Malik Nabers Doubles Down on Defense of Body Language: “I’m an Ultimate Competitor”

New York Giants wide receiver Malik Nabers is going to have his good games and an occasional bad game once in a while, but the last thing he wants to be known as is a bad teammate.

The Giants’ 19-11 road win over the Philadelphia Eagles last Sunday was far from a perfect one for Nabers, who was targeted a team-high eight times but caught only five passes for 43 yards and dropped a beautifully placed ball from J.J. McCarthy that would have given him his third touchdown of the season.

It was a frustrating change of pace after the LSU product had rattled off four consecutive 100-yard games, matching a franchise record, including two contests in which he was targeted at least 15 times and caught double-digit passes.

As the Giants offense’s struggles to move the football against Philadelphia’s aggressive pass rush stretched into the middle of the fourth quarter, that frustration appeared to follow Nabers to the sideline, where the FOX broadcast cameras took notice.

The moment went viral when analyst and former NFL tight end Greg Olsen and broadcast partner Joe Davis questioned Nabers’ body language and sideline demeanor during the Giants’ game in Philadelphia.

That prompted Nabers to respond on social media to what he perceived as Olsen’s depiction of him as a bad teammate during the win.

The receiver doubled down on his defense in front of the media scrum on Tuesday.

“As far as speaking about who I was intending the message to be received by, I think I said all I wanted to say,” Nabers said regarding his Instagram story.

“I felt like that was just a lie, just attacking my character as a football player and as a teammate. I’ve never been on a team where anyone has called me a bad teammate that I know of, so I would implement that too because I couldn’t speak up for myself during the game when these things were said about me.”

Olsen also took to social media to push back on the idea that he viewed Nabers as a bad teammate.

Nabers Had an Off Game

Despite Nabers’ costly drop, the Giants built a large enough lead over the Eagles in the second half thanks to a 14-play drive led by Jameis Winston, who replaced McCarthy shortly after the starter took a huge hit to his right side while running with the football. The drive ended in a wide-open connection to Isaiah Likely for the team’s lone touchdown.

Beyond that impressive possession, the Giants’ passing game was held to 198 total yards, with no receiver tallying more than 54 yards on the day, which ended Nabers’ streak of four games with 100-plus receiving yards. New York also had six drives stall in under three plays, leaving the rest of the scoring to Dominic Zvada, who went four-for-four on long-distance field goal attempts.

Even when the Giants’ first win inside Lincoln Financial Field in 13 years seemed imminent, Nabers wanted to see more from his teammates to keep their winning momentum going at a critical point in the season, as they aim to capture their first NFC East title since 2011.

He offered reassurance that his mood on the sideline wasn’t about being dissatisfied with an inability to get more touches, but rather that neither he nor the rest of the offense fully capitalized on the opportunities the defense was providing to stack the scoreboard.

“My body language is the same all the time,” Nabers added. “Whether I’m having a good game, bad game, losing, winning. You can go to the games, and you can see it for yourself if you want to go look.

“But as far as the bad body language and things being said that I was saying on the sideline, especially from people that’s watching the game, they don’t know what’s going on down on the field, what is being said. You don’t know if I’m mad, you don’t know if I’m not.

“I’m an ultimate competitor, whether it’s going well or if it’s going bad. If I make a play, my body language is I’m a mean guy, raging, slapping my helmet, screaming, never really smiling, but that’s just how I play the game of football.”

Nabers is still an important part of the Giants’ offense, and there should be no doubt he will shake off his bad outing and the unwanted controversy it has attracted to help New York rebound quickly in an impending rematch with the Washington Commanders at MetLife Stadium on Thursday night.

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