Odell Beckham Jr.: With all of the drama, it's easy to forget just how good the Giant is

Let's start this off with an admission regarding all the speculation involving Odell Beckham Jr. and whether the New York Giants would actually consider trading him.

It's easy to forget just how good Beckham is on a football field.

Part of that is Beckham's fault. Part of that is also our refusal sometimes to see anything beyond the 280 characters within a tweet, the latest juicy rumor that will draw the most clicks or keep the phone lines of your favorite sports radio talk show tied up all afternoon.

Those who dislike Beckham want him out of town. They want to trash his name and his game, and in some ways that tactic is successful in altering perception in the echo chamber of our current society, the stick to sports community included.

Those who love Beckham believe he can do no wrong, that his haters are responsible for all the drama in his life both within and away from the NFL.

The truth lies somewhere in between.

So consider this column a dose of reality to the soap opera that has engulfed the most polarizing athlete in New York area sports, and certainly— when factoring in his social media following and worldwide celebrity— well beyond those borders.

At 25, Beckham is a mega star. He's also a darn good football player who could play his way into the Pro Football Hall of Fame one day.

Yes, he's more than The Catch. Beckham put together the best three-season start to a career for a wide receiver in NFL history, including single-handedly carrying an offense to the playoffs. The Giants don't beat the Ravens and the Cowboys (the second time) without those Beckham home runs, and without those two victories, they very likely don't make the postseason.

But the lasting memory from the first and only playoff game of Beckham's career - the only playoff game for the Giants since Super Bowl XLVI, by the way - is the hole he allegedly punched into the wall outside the visitors' locker room at Lambeau Field in Green Bay.

The game itself was defined by two dropped passes of significance for Beckham, including one that could have gone for a touchdown, which may have changed the complexion of a wild-card game the Giants ended up losing to the Packers, 38-13.

Last season was supposed to represent his redemption, but a preseason high ankle sprain was the precursor to a broken ankle four games into his fourth season on a freakish play.

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And that was that.

Now all some want to focus on: how many draft picks can the Giants get in return for Beckham ... so they can go into the draft and search for the next player who may or may not be able to have the kind of impact Beckham has had.

One of the craziest things about judging Beckham and where he currently is as a player: he's compared to All-Pros Antonio Brown and Julio Jones, and rightfully so. That's the caliber of player he should be trying to emulate: their production, their presence.

But that's not even his generation. He's four years younger than AB and Julio.

Compare him to Mike Evans, Sammy Watkins and the rest of the Class of 2014, because that's his generation.

Remember: a generation in NFL terms is four years, which is roughly the average career expectancy for players nowadays.

That brings us to where Beckham and the Giants are right now with the NFL league meetings finishing up Wednesday in Orlando, Fla.

The Giants don't want to trade Beckham, but they're willing to listen if teams call to inquire. Maybe we wouldn't even be to this point if Giants co-owner and team president John Mara didn't open the door himself, but he did, and we'd be naive to think he did so without a purpose.

Beckham and the Giants are headed into a serious negotiation in which both sides know what they want. Could Mara have been posturing? Certainly. Will Beckham's team try to use the perceived tension here to his advantage? Not sure how, but if there's that opportunity, absolutely.

Beckham wants the Giants, the Giants want Beckham.

Will they end up staying together for the long haul? There are no guarantees.

By taking this approach, the Giants are allowing league sources to dictate their public relationship moving forward with Beckham. Many if not all of those sources do not have the Giants’ best interests in mind. Fact, fiction or somewhere in the middle: this is the game they chose to play, willing or not.

Case in point: ESPN's Adam Schefter reported Wednesday that the "Giants have asked for at least two first-round picks in return" for Beckham, according to a league source, "even though team insists it is not shopping him. Doesn’t mean they get it, or close to it, or even trade OBJ. But they have asked for at least two first-round picks."

So here's a hypothetical situation for you:

Team A calls the Giants: We'll give you a 1st rounder this year, a 2nd rounder this year and a 2nd rounder next year for Beckham. Giants: No way. We wouldn't even consider anything until two 1st rounders were on the table, and even then ... Team A: Giants want at least two 1st rounders for Beckham.

And that is the harm in listening. Someone else is controlling the message, and it is out of your control. This is a matter of trust, and the Giants can be completely forthcoming with how they are handling this situation; but they can't stop the game of telephone.

Here's the thing with all of this, though: the more we chase rumors and speculation, the more we turn those rumors and speculation into fact in the public domain, and especially on social media.

With so many playing fast and loose, we get a distorted view of what's real, what's imagined and what's for clicks. That becomes our reality, and it gets to the point where no one knows for sure what is real and what is fantasy, and there is no turning back from that. It's very difficult for everyone to live in that sports media world without succumbing to it.

And in our sports media world, Beckham has proven to be a king of controversy.

Good or bad, and there is no indifferent: Odell sells.

What transpired over the past four days in Orlando should change very little in terms of what the Giants want, what Beckham wants and their chances of finding that happy medium which will keep him with Big Blue beyond the final year of his rookie contract in 2018.

It's absolutely a complicated game, and predicting how it will end is difficult.

When weighing in on all the drama, don't lose sight of why this is such a big deal: Beckham is a darn good football player and the Giants just can't afford to be in the business of giving those away regardless of price.