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Remember Odell Beckham Jr.’s expensive watch? Ancient news.
The Browns receiver on Thursday accused Jets defensive coordinator Gregg Williams of encouraging players to injure Beckham in a 2017 Giants preseason game in Cleveland. Beckham suffered a high ankle sprain on a hit by Browns cornerback Briean Boddy-Calhoun.
“I had people who were here when he was here telling me, ‘If you get a chance, take a shot at him. You can hurt him. I guarantee he’s going to leave the game hurt.’ Stuff like that,” Beckham said.
Beckham missed 16 of his last 32 games for the New York Giants because of injuries. Beckham believes the injury in the Cleveland game directly led to a broken left ankle during the 2017 season and also to a quad injury that cost him the last four games in 2018.
“That’s exactly what it did,” he said.
The Browns will face Williams’ defense Monday night in MetLife Stadium, Beckham’s former home stadium for five season with the Giants. It’s the first time the Browns will oppose Williams since he was passed over for the Browns head coach job after guiding the team to a 5-3 record last year as interim head coach.
Williams was suspended for the 2012 season by the NFL for his role in promoting a pay-for-injury bounty system while with the New Orleans Saints in 2010 and 2011. Williams seemingly had repaired his reputation since his reinstatement in 2013.
Beckham’s comments were the first to charge Williams with the antics since then. Beckham made the comments in response to a question about whether he expected to face some one-on-one coverage in the game against Williams’ Jets.
“I definitely don’t think that,” Beckham said. “The only thing I’m buying is probably you just got to watch out for the cheap shots and dirty hits, all the things that he likes to teach.
“If I was a coach, I’d never teach what he teaches, but that’s just him and what he does.”
Beckham said the preseason game against the Browns in 2017 – Williams’ first year as Browns coordinator – was his only memorable experience against a Williams defense.
“Other than that, I don’t know when I played him, but I’ve seen his defense for plenty years,” he said. “[It’s] a very good defense, aside from all the other stuff he teaches. It’s very disruptive. He makes it hard for offenses.”
Beckham said Boddy-Calhoun’s low hit to just below his knee was a cheap shot because it came in a preseason game.
“It’s preseason. It’s like a known rule. Nobody in the NFL is out to do stuff like that,” he said. “I had players on this team telling me that that’s what he was telling them to do – take me out of the game in preseason. You just know who he is. That’s the man.”
Beckam said that he came back three weeks early from the preseason injury and it precipitated the subsequent injuries with the Giants.
"If God wouldn’t have blessed me the way that I am I probably would have blown my knee in that preseason game, if I couldn’t get my foot out of the ground," he said.
"And that high ankle sprain led to the broken ankle on the left, which led to compensation in different areas. It was kind of like a little spiral. It’s something that I never forget. It’s something that changed my life forever, so I don’t necessarily regret it. Of course I wish it didn’t happen, but it did. That led to the ankle, for sure."