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For most of the 2015 off-season New York Giants defensive end Jason Pierre-Paul was an avid tweeter. He often let fans -- and the New York Giants -- know how how hard he was working to prepare for the 2015 season. He routinely posted Instagram picture or videos his grueling workouts as he battled to improve his explosiveness, conditioning, and a 265-pound goal weight.
The results of JPP's workouts are evident in the marked improvement of sophomore defensive tackle Jay Bromley, who spent time training with the defensive end over the summer.
But since JPP's July 4th accident, he has been (predictably) absent from social media.
In his first tweet in more than a month, JPP announced a charity event to help get school supplies to kids in need. But rather than talk about Pierre-Paul's good works, some of his followers seized upon a couple typos and made light of his injury.
That, perhaps, lead JPP to tweet the following roughly an hour later.
What happened to me was not a set back. God has greater plans for me. No man can judge me accepted God himself.
— iamjasonpierrepaul (@UDWJPP) August 23, 2015
For the Grammar Police out there, JPP obviously meant to write "except" instead of "accepted". Now, typos are hardly exceptional on the intergoogle (or interwebs, if you use Safari or IE for some strange reason) but once again folks took the opportunity to talk about his missing right index finger (not that having the full compliment of fingers makes typos or auto-trolling any less common).
To all of them JPP replied:
My bad except lost a finger LOL.
— iamjasonpierrepaul (@UDWJPP) August 23, 2015
Ultimately, there are two ways of looking at these tweets. The first is that JPP is being annoyingly flippant over an injury that may have jeopardized his team and teammates. As Cris Carter has pointed out on ESPN, everything JPP is, the New York Giants have helped to build. The Giants drafted him higher than anybody thought they should, then committed to teaching a raw-as-steak Tartar athlete how to play football. They gave him time to grow as a football player and put him in an exceptional environment to do so. His success is their success, and an injury to him is an injury to the whole organization.
But on the other hand (no pun intended), regardless of how much JPP means to the Giants -- and it is a lot -- nobody has been hurt more by his accident than JPP himself. Perhaps his making light of his injury is a good thing. The teammates and coaches who have talked to JPP have all said that he is in good spirits, and this latest tweet seems to be a testament to that. One of the most important aspects of overcoming adversity is attitude. If JPP has truly reached a point where he can joke about his injury, it could very well likely a good thing.
For JPP and the Giants both.