PHOENIX — Free agent wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. wants to return to the New York Giants. The Giants are at least open to looking into adding Beckham for a second tour with the team.
After Beckham, 33, reiterated his desire at a flag football event last week for a reunion with the Giants, his former coach seemed at least open to the possibility.
“The obvious pat answer would be you look at every option,” Giants coach John Harbaugh said Monday during the coaches’ breakfast at the annual league meeting. “And if Odell is an option, we’ll be looking at him for sure.”
Harbaugh maintained that he has a strong relationship with Beckham after their time together in Baltimore during the 2023 season. Beckham had 35 catches for 565 yards and three touchdowns that season.
But he has played in just nine games over the past two years. He was suspended for six games in 2025 for violating the league’s policy on performance-enhancing drugs and then went unsigned the remainder of the season.
It would take Harbaugh’s approval to get him back into the NFL and to New York.
“He and I do talk. We do text,” Harbaugh said. “We’ve maintained a really great relationship. He’s one of my very favorite people in the world. It’s not like you don’t talk to guys on things like that. And certainly we have.”
Beckham has seemed more willing than the Giants to date. New York re-signed veteran wide receiver Isaiah Hodgins and added Darnell Mooney and Calvin Austin III in free agency over the past month.
But the veteran receiver has the support of some of the current Giants players. Multiple sources told ESPN that quarterback Jaxson Dart and wide receiver Malik Nabers have informed the team that they would support adding Beckham. Dart mentioned earlier this offseason that he spoke to Beckham about Harbaugh after he was hired as the Giants coach. Nabers went on Instagram recently and publicly petitioned for Beckham.
“Let’s play together,” Nabers commented on an Instagram post from Beckham.
Nabers and Beckham are LSU products and have a preexisting relationship.
Meanwhile, Harbaugh said the Giants remain a “work in progress.” They are not done fine-tuning their roster. He left open the possibility that Beckham could become an option at some point.
“We’ll just have to see how it all goes. What’s best for him, what’s best for the Giants. That is the No. 1 thing. It is what is best for our team and any player. If he helps you be a better team and can make you better, then you are going to pursue that.
“We’ll just have to see where that goes,” the coach said.
Beckham has been training in Arizona in preparation for this season. He insisted that he intends to play this season, and he impressed at the Fanatics Flag Football Classic in Los Angeles earlier this month.
“Looking forward to hopefully getting the opportunity to play this year, and this is kind of just the starting point,” he told sports show host Kay Adams in an interview before the event.
Adams brought up the possibility of playing with the Giants and Dart. That piqued Beckham’s interest.
“Weird you say that. That sounds great; if that opportunity presents itself, I would love to do that. I would be excited about that,” he said. “[Dart’s] a good dude. He’s young. He likes to dance. I like all that. So he looks like he likes to have fun … if I get the opportunity.”
