After sending away Odell Beckham Jr. to the Cleveland Browns and losing Sterling Shepard for now due to a thumb injury which should put him out of action for the entirety of training camp, as well as Corey Coleman to a very early ACL tear, it looks like the New York Giants might also lose one of the newest additions to their receiving corps.
Golden Tate joined the team this offseason but not long after starting with the Giants, it was revealed that Tate may be facing a four game suspension for violating the league’s substance policies. While it looks like the reason for the suspension is an accident, it doesn’t change the fact that the league’s policies have a precedent for being enforced regardless.
That’s the reason why Peter King predicts in his Football Morning in America column that Tate is going to lose the ongoing appeal, which will determine whether Tate is able to play for the Giants during the start of the season or not.
And a note about Golden Tate, who is facing a four-game ban for a PED that he claims was an innocent fertility drug—taken in a family-planning mode to help he and wife have a child. Then he found out the drug contained a substance banned by the NFL. Here’s the problem: If the NFL lets Tate slide on this, and agrees that he and his wife are innocent parties here, what does the league do about the point it’s made in scores of team meetings and scores of public statements about performance-enhancing drugs: All players are responsible for what they put in their body, and if it’s on a banned list, there are no exceptions. Does the league roll back that stricture? I doubt it.
The Giants may have Sterling Shepard back in week one if the recovery from his hand injury is a quick one, but they’ll still be quite thin at the position for the first four games unless Tate is in the lineup. They are, after all, in their first season figuring things out at the position without the presence of a star like Odell Beckham.
With the Giants also losing Corey Coleman to an ACL tear, it looks like the number two receiver spot for the start of the season will come down to players such as Russell Shepard and Cody Latimer – neither of whom have had this much pressure on them before. It’s not ideal… And the situation will leave Giants fans anxiously waiting for the result of Tate’s appeal.
Just don’t count on the NFL overturning years of precedent to allow Tate to start the season with no suspension. It’s not completely out of the list of possibilities, but unless the NFL wants to make a big shift, it just doesn’t look like something that will happen.