The New York Giants made Saquon Barkley one of the faces of their franchise when they selected him with the No. 2 overall pick of the 2018 NFL draft, but the running back felt disrespected they didn’t do everything they could to keep him when he hit free agency after six years.
“I kind of felt like it was kind of a little disrespectful, to be honest,” he said during a conversation with Dianna Russini of The Athletic that was released Tuesday (23:20 mark) when discussing the Giants having him go find offers and then come back to see if they would match it. “It’s kind of like a slap in the face.”
Barkley ended up signing with the division-rival Philadelphia Eagles.
The running back’s future with the team was a major talking point ahead of the 2023 campaign when the Giants decided to reward quarterback Daniel Jones with a long-term deal and place the franchise tag on Barkley to prevent him from hitting the open market.
The Penn State product ultimately didn’t sign the tag, and the two sides agreed to a one-year contract to prevent a lengthy holdout.
He finished last season with 962 yards and six touchdowns on the ground to go with 41 catches for 280 yards and four touchdowns as a receiver. His 3.9 yards per carry represented a dropoff from the 4.4 he posted as a Pro Bowler in 2022, and he was also unable to eclipse his career-high 1,312 rushing yards from the previous season.
Perhaps the Giants were concerned about the decrease in production for the 27-year-old. A conversation between Barkley and general manager Joe Schoen that was revealed in HBO’s Hard Knocks made it clear where the team stood.
“I think, just mulling over this, the right thing to do is let you test the market and see what your value is. I don’t want to do the franchise thing, or all that again, I don’t want to go through that, we’ve both been through that,” Schoen ssid If you really want to be a Giant for life and you’re interested in staying here and coming back, just see what your market is and have Ed come back to us and we’ll see if we can come to an agreement.”
