‘Hard Knocks’ reveals John Mara-Joe Schoen talk that spelled end of Saquon Barkley with Giants

If it were up to Giants owner John Mara, Saquon Barkley may still have been a member of Big Blue.

While the opening episode of “Hard Knocks: Offseason with the New York Giants” bounced around to a number of offseason issues that Joe Schoen and the Giants brain trust faced, the departure of the 2018 first-round pick played a central role throughout the 40-minute episode.

The most telling moment came during a Feb. 13 conversation between Schoen and Mara at the Giants facility in East Rutherford.

The HBO cameras captured a frank discussion between the two over what franchise tagging Barkley would really accomplish and whether there would be a trade market for Barkley if they decided to go that route.

“What are we really gonna get unless it got down to $7 million? I don’t want to offer that because I don’t want to be like we ‘disrespected him,’ ” Schoen said during the conversation. “There’s 31 teams and it only takes one to maybe be open to doing something. If it doesn’t get to that then, hey, we’re going to let you hit free agency. Find out your market, come back and let us know if we can match it. If we can, we’ll have those discussions.”

It was during that moment that Mara expressed a desire to still bring the Penn State product back, telling Schoen that “in a perfect world, I’d still like to have him back.”