Odell Beckham Jr. Wants To Finish Career As A Giant
Odell Beckham Jr. has been the talk of the New York Giants front office this offseason with his desire for a new contract heading into the final year of his rookie deal. Beckham Jr. was absent from the New York Giants voluntary offseason OTAS a few weeks back and had many people wondering whether it was his way of showing displeasure of his current contract situation. At the end of the regular season, New York Giants’ General Manager Jerry Reese told Beckham Jr. he needed to grow up and mature over the course of the offseason. Beckham Jr. responded to those comments by skipping the team’s voluntary workouts to grow and mature as a person. To say that the next few months between the New York Giants and Odell Beckham Jr. will be interesting is an understatement.
There is clearly tension between Beckham Jr. and the front office of the Giants since the beginning of the offseason, but Beckham Jr. has undoubtedly proved his worth to the franchise during the first three years of his young career. In three years with the Giants, Beckham Jr. has caught 288 passes for 4,122 yards and 35 touchdowns which has him near the top of the league during that span. The team must find a way to keep him happy despite only making $1.8 million this upcoming season to have any chance at taking down the defending NFC East champions in the Dallas Cowboys.
Odell Beckham Jr. plans to be a Giant for life. https://t.co/sns98Yugs8 pic.twitter.com/pmo7gJbiMS
— ESPN (@espn) June 13, 2017
Even though Beckham Jr. now makes more money with his endorsement with Nike than with the New York Giants, he has refused to openly come out and say he is displeased with his currently structured contract and believes it will eventually resolve itself. Jordan Raanan of ESPN wrote about Beckham Jr.’s current situation with the Giants and quoted him on what he thinks about the rumored contract dispute.
“I couldn’t really tell you. Like I said, when the time comes. Any contract question is not for me to discuss. I haven’t really talked to anyone about contracts. So it’s not something that has been in the air. It was kind of something that was brought up amongst other people. It was never really in my discussion. Take it a day at a time, and when it comes, it will come.”
Beckham Jr. later contradicted himself in a later interview with reporters saying that he was training in Los Angeles to get in better shape. While in Los Angeles, Beckham Jr. was seen at the NBA Finals between the Golden State Warriors and Cleveland Cavaliers. Despite missing the voluntary OTAS, New York Giants’ quarterback Eli Manning believes that Odell Beckham Jr. did not miss much and should be fine moving forward during minicamp.
Beckham Jr. has since reported to the team facilities for minicamp and all seems to be well, but he still received questions about potentially holding out for a new contract with the Giants. Steve Politi of NJ.com wrote about Beckham Jr. contradicting his words through his actions throughout this offseason and quoted him regarding his reason for not holding out of minicamp.
“I have seen the whole holdout and all of that stuff and I have never really seen that work, so that was never in my mind, to not go to OTAs to get a new contract. I don’t really think that that proves a point in my opinion.”
Even with the tension that seems to be between both parties during this offseason, Beckham Jr. and the Giants’ front office have both openly stated that they want Beckham Jr. to finish his career with the New York Giants. For the sake of Beckham Jr.’s happiness, a deal must get done before the start of the 2017 NFL season.
[Featured Image by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images]
