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It’s a hard time to be a running back in the NFL these days.
The top backs are called upon again and again to to provide for their teams with heavy workloads at one of the sport’s most taxing positions.
But when it’s time for the teams to repay (literally) the work, it often ends in animosity.
Just ask New York Giants star Saquon Barkley.
Barkley recently agreed to a one-year deal with the Giants worth up to $11 million.
But not before things got contentious between he and the team that drafted him No. 2 overall in the 2018 NFL Draft.
“My leverage is I could say, ‘f— you’ to the Giants, I could say, ‘F— you to my teammates,” Barkley said on a recent podcast appearance. “And be like, ‘You want me to show you my worth? You want me to show you how valuable I am to the team? I won’t show up. I won’t play a down.’ And that’s a play I could use.
“Anybody [who] knows me, knows that’s not something I want to do. Is it something that’s crossed my mind? I never thought I would ever do that, but now I’m at a point where I’m like, ‘Jesus, I might have to take it to this level.’ Am I prepared to take it to this level? I don’t know.”
Las Vegas Raiders star Josh Jacobs is currently in a similar situation. Jacobs, a two-time Pro Bowler and returning all-pro team member, has yet to agree to a long-term deal to remain in Vegas.
The league’s top running backs are tired of being underpaid. But Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay doesn’t seem to care.
NFL Running Back situation- We have negotiated a CBA,that took years of effort and hard work and compromise in good faith by both sides..to say now that a specific Player category wants another negotiation after the fact,is inappropriate. Some Agents are selling ‘bad faith’..
— Jim Irsay (@JimIrsay) July 26, 2023
“NFL Running Back situation- We have negotiated a CBA,that took years of effort and hard work and compromise in good faith by both sides..to say now that a specific Player category wants another negotiation after the fact,is inappropriate. Some Agents are selling ‘bad faith’…,” Irsay tweeted on Wednesday.
Fans were not happy with Irsay’s take.
NFL teams famously never want to rework contracts before they are completed https://t.co/oZBbtPbGUP
— SlippinBenny (@SlippinBenny) July 27, 2023
Neither were agents…
Bad faith is not paying your top offensive player https://t.co/ZYvrLhxygG
— malki kawa (@malkikawa) July 27, 2023
And some journalists believe it was better off unsaid.
Some things are better left not Tweeted. https://t.co/Q3U5H3tFIb
— Field Yates (@FieldYates) July 26, 2023
Colts star running back Jonathan Taylor hits free agency following the 2023 season. Surely Irsay’s tweet won’t come back to bite him.