One of the toughest weeks of Malik Nabers’ standout young NFL career was compounded by a “family emergency back home.”
With the Giants in the facility Friday for meetings but not practice, Nabers said that he wasn’t in the locker room after Thursday’s game for personal reasons — not because of his frustrations after losing a fumble for the first time in three years and not preventing an interception on the final pass of a 24-21 loss to the Commanders.
“You are thinking about plays that could’ve been the difference in the game,” Nabers said. “That [fumble] could’ve been one of those. We could’ve got a field goal or a touchdown. Sadly, went away just off a mistake I made. Just try to be better, and I’ll be better on protecting the football and having awareness of where I am.”
Nabers is close friends with former LSU teammate Jayden Daniels, who improved to 4-0-1 against the Giants as Commanders quarterback.
“It’s bugging me pretty bad,” Nabers said. “He calls me all the time. He’s probably trying to call me right now. But I can’t answer that phone call.”
Nabers laid flat on his back on the turf at the end of the game after Rasul Douglas intercepted a jump ball. He always encourages his quarterbacks to just give him a chance, but J.J. McCarthy could’ve thrown elsewhere against a zero blitz when the Giants needed to gain only 20 yards over the next 34 seconds to attempt a 50-yard field goal.
“I saw the ball go up,” Nabers said. “I didn’t really see [Douglas] or where he was so I’m not really aware. My head is looking up at the ball, even though he was driving on the ball. Just seeing how high the ball was and waiting for it to come down, made a jump to catch the ball and got hit, and he made a play.”
Nabers was criticized last week when his body language against the Eagles was critiqued by the Fox broadcast team of Joe Davis and Greg Olsen. He fired back twice after interpreting their words as suggesting he is a bad teammate.
There was a time Thursday when Nabbers hopped up and down and gestured to the sideline after an incompletion to Isaiah Likely. He had two catches for 3 yards at the time.
But Nabers also hustled to block for Likely on his 66-yard touchdown catch. The two danced together in the end zone. But the celebration soon turned into disappointment. How do you move forward?
“I’m still trying to find ways,” Nabers said. “I take losses more painful than a lot of people. I want to win so bad. When I receive a loss, it hurts. … You just have to be able to flush it, move on and do everything you can the next week to try to win. It’s hard, for sure. I don’t know how to handle that. I’m still going through that. I’m still learning to find my way on flushing losses like this — or losses in general.”
