It certainly was an eventful year in the life of Giants defensive end Osi Umenyiora.
He spent the lockout as one of the plantiffs in a court case against the league, supplied an affidavit that pretty much called Giants G.M. Jerry Reese a lawyer liar (Freudian slip?), staged a short holdout in camp because of unhappiness about his contract and then chose to have knee surgery shortly after reporting. He missed three games, returned and then suffered an ankle injury that cost him four more games. He returned again for the end of the season and the playoffs and came up with one of the bigger plays of the Super Bowl run when he stripped Aaron Rodgers in the third quarter of the victory over the Packers.
Umenyiora made it clear during the season that he was still unhappy about his contract, which has one year at $3.975 million remaining, but that he wasn’t going to make a stink about it during the season. The season ended on Sunday night and it didn’t take long for questions about the future to start flying Umenyiora’s way.
“Honestly, I am going to go home and sleep, enjoy this victory and we will get to that,” Umenyiora said, via Ohm Youngmisuk of ESPNNewYork.com. “I don’t know what is going to happen. I haven’t really thought about this. It will all be up to them. I have nothing to do with that.”
It actually won’t all be up to the Giants. They could choose to trade or release Umenyiora, but if they don’t avail themselves of those choices and don’t offer the defensive end a new contract then the ball will be right back in Umenyiora’s court.
Umenyiora’s past comments have indicated he’s looking for elite pass rusher money, something that the Giants might not be willing to offer. The emergence of Jason Pierre-Paul, Umenyiora’s injury history and the need to address other areas of the team would all seem to work against Umenyiora getting the kind of deal he’s talked about in the past. If that deal isn’t forthcoming, it could be another year of drama for the defensive end.