Giants suspend Burress for four games after gun incident

Just one day after NY Giants wide receiver Plaxico Burress was arraigned on two felony weapons charges in New York City, the team meted out their own justice.  After meeting with Team President John Mara, General Manager Jerry Reese and head coach Tom Coughlin, the Giants suspended Burress for four games for ‘conduct detrimental to the team’.

That means that Burress is done for the regular season and since the Giants also put him on the “reserve non-football injury list” it also means that he can’t come back for the playoffs either.  It’s all a matter of semantics anyway, since Burress’ self inflicted accidental gunshot wound to his thigh would keep him out four to six weeks anyway.  Despite swinging the hammer at their trouble prone wide receiver, Team President Mara suggested that the Giants’ thoughts were with him:

"As we have said since Saturday morning, our concern is for Plaxico's health and well-being. This is an important time for him to take care of his body and heal up and also deal with the very serious legal consequences and other issues in his life. When I spoke with Plaxico he expressed great remorse for letting down his teammates."

General Manager Reese said that based on his conversations with Burress he understood the seriousness of the situation:

"I had two conversations with Plaxico today, and it was obvious that he understood the magnitude of this situation”

Coughlin, meanwhile, took his usual “we’ve got to get past this distraction and win” position:

"When you lose a player of Plaxico's ability, it is incumbent that everybody step up and fill the void. In the last two seasons, this team has done an outstanding job of that."

In addition to the injury to Burress’ thigh, he’s also going to take a hit to the back pocket—he’ll not be paid while under suspension which will cost him around $206,000 per missed game.  He’s also got a $1 million signing bonus payment due at the end of the year, and the status of that is not known at this point.

Burress accidentally shot himself in the thigh at a New York nightspot called “The Latin Quarter” on Friday night, not long after the Giants announced that he wouldn’t play against the Washington Redskins due to a hamstring injury.  After sustaining the injury, he used a fake name at the hospital and gave a false account of the circumstances behind the shooting to medical personnel.  He turned himself in on Monday and was released on $100,000 bail.  He will now await a grand jury’s decision on whether he should face an indictment on the charges. His next court date will be March 31 2009, unless he works out a plea agreement in advance.