: other injuries on the defensive line. D.J. Davidson (shoulder) and Rakeem Nunez-Roches (stinger) also were hurt on Thursday.

Might the Giants need to sign defensive linemen before they host the Saints on Dec. 8, be it from their practice squad or from elsewhere?

“There’s definitely a chance of that,” Daboll said.

The coach said tight end Theo Johnson suffered a foot injury on Thursday that also is likely to be long term.

Daboll said injury decisions about Lawrence or anyone else will not be shaped by the fact that the Giants (2-10) became the first team eliminated from playoff contention.

“No, status quo,” he said. “It’s just play time, and everything we can do to put the best guys out there, and that’s what we’re looking for.”

As for the Giants’ quarterback situation, Daboll said the staff would decide on a starting quarterback Friday.

Tommy DeVito missed Thursday’s game with a sore right forearm, making way for Drew Lock.

“We’ll see where we’re at,” Daboll said. “We’ll see where Tommy’s at. We’ll see where Drew’s at.”

Lock made some plays against the Cowboys, including a long run that set up a touchdown and an 8-yard scramble for a score. But he also lost a fumble and threw an interception that the Cowboys returned for a touchdown.

“I thought Drew did some good things,” Daboll said. “We’ve got to, obviously, clean up the turnovers . . . We’ve got to make sure we’re taking care of the ball. Give our guys a chance down the field to make some plays.”

Things aren’t much better on defense. The Giants set an NFL record on Thursday by going an 11th consecutive game without an interception.

And it will not get much easier. Three of the Giants’ last five opponents currently have winning records.

It appears team president John Mara will stick by his midseason promise not to make a coaching change during the season, so Daboll will have to try to figure out some path out of this mess.

How does he plan to motivate his players to get through this last month?

“We’re all professionals and we have a job to do,” Daboll said. “Again, I’ve said this many times: The results aren’t what they want, we want. But there’s a lot of pride and commitment to improving and doing the things we need to do on a weekly basis.

“We’ve got a lot of young players that have come up, learned from the older guys and work extremely hard during the week, and we’re not getting the results. But they’re professionals. Our job is to go out there and do everything we can to improve each week and get ourselves a chance to get the results we look for.”

By Neil Best

neil.best@newsday.com@sportswatch

Neil Best first worked at Newsday in 1982, returned in 1985 after a detour to Alaska and has been here since, specializing in high schools, college basketball, the NFL and most recently sports media and business.