The New York Giants are optimistic star wide receiver Malik Nabers will be ready for Week 1, believing he will be in uniform Sept. 13 against the Dallas Cowboys.
What, though, if he is not? Or, what if he is and he isn’t close to the form that he showed in 2024 during a 109-catch, 1,204-yard rookie season?
After all, players recovering from torn ACLs sometimes don’t return to full strength and productivity until their second seasons back from the injury. Nabers had an admittedly complex knee injury also
involving a torn meniscus, and had a second surgery this spring to deal with scar tissue that was causing stiffness in the knee.
Head coach John Harbaugh admitted at the end of mandatory minicamp that Nabers faces a “grind” to return to full strength.
“It’s a slog, it’s a grind. He’s still in the middle of it. He’s probably not in the middle of it now. He’s probably maybe 70 percent through. I don’t know, something like that. Eighty percent through,” Harbaugh said. “He’s still grinding. It’s going to be a grind when he starts playing again, too, to get back right.”
What if Nabers isn’t ready to start the season? Or, what if he is not the dominant player he was during his rookie season? Do the Giants have enough at wide receiver to make plays for quarterback Jaxson Dart and help him take a step forward in his second NFL season?
After looking at what they had for most of the spring, the Giants clearly made the judgment that they need more at the position when they replaced one injured player (Gunner Olszewski) with three veteran wide receivers (Odell Beckham Jr., Braxton Berrios, JuJu Smith-Schuster) at the beginning of June.
Do they have enough now? Here is a look at each receiver on the roster other than Nabers, with thoughts on the spring and what that player might offer the Giants in 2026.
Calvin Austin — The 5-foot-9, 162-pound Austin is the closest thing the Giants have to a direct Wan’Dale Robinson replacement. He spent the spring as the starting slot receiver in the Giants’ 11 personnel package. He is capable, but he’s not Robinson. Austin had 84 receptions in three seasons with the Pittsburgh Steelers. Robinson had 90 or more receptions each of the past two seasons. With Olszewski out for the year, Austin might emerge as the primary punt returner.
Odell Beckham Jr. — Harbaugh might be the only coach in the NFL willing to give Beckham, who did not play in 2025, a chance to revive his career. Can Beckham do that? He is nowhere near the dominant player he was during his first stint with the Giants. What he can still do is catch the football, run quality routes, and find spaces in zone coverages. Can he stay healthy and be on the practice field every day? Can he accept a part-time role if he does make the roster?
Braxton Berrios — Entering his eighth season, the 30-year-old Berrios is a 1:1 replacement for Olszewski. Berrios has spent his career as a reserve wide receiver and kickoff/punrt return man. Berrios suffered a torn ACL in 2024, and missed time with a hamstring injury last season. His spot on the 53-man roster is far from guaranteed.
Dalen Cambre — Cambre made the catch of minicamp, maybe the catch of the spring, when he dove and hauled in a pass with a fully outstretched right hand. The former undrafted free agent still has only one real path to the roster. That is to convince Harbaugh that his work on special teams coverage units makes him a must-keep. As much as Harbaugh values special teams, Cambre’s chances might be 50-50, at best.
Beaux Collins — The second-year former undrafted free agent missed a chunk of spring workouts with a hamstring injury. Harbaugh likes to say that real competition for spots does not begin until training camp. Maybe so, but the missed time is going to complicate Collins’ effort to make the active roster.
Malachi Fields — The rookie third-round pick had a promising spring. With Nabers and Darius Slayton sidelined, Fields worked with the first team in 11 personnel sets. At 6-foot-4, 222 pounds, he showed the hands, contested catch, and red zone ability the Giants were hoping for.
I wouldn’t go penciling Fields in for 75 catches and 800 yards receiving, but he should find a role in the offense.
Xavier Gipson — Gipson possesses a skill set similar to Austin’s. What has held him back is his propensity to fumble the ball — 12 fumbles in 163 touches. His chance to make the 53-man roster seems virtually non-existent.
Isaiah Hodgins — At this point in his career, what Hodgins is has been well established. He runs correct routes and catches the ball. He isn’t dynamic. He isn’t a game breaker. He won’t create tons of yards after catch.
Hodgins remains popular in New York because of his terrific run in the second half of the 2022 season. Hodgins is a long shot to make the roster because he doesn’t play special teams, and, as the sixth or seventh receiver on the roster, that is problematic.
Jalin Hyatt — The former third-round pick caused a little bit of excitement because he had one nice minicamp practice during which he made a couple of nice catches. In the five spring practices I saw, though, that is all I witnessed Hyatt do. More often than not, quarterbacks didn’t even look in his direction.
Hyatt is among the group of underperforming Joe Schoen draft picks Harbaugh has given one more chance. So far, he really hasn’t done much with it. Hyatt is running out of time.
Ryan Miller — Miller caught just 14 passes over parts of three seasons with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers before the Giants claimed him on waivers near the end of the 2025 season. He looked OK catching the ball this spring, but, like Cambre, to make the roster Miller is going to have to show Harbaugh and special teams coordinator Chris Horton that they need him on coverage units.
Miller has one advantage over Cambre. He is 6-2, 221 pounds to Cambre’s 6-foot, 192 pounds. Harbaugh has surely noted the difference.
Darnell Mooney — Entering his seventh season, the 28-year-old Mooney was perhaps the Giants’ biggest offseason swing at adding a quality veteran wide receiver. A fifth-round pick by the Chicago Bears in 2020, Mooney had a 1,000-yard receiving season for Matt Nagy and the Bears in 2021, and a 900-yard season for the Atlanta Falcons in 2024.
The Giants would love it if Mooney, reunited with Nagy, could approach that kind of production. Can he? Maybe, but Mooney had a quiet spring. That doesn’t mean he won’t have a good season; it just means he didn’t wow anybody in early practices.
Darius Slayton — It is really easy to overlook Slayton, or downplay his value to the Giants. He missed all of spring workouts after surgery for a sports hernia, making him an “out of sight, out of mind’ player during OTAs and minicamp.
Slayton, who has at times struggled with drops, had one of those years in 2025 in which he struggled to catch the ball. His 7.9% drop rate was above his 6.3% career mark.
Slayton has surpassed 700 receiving yards three times in seven seasons, but has not done so since 2023. Still, it seems like whenever the 29-year-old is counted out or pushed down the depth chart, he finds a way to climb back and fill an important role. I expect him to do the same in 2026.
JuJu Smith-Schuster — The fact that the Giants added Smith-Schuster along with Beckham and Berrios caught some people by surprise. Entering his 10th season, Smith-Schuster is a capable player, but not a game-changer.
In his early practices with the Giants, Smith-Schuster flashes good hands and the ability to catch the ball in traffic. Will he make the season-opening roster? That’s a good question. I think so, if Nabers lands on the Physically Unable to Perform (PUP) list and the Giants keep seven receivers. Still, he clearly is competing for a spot.
Final thoughts
If Nabers is missing from the lineup or limited, the Giants’ wide receiver group won’t be nearly as dynamic as it could be. The group could be OK, but there are a lot of question marks:
- Mooney and Slayton need to be reliable. Neither has to match or exceed their career-best numbers, but both need to produce when called upon. It would help if both, especially Slayton, could stretch the field with an explosive play on occasion.
- Austin has to give them something. It isn’t realistic to expect 50-60 catches, but he has to make some plays.
- Fields doesn’t have to be a star. The Giants need him to make some contested catches, and be a short yardage/red zone threat.
- Whether it’s Beckham, Smith-Schuster, Hodgins, Hyatt, Berrios, or someone else, the Giants need another player to step forward and be able to at least help the offense churn out first downs when needed.
The wildcard in the passing attack isn’t even a wide receiver. It is tight end Isaiah Likely. He averaged 33.75 catches in four seasons with the Baltimore Ravens. The Giants are paying him $40 million over the next three years ($20.5 million guaranteed) to be much more than that. If he is, that will be a huge help. If he isn’t, that will put more pressure on the wide receivers.
