Xavier McKinney Says Saquon Barkley Has His Unconditional Support

As the New York Giants prepare to report for training camp next on July 25, the veterans will do so minus one very important member of the team.

That would be running back Saquon Barkley, whose negotiations with the Giants failed to produce a multiyear agreement that would allow him to avoid playing on the one-year, $10.1 million franchise tag.

Instead, a disappointed Barkley is expected to skip training camp and continue his training out in Arizona, thousands of miles away from East Rutherford and his teammates, as he also contemplated what to do about the start of the 2023 regular season.

But at least one teammate who has been in contact with Barkley since talks with the Giants fell through will be thinking of the running back when football drills begin next week, and that is safety Xavier McKinney.

"I'm not gonna speak on it too much, but I've been in contact with him," McKinney said during an appearance on The Jim Rome Show. "Just letting him know that I love him, that he's my brother, that I know how much he has an impact on our team and just kind of letting him know those things."

McKinney said he's with Barkley "a hundred percent" regardless of what decisions are made and would have no hard feelings either way. The safety also declined to offer any opinions about what his teammate's next move might be.

"Whatever he decides--obviously, we want him to be there. But if he can't, we understand that as well. And I think that's not just for me, but that goes for a lot of guys in our locker room.

"We all with him, we all respect him, we all love him, and we all know what he brings to our team, and we know what he'll bring to any team as well. So and we also know how great he is in this league. So that's how we approach it. And we'll just keep it at that."

McKinney also spoke about how lucky he was to not lose three fingers on his left hand following his ATV accident last year during the bye week on a trip to Mexico.

"Yeah, it was close, man. It was really close. I just thank God every day. But you know, that situation could have been a lot worse. I think that's what another reason that kind of just pushed me through it because sometimes...you can die from things like that. So you know, the, the fact that it was just a hand injury, and, nothing else... I was blessed to come out with that."

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