The New York Giants began contract talks with wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. earlier this week.
The negotiations began days after co-owner John Mara said the two sides hadn’t began contract talks but would be speaking with Beckham’s representatives “sooner rather than later.”
Beckham has been regularly participating in live drills during training camp, a sign that he has recovered from the broken ankle that limited him to four games in 2017. The Giants also wanted to know where Beckham stood with their new regime before beginning negotiations.
The start of negotiations are a good sign that a new deal will be finalized before the Giants’ regular season opener against the Jacksonville Jaguars on Sept. 9.
“Depends on how reasonable they are,” Mara said Wednesday on “The Morning Show with Boomer and Gio.”
At one point, Beckham said he wanted to be the NFL’s highest paid player. He later modified his statement to state he wants to be the league’s highest paid wide receiver. The Pittsburgh Steelers’ Antonio Brown is currently the highest paid wideout, earning $17 million per season.
Ten of the 12 wide receivers taken in the first two rounds of the 2014 NFL Draft have signed extensions, including The Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ Mike Evans. He signed a five-year, $82.5 million extension with $55 million guaranteed.
Any deal would more than likely use Brown and Evans’ deals as barometers.
Beckham will make $8.5 million this season in the fifth-year option of his rookie deal. He did himself huge favors by attending the Giants’ offseason workout programs, organized team activities (OTAs), and minicamp. Mara has said on different occasions that Beckham is “moving in the right direction”.
Beckham also has developed a relationship with head coach Pat Shurmur. Shurmur met with his star receiver in Los Angeles not long after he was named Giants head coach. The two kept the lines of communication open by texting each other regularly.
The Giants like what they’ve seen from Beckham so far in training camp.
“I see what I expected to see when we started to communicate back in February,” Shurmur said earlier this week. “This guy loves to play football, he trains extremely hard, he’s totally engaged in the meetings behind the scenes, the things the world is not aware of, and he’s got a lot of passion for the game. We were just out at a walk-through and I saw three or four times when he was talking to different players about certain techniques within the play. That’s all good stuff.”
In four NFL seasons, Beckham has 313 receptions for 4,424 yards and 38 touchdowns. He has been named to the Pro Bowl three times.
– Curtis Rawls is a Managing Editor for Full Press Coverage and covers the NFL, the New York Giants, and the NBA. Please like and follow on Facebook, Twitter, and Twitter. Curtis can be followed on Twitter @CuRawls203.
