The contract negotiations between the New York Giants and star running back Saquon Barkley do not seem to be going too well.
Saquon Barkley has not yet signed his franchise tag with the team and has made it clear that there is at least a chance he could sit out the entire 2023 season if he doesn’t reach a contract extension with the team before the July 17 deadline.
“I think that’s a conversation, like you said, that’s a card I could play,” Barkley said according to the New York Daily News. “That comes up in conversation if something doesn’t get done by July 17. And we got a little bit of time in between there. So when that date comes up, then I’ll have to sit down with my team and my family and make decisions, see what we’re gonna do, what’s the game plan, what’s the next move.”
Much of the reason for the bad blood appears to be some frustration that Barkley has with the Giants’ front office for leaks about the contract negotiations that he calls “misleading” and “untruthful,” saying that the team has “tried to make me look like I’m greedy.”
“We say ‘family business is family business’ in that facility, in that building, and I’m gonna stick to that,” Barkley said. “The thing I’m frustrated most about is, like how I said ‘family business is family business,’ and then sources come out and stories get leaked, and it didn’t come from me … I feel like it’s trying to paint a narrative of me, a picture of me that’s not even the truth. It’s not even close to being true.”
It will certainly be interesting to see how this all plays out.
