Tension brewing between Giants and Odell Beckham, again

The New York Giants have a small chance to make the playoffs, but Odell Beckham’s behavior may be leading to new tension.

They need a ton of help, but with four wins in their last five games the New York Giants are 5-8 with a chance to make the playoffs. Wide receiver Odell Beckham missed last week’s game against the Washington Redskins, and now as he seeks further outside evaluation on his bruised quad his status for Sunday against the Tennessee Titans is in doubt.

Beckham surfaced on the injury report late last week with the quad issue, with a limited practice on Friday before he was declared out on Saturday. The situation seemed to escalate quickly, from  a limited practice to not traveling for the game, and it’s worth wondering if Beckham essentially tapped out and the Giants had to live with it.

Via his “I AM MORE: OBJ” Facebook video series last Friday, Beckham revealed he has been dealing with a bruised quad since the Nov. 25 game against the Philadelphia Eagles. NFL rules would generally require disclosure of the injury, but it apparently had not limited his practice activity before last Friday and he hadn’t missed a game before last Sunday.

Earlier this week, Giants head coach Pat Shurmur casually lamented Beckham’s declaration of his injury.

"I think he’s getting better each day, but we’ll know more as the week goes on. And I encourage our players not to talk about their injuries. So hopefully that’s about all you’ll get out of it."

Beckham is no stranger to causing distractions with odd actions, and earlier this year an ESPN interview where he criticized Eli Manning with Lil’ Wayne sitting next to him is the latest. The critique of Manning is well-warranted, but the whole thing was weird enough to make his words secondary.

Soon after that, Giants owner John Mara clearly wasn’t thrilled with Beckham.

There’s no denying Beckham’s talent and production, and the Giants made him the league’s highest-paid wide receiver with a five-year, $95 million contract extension that will start in 2019. But with that rare talent comes others things that have to be dealt with, as Beckham wants to be a star off the field and he’s now empowered by a big contract.

By investing big in Beckham long-term, the Giants committed to live with all of who he is and what he does. At this point, a declaration that he’s too hurt to play and will shut himself down for the season looms as a possibility.