New York Giants Lose Third Player This Week To Retirement, Fourth This Offseason, After Zach Fulton Calls It Quits
(CBSNewYork)- NFL training camps are notoriously hard, particularly for veteran players who have been going through them each year they've been in the league. The rigors of conditioning, practices, and putting the pads back on can cause vets to rethink their decision to return. For the Giants, that's now happened three times just in the week since camp started.
According to multiple reports, veteran offensive lineman Zach Fulton told the team he had decided to retire on Thursday night. Fulton becomes the third player this week to make that decision following fellow offensive lineman Joe Looney and linebacker Todd Davis.
Giants are going to run out of gold watches. Another vet has retired. This time it's OL Zach Fulton, who informed the team of his decision last night. Fulton joins Todd Davis, Joe Looney and Kelvin Benjamin as guys who have hung 'em up so far this training camp.
— Tom Rock (@TomRock_Newsday) August 6, 2021
That list includes Kelvin Benjamin if you include the entire offseason to this point. According to Mike Garafolo, the reason for the 29-year-old Fulton was the same as Looney, his body just couldn't handle the strain.
Spoke to a source on this and am told it's the same for Zach Fulton as Joe Looney. The spirit was willing but the body wasn't. https://t.co/I5nPgIGjQs
— Mike Garafolo (@MikeGarafolo) August 6, 2021
It's not unusual to see players retire in training camp, but it's been a strange trend for the Giants this week with three veterans all deciding to hang it up within days of each other.
That's not to suggest the Giants have done anything unusual or wrong that led to these decisions, and several reporters said that people they spoke to said the issue was physical for Looney and Fulton, not with the organization.
It's easy to wonder if there's a larger issue at hand after three Giants players (Todd Davis, Joe Looney and Zach Fulton) recently retired during training camp.
— Doug Kyed (@DougKyed) August 6, 2021
"There is absolutely nothing there. The Giants were great," a source close to a retired player said this morning.
Understand why the three retirements will be grouped together in searching for a trend with Giants, but I do know Joe Looney did not think his body would hold up the way he needed it to, and he didn't want to string along the coaches and hold another spot. https://t.co/UPv4njLipM
— Art Stapleton (@art_stapleton) August 6, 2021
Regardless, an inauspicious start to camp for the team which also had a brawl break out earlier this week that ended with quarterback Daniel Jones on the bottom of a pile of players.