So you didn’t think the nightmare of the Giants season couldn’t get any worse?
Well it just did.
According to the New York Post, quarterback Eli Manning and the New York Giants have been passing along fake memorabilia to collectors and the likes of the Pro Football Hall of Fame so Manning could keep the items for himself. The team’s equipment manager Joe Skiba, locker-room manager Ed Wagner Jr. and dry cleaner Barry Barone are also very much involved according to the report:
According to the lawsuit, Joe Skiba told [Eric] Inselberg [the sports collector bringing the suit] that he “created fraudulent memorabilia at the direction of the Giants’ management and players,” including Manning. For years, the Giants operated a racket in which they “repeatedly engaged in the distribution of fraudulent Giants memorabilia,” Inselberg claims. They then “coerced and intimidated” Wagner and the Skibas “into lying to the FBI about it,” the suit alleges.
These allegations include Manning asking Skiba for a game worn helmet back in 2005 that he signed and put on the market claiming it was from his rookie season. Some of this memorabilia was even displayed in the Giants’ Legacy Club at MetLife Stadium which is hilariously ironic. The charges also aren’t something to scoff at which come down to “civil-racketeering, breach-of-contract, malicious-prosecution and trade.”
