Getty Saquon Barkley of the New York Giants
Saquon Barkley has an ally in New York Giants legend Tiki Barber.
Appearing on today’s episode of the Scoop B Radio Podcast, I asked Barber what Barkley’s ceiling was. “Right now, he’s living it,” he told me.
“But it’s interesting because he gets compared to at least successful things I did in my career. If he stays with the Giants, my records have no chance. He’s going to run through them. But it’s interesting. It took me about 4 years to figure it out; in 2000 or so, I started to figure it out, 2001 how to be consistent, how to stay healthy, how to be a reliable contributor. Saquon had that from Day One! And if you start and if you get it [the proverbial ‘get it’] from Day One and he had great success; he was Rookie of the Year and I can’t remember if he led the league in rushing but, he was right up there.”
During his rookie year, Saquon Barkley set a record with the most rushing yards by a rookie by notching 1,307 yards and had the distinction of setting a rookie record for the most touchdowns in a season by a rookie with 15.
What’s next? “The next thing that you want is team success,” Tiki Barber tells Scoop B Radio.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – DECEMBER 18: Saquon Barkley (R) hosts event for lucky Verizon Up Super Ticket recipients together with Tiki Barber at Bryant Park on December 18, 2019 in New York City. (Photo by Mike Coppola/Getty Images for Verizon)
“And so, after one year, Rookie of the Year. Second year, he had a little bit of a setback; maybe because of that high ankle sprain that kept him off the field for a couple weeks. He played, but he battled it and he finally started to get right at the end. But now going into Year Three, it’s like, we need to win. I mean, we got this from this side of our team — we got pieces on the defensive side of the team, we have a quarterback that we all believe in and we got a coach in Joe Judge that is no-nonsense and tells it like it is… we gotta start winning. And so if I’m Saquon, in my mind I’m saying, what are we winning? It’s not like he we gotta build another year, once we get this through the Draft…that’s gotta go out the door. And it’s on him; because when you think about it, who are the leaders there? It’s him. They’re a young team, the New York Giants and Nate Solder’s 30 years old, but he’s a tackle. Saquon’s got to be that leader and Daniel Jones has to follow and hopefully it leads to wins.”