It was another somber locker room for the New York Giants on Sunday evening. They had just watched a potential game-tying field goal get blocked, securing a 14-11 victory for the New Orleans Saints.
It was the team’s eighth straight loss and their seventh at home this season.
Needless to say, the players weren’t exactly in a jubilant mood when reporters came with questions about the pregame protest in which a fan chartered a plane and flew a banner reading, “Mr. Mara, enough. (Please) fix this dumpster fire” around MetLife Stadium.
“I ain’t pay for no plane,” rookie wide receiver Malik Nabers said. “I ain’t got nothing to say.”
While Nabers skirted questions about the protest, other Giants players took the opportunity to mock the anonymous fan who ponied up for the plane.
“Shoot, just give me that money that they wasted,” Adoree’ Jackson told NJ Advance Media. “At 11:30, I don’t think anybody would’ve been on the field anyway. So save that money. And next time, tell them: Just give it to me. I’ll deliver the message — whatever they need. I can put a little extra money in my pocket.
“I don’t think nothing of it. Obviously, everybody has their own opinions, their own their reactions. And they may go to extreme lengths. But I don’t think it fazes us in general.”
Jackson went on to compare Giants fans to fans of the Tennessee Titans, where he spent the first four seasons of his career.
“Man, the first experience that I had with the fans (here) would be the craziest thing ever,” Jackson said. “They booed a player on the field and cheered when he came off the field. I thought that was pretty bizarre. Never really heard too much booing — actually, I never heard booing in Tennessee.”
New York is a notoriously tough place to play and Jackson feels like the fans can drag a player down. He pointed to Evan Engram and Sam Darnold as examples of players who found success once they left the toxicity of East Rutherford and the surrounding areas.
But Jackson wasn’t the only player put off by the plane protest. Wide receiver Darius Slayton, who was recently nominated for the 2024 Walter Payton Man of the Year Award, also viewed it as money wasted.
“People have money and time to do stuff like that. If that’s what they choose to do, that’s what they choose to do,” a visibly annoyed Slayton told reporters.
Linebacker Kayvon Thibodeaux was a bit more playful in his response, telling the anonymous fan who carried out the protest to “come see me.”
Meanwhile, quarterback Drew Lock also dismissed the protest as an irrelevance.
“That’s going to pretty far lengths to try and take a message,” Lock said after the game. “In one ear, out the other. Not going to affect me tonight. Not going to affect me tomorrow.”
And so the disconnect between the organization, its players, and their fans — or the “customers” as the late Wellington Mara called them — continues to grow.
