Just two games into the season, the New York Giants have been hit with a blow that might be too much to recover from. After sustaining a knee injury in the Week 2 matchup against the Chicago Bears, Saquon Barkley is feared to have suffered a torn ACL, according to NFL insider Adam Schefter.
The injury to Barkley came early in the second quarter of the Giants’ road test in Chicago. On a 2nd and 10 carry for Barkley inside his own territory, Chicago safety Eddie Jackson tackled Barkley near the sidelines. Barkley was carted off the field and later ruled that he would not return in the game.
Oddly enough, the injury to Barkley came in the same week where he received some criticism from a Giants legend. While he might not have been necessairily predicting an injury this week, former Giants running back Tiki Barber said this week that he did not think Barkley was an every down back that the Giants could lean on.
“I will say that Saquon Barkley, he might not be an every down back. He cannot pass protect, and it is starting to become glaring,” Barber said on CBS Sports Radio’s Tiki And Tierney. “It’s probably the only issue he had to deal with coming into the NFL, he wasn’t asked to do it at Penn State. And now you see him diving on the ground, not sticking his head in people’s chests – It’s gonna be a liability, because people see it now. It’s on tape. And it’s gonna come out.”
The Giants look like they might be off to an 0-2 start in their 2020 campaign and it doesn’t look like things are going to get any easier moving forward. Next week, New York will make a trip out west to play the defending NFC Champion San Francisco 49ers. Without a healthy Barkley, they could be in trouble.
Barkley entered 2020 hoping to build off a 2019 season altered slightly by injury. Barkley missed three games due to his high right ankle sprain that he sustained Sept. 22 during the Giants’ 32-21 win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Florida.
While starting in all 13 of the games he played in, Barkley took 217 carries for 1,003 yards (4.6 average) and six touchdowns. He added a receiving threat by catching 52 passes for 438 yards (8.4 average) and two touchdowns.
After the Giants selected the former Penn State star with the No. 2 overall pick in the 2018 NFL Draft, Barkley exploded as a rookie with a monster season. He turned 352 touches (261 carries, 91 receptions) into 2,028 yards from scrimmage (1,307 rushing, 721 receiving) and 15 touchdowns (11 rushing, four receiving) en route to earning the Associated Press Offensive Rookie of the Year and making the Pro Bowl.
247Sports’ Garrett Stepien contributed to this storyread more
Report: Saquon Barkley believed to have torn ACL – 247Sports
