Giants news, 8/24: George Young denied Hall of Fame again, Odell Beckham contract update, more

Good morning, New York Giants fans! There is a game today, as the Giants “visit” the New York Jets at MetLife Stadium with kickoff set for 7:30 p.m. ET. Let’s check some of the headlines as we wait for that.

George Young again overlooked for Hall of Fame

Former Giants general manager George Young, the architect of the great Giants teams of the 1980s and early 1990s, has again been bypassed for Pro Football Hall of Fame consideration. The Contributor’s Committee on Thursday selected Denver Broncos owner Pat Bowlen and former Cowboys executive Gil Brandt as the two contributor finalists for the Class of 2019.

Those sentiments come from two veteran football writers who saw first-hand how Young rescued the Giants from the Wilderness Years of the late 1960s and 1970s.

Yours truly has beaten the “George Young should be in the Hall of Fame” drum for years now.

Hired by the Giants in 1978, it was under Young’s direction that the Giants ended a 17-year playoff drought in 1981, then went on to win a pair of Super Bowl titles. Young’s tenure with the Giants ended in 1997 and included eight playoff appearances. The one glaring mistake on his resume was not ensuring that Bill Belichick would succeed Bill Parcells as head coach.

Still, in my view, Young’s is a Hall of Fame body of work. Hard to understand why the voters have never seen it that way.

Beckham contract talks progressing — ESPN

ESPN reported Thursday that there is “reasonable optimism” that Odell Beckham Jr. and the Giants will on what likely will be a “record-breaking contract for a wide receiver” before the Giants open the regular season on Sept. 9 vs. the Jacksonville Jaguars.

Antonio Brown of the Pittsburgh Steelers ($17 million per year) has the largest wide receiver contract in terms of annual value. Mike Evans of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers ($55.008 million) has the largest amount of guaranteed money.

Valentine’s View: This is the timeframe we have been discussing here at Big Blue View for several weeks. It made perfect sense that the Giants would want to see both how Beckham responded to the new coaching staff and how healthy/explosive he looked after his fractured ankle before committing record-setting dollars to him. Since co-owner John Mara said at the beginning of training camp that negotiations would start “pretty soon,” the end of preseason/beginning of the regular season timeframe has seemed to make sense.

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