December 16, 1984

The Giants were fortunate their game against the New Orleans Saints today could not affect their chances to make the playoffs. They played ineffectively on offense and erratically on defense, committed too many penalties and allowed too many sacks, and they lost, 10-3. The Giants finished their regular season with a 9-7 record. They will make the National Football League playoffs only if the Washington Redskins defeat the St. Louis Cardinals Sunday and the Miami Dolphins beat the Dallas Cowboys Monday night. If that happens, the Giants will play the Los Angeles Rams in a wild-card game next weekend in Anaheim, Calif.

When Robert Bauer made his regular visit to his wife's hospital bedside one morning last year, he had no inkling what was about to happen, how it would change his life forever and end his wife's. For two years his wife, Emily, had suffered from Lou Gehrig's disease, or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a gradual but relentless disease of the spinal cord that results in complete paralysis and eventual death. She could not talk any more. She had a screen on her table and a switch by her pillow, which she could nudge with her head to laboriously print out a typed message. Mrs. Bauer could not swallow, so tubes up her nose carried nutrition to her stomach. She could not breath by herself, so a respirator pumped air into her lungs through a hole in her throat. She could not control other body functions either.

RALPH ACOSTA JR. can tell when winter has arrived - not by the calendar, not by the weather but by the heightened public interest in the homeless. ''It's almost as though the season makes the problem,'' said Dr. Acosta, who is program director at the county-sponsored shelter for homeless men and women, run by the Volunteers of America at the Westchester County Airport, ''That's a conception we'd really like to change,'' said the Rev. Rayner W. Hesse Jr., the priest in charge of St. Andrew's Episcopal Church in Hartsdale and the president of the Coalition for the Homeless of Westchester. The group of county charitable, civic and religious organizations was formed in August last year to act as an advocate and a resource for the homeless. ''It's not a winter problem,'' Father Hesse said. ''It's a year-round problem that's increasing. The fact that people are cold and need a place to stay cannot be denied. But there are cold nights during the summer, too, and if you have no food and no place to go, you have as much chance of dying then as in the winter.''

The accident at the pesticide plant in Bhopal that killed at least 2,000 people has obscured the fact that pesticides have also brought better health to millions of people in India and other third world countries, according to international food and health officials here. The risk of such accidents and the more usual concern that pesticides may harm farmers or contaminate food and water supplies must be balanced against their value, according to these experts. Output Greatly Increased In the last two decades, they say, India has increased its grain output thanks partly to the application of pesticides. The green revolution, which has made India largely self-sufficient in food, was based on the development of high-yield strains of wheat and rice that required irrigation and fertilizers.

THIS is Rickey Henderson: 'He took off from second base with the pitch,'' Butch Wynegar related, recalling his most vivid memory of a Henderson escapade. ''It was a fastball right down the middle that the hitter took. When I caught the ball, he was barely reaching halfway between second and third. When I came up to throw, I remember thinking to myself, 'I got him, I got him.' I made a perfect, chest- high throw to Nettles, but by the time the ball got there, he was sliding in safe. I swear he accelerated like I have never seen anyone accelerate. I stood there bewildered. I was in awe.'' This is Rickey Henderson: Dave McKay was at first base for Oakland when Henderson bunted the ball hard through the grass on the right side of the Yankee Stadium infield. Tom Underwood, the pitcher, dived for the ball but missed it. Jim Spencer, the first baseman, had charged toward the plate with the pitch and helplessly watched the ball roll past him. With the Yankees playing for a force at second, Dennis Sherrill, the second baseman, broke for the base and was nowhere near the ball as it rolled across the infield dirt and toward the outfield grass. The ball barely reached the grass, but Henderson easily reached second with a bunt double.