New York Giants Running Back Saquon Barkley Responds to Critics Who Say He’s ‘Dancing’

Saquon Barkely is not having it.

The New York Giants running back is fighting back against the narrative that he does too much dancing in the backfield. An anonymous coach put Saquon Barkley on blast when ranking this year’s running backs. ESPN released its list of the NFL’s top 10 running backs for 2022, in which Execs, coaches, players make their picks for the best rushers in the NFL.

“I’m down on him — he still doesn’t know how to play running back enough,” the anonymous coach said. “He’s a bouncer. He wants every run to be a home run. He’s going to have to learn that 4-yard runs in this league are good, instead of stopping, cutting it back and losing 2. And he gets his ass kicked in protection.”

Barkley caught wind of the critics, and blasted back about what people perceive as his running style.

“I know … a thing that’s been said about me is he don’t know what he’s doing, he’s just dancing back there,” Barkley said. “I’m really kind of fed up with people who never played the position and try to speak on how I run the football. We call them All-Pros with clickers in their hand.”

“Running back is a tough position, but it’s easy to be there and watch football and watch on TV or even watch film and stop the clip and say he should have made that cut.”

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Saquon Barkley gives a long answer on why he's fed up about people saying he's "dancing." pic.twitter.com/lSIcKriWoJ

— Talkin’ Giants (@TalkinGiants) August 18, 2022

Barkley did acknowledge that the head coach and his staff want a physical running style.

“The coaches have been making a point of emphasis of, a running style that we have as a team and the mentality that we have as a team and like I said, I want to do whatever coach wants me to do and that’s been my focus which — trying to be the best running back I can be for the team.

“Coach has kind of an emphasis, meaning we want to get more physical, we want to get more downhill.”

Barkley rushed for 593 yards and two touchdowns on a team that posted a 4-13 record.

Saquon certainly hasn’t lived up the hype, but he’s also never been able to stay healthy. It would be nice to see him at least live up to his fantasy rankings once in his career.

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