Giants close locker room, await next lockout ruling
File photo of Rich Seubert. The Giants are expected to cut the veteran. Credit: Getty Images
Rich Seubert and Rocky Bernard joined Brandon Jacobs at the Giants’ Meadowlands training facility yesterday, but unlike the previous day, their visits were not very productive.
The players were allowed to pay social calls on coaches, much like Jacobs, Mario Manningham and Chris Canty had the day after Judge Susan Nelson lifted the owners’ lockout. But unlike Tuesday, the weight room was closed, thanks an admonishment from NFL headquarters demanding the Giants adhere to a closed-door policy until the stay request of Nelson’s lockout injunction is settled.
The Giants, it seems, were taken to the principal’s office for doing the right thing by their players.
Commissioner Roger Goodell told the Newark Star-Ledger he did not personally contact the Giants, but a staff member probably did.
“We have to react when judgements are made,” Goodell said as he awaited Nelson’s stay ruling. “We obviously have to comply with those judgements, but we want to make sure it’s done in an orderly fashion.”
This was not the first time the Giants' hierarchy departed from its brethren. A lot of other owners were sneering under their breath when the Giants became the only team not to ask their patrons for a penny in season-ticket money before the 2011 season is assured. The other 31 owners demanded at least partial payment by the end of April, with some soaking their fans for half the sum.
The Giants bent to the league’s pressure this time and closed the weight room. But they still allowed the players to talk to coaches, if only to say “hi.” Seubert, rehabbing from right knee reconstruction, was actually on his way back from a visit with team doctor Russell Warren, and reported that an MRI showed promising results.
