Odell Beckham came out on the winning end of his matchup with Josh Norman despite the Giants' loss. However, the wideout claims he was also fighting a losing battle with the referees from the get-go.
Officials around the league weren't oblivious to the nine months of hype that surrounded Beckham-Norman II and were likely on high alert, as viewers were, for fireworks. Beckham says that the refs initiated a pregame conversation with him concerning his behavior.
"Today, they came up before the game and said, 'If you do anything, we're throwing you out of the game.' That was before the game," Beckham said. "There was no, 'You get a warning.' There wasn't any of that. You've just got to be on your best behavior. Unfortunately, this is what we've come to. It's not really football any more as much as it is all of the other things that play into it.
"Today, I think we did a great job making it a lot about football even though there were a lot of outside implications that went on that kind of predetermined the matchup before it happened instead of letting us play football like we've done our entire lives."
Beckham had his best game of the young season on Norman, catching seven balls for 121 yards and eclipsing 3,000 yards for his career. But his afternoon wasn't without antics.
Norman lifted Beckham like a ballerina in the end zone, preventing the wideout from running a proper fade route. Then, following a red-zone interception later in the game, Beckham required a pep talk from Eli Manning and several members of the coaching staff after a sideline tirade that saw him whip his helmet into the kicking net.
Things didn't spiral out of control like in Beckham's last meeting with Norman, and it's possible that the refs' stringent warnings played a part in the players' self-censorship. However, it can't be comforting for Beckham to know that he has earned this reputation among officials.
