The Giants are looking at a few veteran receivers, but they already know one player at the position they want on their roster.
New York is signing Braxton Berrios to a one-year deal, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter.
Berrios, 30, spent last season with the Texans. He appeared in four games, catching six passes for 37 yards. He also returned three kicks, averaging 27.0 yards, and three punts, averaging 8.3 yards.
Berrios would appear to slot in as a direct replacement for Gunner Olszewski, who suffered a torn Achilles during OTAs last week.
Berrios has appeared in 91 games with six starts since entering the league in 2018 as a sixth-round pick. He’s caught 140 passes for 1,360 yards with six TDs.
The Giants were also reportedly working out Odell Beckham Jr. and JuJu Smith-Schuster.
Odell Beckham Jr. won’t be the only veteran wide receiver working out for the Giants on Monday.
Beckham discussed the possibility of a second stint with the Giants over the weekend and he’s already worked out for the team once this offseason. Adam Schefter of ESPN reports that the team will also be working out free agents JuJu Smith-Schuster and Braxton Berrios on Monday.
The workouts come after the Giants lost wide receiver Gunner Olszewski to a torn Achilles in practice last week. Malik Nabers is recovering from a torn ACL and Darius Slayton recently had core muscle surgery, so the team is short on healthy wideouts at the moment.
Smith-Schuster played for Giants offensive coordinator Matt Nagy in Kansas City the last two seasons and had 33 catches for 345 yards and a touchdown last year. Berrios only played in four games for the Texans, but has experience as a returner and that was Olszewski’s main role for the Giants.
Beckham did not play last season and had nine catches in nine appearances for the Dolphins in 2024. He was a Giants first-round pick in 2014 and spent his first five NFL seasons with the team.
UPDATE 8:23 a.m. ET: Ian Rapoport of NFL Media reports Anthony Miller will also be involved in the workout. Miller played two games for the Ravens in 2024, but did not play at all in 2022 or 2023. He had 134 catches in 47 games for the Bears over his first three NFL seasons.
They have to install playing surfaces that meet exacting standards. They have to change the names of the facilities. They have to shut down all other business (such as major concerts) for the duration of the World Cup.
Given the hoops through which the 11 NFL stadiums will have to jump in order to placate FIFA, it’s fair to ask whether it’s worth it.
Ben Volin of the Boston Globe recently took a look at that question. Said an NFL official from a team that won’t be hosting any of the World Cup games, “I know more than a few teams weren’t disappointed to lose the bid.”
That could be sour grapes, because those who won the right to host the matches are crowing about it.
“Can’t sleep,” Cowboys owner and G.M. Jerry Jones said recently, per Volin. “This is a great chance to associate with the worldwide love with soccer, and lets us put a little notch on our belt and share it with what soccer’s about, too. They’ll never be able to take away that we held those games in that stadium.”
Cowboys executive Stephen Jones echoed the sentiment: “We’ll be shut down all summer. But it’s worth it. I mean, this is about brand and, you know, being a part of something special.”
The Joneses wanted to host the matches badly enough to give up their suite for the matches.
“I think I’ve got to go someplace else, but that was a part of it,” Jerry Jones said. “We did a lot of things to make this work.”
The Cowboys, Patriots, Falcons, Texans, Chargers/Rams, Giants/Jets, Chiefs, Seahawks, 49ers, Dolphins, and Eagles will be hosting World Cup games in their stadiums.
The total revenue is projected, per Volin, to be roughly $11 billion. FIFA will pay rent for the stadiums, while keeping the revenue from sponsorships, tickets, suites, merchandise, concessions, and parking.
So how much will the teams get for hosting the World Cup? Per Volin, the terms “have been kept under wraps.”
Given that folks like Jones are not known for doing bad deals, they’ll surely be making more money to host the World Cup matches than they would have made in a normal summer.
Still, it’s a headache. Extra work, extra expenses, extra hassles.
Not to mention the P.R. bruise that comes from the perception/reality that NFL owners who are giving FIFA the surfaces it demands while stubbornly refusing to do the same for pro football players.
The Giants need another receiver, after the recent torn Achilles tendon suffered by Gunner Olszewski. Could Odell Beckham Jr. be the answer?
Beckham spoke to the New York Post on Saturday, at linebacker Brian Burns’s charity softball game.
“You know, it’s a place I never wanted to leave,” Beckham told the Post. “And it’s just a special place in my heart just to see all these Big Blue jerseys. Just hoping for the best.”
So where do things stand?
“I think you just rely on the things you always rely on, which is my faith,” Beckham said. “And, you know, God has a place of special purpose and journey for me, and just being able to spend that time away, just made me realize some things. You know, I left some things unfinished, so hopefully we’ll see what he’s got working out.”
What would he say to anyone who questions whether Beckham still has it?
“I guess we gonna find out soon,” Beckham said.
Via Ryan Dunleavy of the Post, the Giants will be working out free-agent receivers on Monday. Beckham reportedly will be among the attendees.
Earlier this month, Giants coach John Harbaugh left the door open for a potential Beckham signing, with a caveat.
“It’s got to be right for both parties,” Harbaugh said, “and Odell wants to be the kind of player that can make a difference. I’m pretty sure that he can make a team in the National Football League right now. But can he make a difference?”
The biggest question is where he’d land on the depth chart. Malik Nabers, Darius Slayton, and Calvin Austin III are the expected starters. Olszewski is a backup and a kick returner.
The team’s anticipated use of Beckham also will determine the contract he’d be offered. Given that he hasn’t played since the 2024 season, the Giants likely wouldn’t be making a major financial commitment. Which means he likely wouldn’t be in a position to make a major impact.
That’s the real question. Does he simply want to be on the team? Does he want to be on the field most of the time? Is he expecting to get a lot of passes thrown his way?
Both sides need to be on the same page about Beckham’s role. It won’t be what it was from 2014 through 2018.
Will whatever the Giants are willing to give him be enough? The answer will determine whether there’s a deal to be done.
Now that the Supreme Court has declined to accept the NFL’s last-ditch effort to force all or part of the Brian Flores case into arbitration, the litigation will finally get going.
And the going could get nasty.
By way of background, I have handled many employment cases. From both sides. After working for years at a firm that focused on representing corporate clients that had been sued (no matter how strong or weak a given case may have been), I decided that I was more interested in representing individuals who had cases I believed to be strong.
So I’ve been there, done that. Many times.
Here’s the reality. No company that has been sued for wrongful termination will admit it. The witnesses will have locked into their stories months before it’s time to take the oath to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Proving that the party line is essentially a lie requires a relentless pursuit of circumstantial evidence to contradict the predictable denial of discrimination, retaliation, etc. (For example, if the plaintiff was fired for violating a specific workplace rule, it’s useful to show that others violated the same rule, without being fired or even disciplined.)
This means that, in the Flores case, his lawyers will aggressively pursue deposition testimony from a wide range of witnesses from the league office and the various teams that have been sued (so far, the Dolphins, Broncos, Giants, Texans, Cardinals, and Titans). Plenty of the witnesses (starting with the Commissioner and any owners) will not react well to being verbally poked, prodded, and pressed for anything beyond the predictable default position: “we didn’t do anything wrong.” These witnesses will emerge from the deposition process feeling anywhere from frustrated to flat-out pissed off.
Flores (along with the other plaintiffs, Steve Wilks and Ray Horton) will deal with the same kind of thing. The lawyers representing the NFL and its teams will look for anything they can find to make them look bad. They’ll dig and dig and dig some more to make the process as uncomfortable as it can be. They’ll throw mud at the wall. They’ll throw mud directly at the plaintiffs. They’ll try to catch them in any potential misstatement, big or small, that could then be characterized at trial as a lie.
In the deposition process, there’s a wide range of latitude when questioning a witness. With no jury present, the lawyers don’t have to worry about being so aggressive (to the point of being openly hostile) that it may alienate the people who will decide the case.
This is what I’d typically say to anyone who was interested in suing a current or former employer: “Think of the worst thing about yourself that you wouldn’t want other people to know. You don’t have to tell me what it is. Just think of what it is. Then, think of what would happen if that thing became public. And then assume that, at some point during this litigation, it will.”
The unofficial playbook for lawyers defending corporate clients against claims of illegal employment practices includes turning the tables on the plaintiff in the hopes of making the plaintiff look as bad as possible when it’s time to present the case to a jury. It gets messy. It gets ugly. And, like the Commissioner and owners who are questioned by Flores’s lawyers, Flores will emerge from his deposition feeling anywhere from frustrated to flat-out pissed off.
That’s how it goes. The discovery process becomes the legal equivalent of a street fight. Which could be bad for the league, the teams, and/or Flores, Wilks, and Horton.
As the snippets of deposition testimony come to light, it will be very good for my current business.
