Calling himself “disappointed,” New York Giants interim head coach Steve Spagnuolo sounded ready to handle the situation involving cornerback Eli Apple and his in-game tweeting. He also sounded ready to move on from the whole distraction and get his young player back on the field soon.
During Sunday’s 30-10 loss to the Dallas Cowboys, Apple tweeted in-game, a move in direct violation of the league’s policy on social media use. After the game, he also ‘liked’ on Twitter a clip of Rod Smith’s fourth-quarter touchdown against his teammates, something that created quite a bit of anger among Giants fans.
Now the explanation for Apple supporting Smith is because the two attended Ohio State together. Apple did not play on Sunday, a coaching decision due to his limited reps this past week but even as he was inactive he is not allowed to tweet per the league’s rules.
“Yeah, I heard about that. I had a conversation with Eli about that. I was disappointed. I told him I was disappointed,” Spagnuolo said. “We’ll decide exactly what we’ll do with it, but it was disappointing. He apologized and we’ll move on.”
Injuries have contributed to Apple’s difficult second season in the league, the former first-round pick looking like a star in the making a year ago and certainly justifying his selection as the ninth overall pick. This year, family issues and the poor overall play of the Giants defense have all contributed to this drop in form.
It has been a difficult year for the Giants and Apple hasn’t been immune to this.
“I guess that’s true. Some of it has been injuries. It’s been back and forth. He’s struggling. We all know that he went through a struggle personally. I mean, I think you’re all aware of that and sometimes it takes a little while to recover from that. I’m not saying that that’s an excuse, but he’s got to step up, show his teammates, his coaches that he’s ready,” Spagnuolo said.
“I believe he wants to and is going to do that. We just need to see him do it. Last week, it was a little bit of a groin I think early in the week and then felt a little bit better. Now, something about a back. I hope you all can understand that a lot is going on in this small brain of mine from last week, so I can’t piece it all together, but I’m hopeful and optimistic we can get him going. I’m disappointed in the tweeting thing, but hopefully, we can get over these hurdles.”
