Devontae Booker will get opportunities, even with Saquon Barkley back
Devontae Booker of the Giants runs the ball against the Raiders at MetLife Stadium on Sunday. Credit: Jim McIsaac
The Giants hope their top running back will be healthy enough to play in their next game.
They think Saquon Barkley has a chance to play in that game, too.
OK, so that’s a little bit of a joke. Barkley, who has missed the past four games with an ankle injury, still is the team’s starter and one of the offensive centerpieces whom the Giants very much want and need to return to the field.
After spending time away from the building during the Giants’ COVID-19 testing troubles last week, he’ll be evaluated in the team’s bye-week workouts in the days to come. The plan is to have him and his dynamic playmaking back in the fold when the Giants face the Bucs on Nov. 22.
His role, though, will be very different from what it was when he limped off the field in Dallas more than a month ago. Back then, he was the Giants’ running back, period. Even as Barkley was being "eased" back into action off his torn ACL in the first four games, the Giants handed the ball off to a running back 64 times, and he was that back on 52 of them.
In Week 3, the Giants didn’t even bother to activate Devontae Booker for the game because Barkley was, well, Barkley.
But something has shifted in the time in which Barkley has been convalescing. Booker has gone from the guy whom the Giants signed as an insurance policy to someone they think can play alongside Barkley, even when both are at full health.
In the last two games, Booker has run for 159 yards on 36 carries and caught eight passes for another 88, making it almost impossible for them to take him out . . . even with Barkley’s return imminent.
"The plan is to have multiple guys who can carry the ball," coach Joe Judge said on Monday. "You’re always better off having two guys who can carry the ball and stay fresh out there and keep running it at a defense. Those two-headed monster teams are tough to face."
The Giants would like to be one of them. Judge made it clear that Barkley still is "a large part of our team and a huge part of our offense."
"We’re going to find different ways to create opportunities for him to get the ball through runs, passes, different things," he said. "That’s always going to be a main point of [our offense]."
Booker also will get those opportunities, though. He is, after all, their leading rusher this season. He took that title after Sunday’s game (not, it should be noted, from Barkley, but from quarterback Daniel Jones).
It’s not an absurd idea to believe that when it comes to Barkley’s touches, less could be more. Some of the most successful teams in Giants history had two running backs to rely upon. Judge comes from a Patriots background in which the team never had a star running back but always had a committee that would handle the touches.
This season the Cowboys certainly have figured out that getting the best out of their marquee running back, Ezekiel Elliott, can be easier to do when splitting the workload with Tony Pollard. The Browns have a similar duo in Nick Chubb and, when he’s healthy, Kareem Hunt.
Booker wasn’t thinking about that after the game against his former team, the Raiders.
"I’ll leave that up to the coaches and whatever they decide," he said after his career-best 99-yard rushing performance. "As of right now, I’m just going to enjoy this and come back from bye week and see what happens."
All of this makes for a promising immediate future while simultaneously clouding the long-term plans of the Giants as they pertain to Barkley. He’ll be due for a contract extension shortly. They drafted him with the second overall pick four years ago to become the identity of their offense. Will the Giants want to make a large financial commitment to someone who they envision splitting reps with another back?
Booker left Sunday’s game with a hip injury that was being evaluated by doctors on Monday. Judge said he was cleared to return to the game on Sunday but the Giants kept him out as a precaution — and also because fullback Eli Penny was rolling, finishing with five carries for 35 yards.
The Giants may be just as conservative with Booker this week during the bye, keeping him off the field as much as possible, to have him ready for the next game in Week 11.
If he is able to play, it sounds as if it will not be as Barkley’s understudy, picking up scraps of snaps when the lead runner needs a break or is unavailable.
Booker has been promoted to Barkley’s equal.
The Giants think they will be better for it.
Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.
