New York Giants Receiver Odell Beckham Jr. Shines in NFL Debut

It took a little longer than anyone anticipated, but the New York Giants finally took the bubble wrap off receiver Odell Beckham Jr. this week, and he did not disappoint.

Beckham, who had been bothered all summer by a hamstring strain that caused him to miss the entire preseason and the Giants' first four games, caught four out of five pass targets for a team-leading 44 yards and one touchdown in New York's 30-20 win over the Atlanta Falcons on Sunday.

Year	Player	Receptions	Yards	TDs
2014	Odell Beckham	4	44	1
2009	Hakeem Nicks	2	18	0
1997	Ike Hilliard	1	19	0
1994	Thomas Lewis	1	8	0

“Words can’t even describe it—to be out this long, have the adversity I had,” Beckham told reporters after the game. “I just want to thank God for giving me the opportunity to play (and) allowing me to score in my first game.”

Beckham’s touchdown, which came in the fourth quarter, put the Giants ahead for good, commencing a run of 20 unanswered points in the game’s final 15 minutes of play.

“I didn’t exactly know that the ball was coming, but I had an idea,” Beckham said. “I just saw it go up and I’m just thinking in my head, ‘There’s no way that I’m going to let this one hit the ground.’ I did my best to just run under it and catch it. That feeling is something that I can’t even describe.”

What’s even more amazing is that the 15-yard score came on a pattern that he and quarterback Eli Manning had yet to work on in practice.

“We have never thrown that route in practice, so we’ve got to get in practice and get on the same page with the timing of things, so I can understand his body movement, his feet, and everything that he can do so that we can be on the same page,” Manning said in his postgame press conference.

Head coach Tom Coughlin, who during Beckham’s absence made little attempt to hide his frustration, did not attempt to hide his joy in seeing the rookie excel in his first NFL game during his press briefing.

“I was impressed. He is certainly going to add a lot to our weapons and our opportunities,” Coughlin said. “For the first time back and for not having the preseason and all of those types of things, the athleticism was obvious to everybody, and his speed will have to be reckoned with.”

What was also impressive about the rookie is how well he handled himself in the face of adversity, a trying period in which he acknowledged his frustration as well as Coughlin’s frustration.

“"We're not going to let him go if he's in danger of hurting himself,” Coughlin said at the start of training camp in late July, a day after Beckham had to leave drills after aggravating the same hamstring issue that bothered him during the spring.

“That's all there is to it," Coughlin said. "I can stand here and fight all I want. It's not going to matter."

With Beckham finally having cleared the hurdle, his play has gone a long way toward mending fences with his head coach.

“Any time you’re out and you’re injured and what you love to do is taken away from you, it challenges your character as a man,” Beckham said. “I hear about it every day and it’s just something, it’s a constant reminder of when I get that opportunity, I’ve got to make the most of it because you never know when your last one will be. I feel like I’m going in the right direction.”

With a solid start in the books, the next step is for Beckham to build on this week’s performance, something he’s anxious to get started with. 

“There’s still time for more work to do,” he said. “There were a few times where I didn’t take the best release and didn’t give Eli the amount of space to throw, so there are a lot of things that we need to work on.”

Coughlin agreed.

“It was a good start for him. He has missed playing. He has missed competing,” he said. “I think if he can look at this game and take the (positives) and the negatives and learn from it, it is definitely going to help him going forward.”

All quotes and information obtained firsthand via postgame press conferences unless otherwise sourced. Follow me on Twitter: @Patricia_Traina.