Getty Image / Cooper Neill
New York Giants running back Saquon Barkley has been loyal to the New York Giants throughout his career. But, he’s not feeling that same loyalty reciprocated.
After an excellent campaign in 2022 following two injury-plagued seasons prior, the New York Giants lowballed the Penn State alum in contract negotiations. After a short holdout, Barkley reluctantly signed the Franchise Tag offer and returned to the team.
Of course, those same New York Giants gave a bottom-tier quarterback in Daniel Jones over $80 million guaranteed and wouldn’t give the only actual difference maker on their offense a fraction of that. Daniel Jones was horrific this year before injuries sidelined him for the season. And, the Giants have been one of the worst teams in NFL history on a point-differential basis, with a truly awful -148 in ten games, despite winning two of them. The next-worst team in the NFL is over 50 points better.
I’m sure that the 26-year-old Barkley is not happy about wasting a year of his prime for this disaster of a franchise. And, he sounded off about what he learned this year, which doesn’t reflect well on the New York Giants. Here’s more, courtesy of ESPN.
“Loyalty means nothing,” he said. “Loyalty, that don’t mean nothing. No matter how loyal, no matter how committed you are, it’s a business at the end of the day. That is something that I have learned…..
Yeah, it’s really crazy when you break it down like that. It’s just the way the business is,” Barkley said. “When you’re a premier back in this league — not to talk about myself — they feed you the ball because it helps you and gives you an opportunity to win games more times than not. And then when it comes to contract or a certain time and you’re a running back, you having so much miles on you, it’s a crazy concept…
I try my best not to think about that or I would go insane. I just try to keep focus on the love of the game, take care of my body and whenever the opportunity comes to talk contract again — whether it’s with the Giants or another team — hopefully I’m able to pull the film or pull up numbers to be able to get a contract that is the best for me and my family.”
Yeah, not a good look for the 2-8 Giants. They will be the sacrificial lambs of the Washington Commanders this weekend, and the race for the top-overall pick in the 2023 NFL Draft is on.