Giants wide receiver Odell Beckham had quite a busy Sunday.
His interview on ESPN Sunday morning made a stir, he dropped a pass on fourth down, botched a punt return that turned into a Panthers touchdown, threw a touchdown pass to Saquon Barkley, caught a touchdown and caught eight passes for 131 yards in the team’s 33-31 loss. After that game came to an end, Beckham was asked about the interview that kicked the day off.
Beckham said he was “trying to be a leader” when he said that he thinks the Giants have lacked heart and energy this season and disputed a report that he apologized to the team for saying it on Saturday night. He did speak to the team, however, and said he is “proud of where we went today.”
“I don’t regret anything that I said,” Beckham said, via NJ.com. “If it took that for us to come together as a team, like we did today, I can take that every single time. I kind of spoke to the team, just to relay the message that sometimes stuff comes off the wrong way. Words can be portrayed in any kind of light. … The words were between us. The way we responded to what was said, I feel like it would have been too easy after what was said, and what I said to them, to come in here and fight and have heart, energy, grit, whatever words you want to use for that, we had it today. But, we came up short. But, I’m proud of this team. This is the team that we’re going got be for the rest of the season.”
In the interview, Beckham also said he doesn’t know if Eli Manning is part of what’s been wrong with the offense. He said that he’s had a conversation with Manning as well, but did not share any of the details.
Head coach Pat Shurmur also addressed Beckham’s comments after the game and declared the issue “finito” because it had been dealt with in the locker room.