Odell Beckham hasn't played for the Giants since 2018, but New York remains on his mind.
The hostile divorce, which culminated with OBJ's trade from NY to Cleveland, has continued to swelter under the surface years later.
"I never thought I would play for another team besides the Giants," Beckham Jr. said on CBS's "All Things Considered" podcast with Patrick McFadden and Patrick Peterson on Tuesday. "I never wanted to win a championship for anybody more than the Giants. It just was such a legendary place, I was very proud to be a part of that organization."
It's how the breakup went down that stuck in Beckham's craw.
"I felt betrayed in a sense that this coach had tried to turn me against my brothers and my people," Beckham Jr. said, via the NY Daily News. "(The coach) was telling the young guys to stay away from me because I'm not a good person or not a good (team player) or not a good role model, this and that."
Beckham didn't name former Giants coach Pat Shurmur by name, nor did he point the finger specifically at GM Dave Gettleman, who traded him out of New York.
Now with Cleveland, Beckham seems in a better spot alongside lifelong friend Jarvis Landry. The star receiver is on injured reserve after suffering an ACL tear in Week 7.
The Giants clearly bailed on a talented player, but OBJ wasn't blameless in the divorce, including sideline antics that the club grew weary of defending.
Beckham said that things turned sour when he became vocal about the team built around Eli Manning, an aging QB clearly on the downside of his career.
"I'm gonna tell you where I ran into trouble. It was when I felt like we had the pieces, we know that Eli (Manning is) a little older," Beckham said, "I've been here now, I've given you two seasons, I've shown you I can hoop, and I felt like they never put people around Eli. It bothered me because it never felt like they built around him. And we kept drafting, but we were just drafting, not, like, building an organization or a franchise.
"We were just never good," Beckham continued. "I ran into that problem when I felt that they weren't growing and evolving as an organization. I wasn't winning. I hated losing that bad. I was having great seasons. I hated losing. I hated it... It just felt like I was coming to the end of the road and was pushing for something that wasn't really tangible and that's where it all went haywire for me."
