Life as a New York Giants fan is tough. Even when the team is winning Super Bowls, it’s not like they were outright dominant. It was a lot of scraping by just to get into the playoffs. The franchise has fallen on hard times, and the moral victories and silver linings won’t cut it anymore.
Look no further than the 2025 season. The team is 1-4 — all but mathematically eliminated from the playoffs — and lost Malik Nabers, its best playmaker, to a season-ending ACL injury. After riding high off their first win of the season in Week 4, last Sunday was a reminder of just how far the G-Men still have to go just to be moderately competitive.
They say when it rains, it pours, and it’s weather advisory time. Big Blue heads home to take on the Philadelphia Eagles in a Thursday night Week 6 divisional matchup, which already looks out of reach. To make matters worse, Saquon Barkley’s documentary, Saquon, is being released in conjunction with Amazon’s broadcast of the game. And what better time to go into the failed contract negotiations between Barkley and the G-Men than when they’re already down?
Saquon Barkley's documentary is going to open old Giants' wounds that still haven't healed
The New York Post was privy to a pre-screening of the documentary, and let’s just say it paints the Giants in a very poor light with some brutal quotes.
For fans finally looking to move past the contract debacle, try again. There’s going to be no escape from the quotes and the feelings the series is about to evoke.
The most painful portion revealed by The Post was the amount of money Barkley was willing to compromise on if he felt valued by Big Blue. He revealed he moved the goalpost tirelessly to get general manager Joe Schoen to budge on a contract extension, but his efforts were never met:
"“I would’ve signed for $10 million, $11 million [per year] if they would’ve just operated a whole different way. If I felt in my heart they tried their best to get it done.” "Saquon on re-signing with Giants
That's just a terrible look for Schoen.
But what might be worse is Barkley’s recollection of how Giants owner John Mara reacted to wanting a trade request:
"“I’m not going to do that. That makes no sense for us. To be honest with you, it’s not going to be in your long-term best interest to do that. There’s no way that I would allow that at this point. You are too valuable to this franchise.” "Mara to Barkley on his trade request
There’s no other way to put it — Amazon’s release of Saquon on Thursday Night Football, while the Giants and Eagles square off in primetime, was a choice. For Big Blue Nation, they just can’t catch a break. It’s bad enough the season is essentially over after their dud against the New Orleans Saints. The 28-year-old exposing his nightmare Giants exit right before they’ll likely lose at home — to those same Eagles — is mortifying.
The way the front office handled Barkley’s departure literally ended HBO’s documentary series, Hard Knocks: Offseason. Watching the team flounder in real-time discouraged every other franchise from wanting to take part in it.
The Giants are 1-4, coming off one of the most inexcusable losses in recent memory, lost Nabers for the season, have Darius Slayton battling a hamstring injury which could stunt Jaxson Dart’s development, play the 4-1 Eagles on national television, and will now have their old Barkley wounds re-opened from the running back’s perspective via a documentary that airs in tandem with the game — because Amazon knows how to make money. Sweet.
This is going to be a brutal watch.