NFL

Plaxico says case ‘blown out of proportion’

Former Giants receiver Plaxico Burress appeared on “Good Day New York” yesterday and spoke about his time in prison, saying he deeply regrets his actions and that he thinks society’s reaction was over the top.

“I believe it was totally blown out of proportion,” said Burress, who shot himself in the leg accidentally when a gun he was carrying went off inside a nightclub. “I believe with everything that was said by the mayor and the media . . . that it was just over-generalized and I think it went a little further than it needed to go. But at the same time, I was accountable for my actions.”

Burress, who spent 20 months in prison for criminal possession of a weapon and reckless endangerment, was publicly rebuked by Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who stated that Burress should be sentenced to the fullest extent of the law.

Overlooked was that Burress held a conceal carry license for the gun in the state of Florida, though that license had expired and Burress failed to file for one in New York.

Burress caught the game-winning touchdown pass from Eli Manning to beat the then-undefeated Patriots in Super Bowl XLII to secure one of the greatest upsets in sports history. Ten months later, he was in police custody for the incident at Manhattan’s Latin Quarter nightclub.

“I look back on that night,” Burress said. “And sometimes, you just wish things had never happened. It was just bad judgment, a bad decision . . . It just goes to show that I had lifelong dreams since I was seven years old to get to the NFL and I made one bad decision. I had those things taken away from me so quickly. One bad decision so quickly took everything away.”

Burress said he carried the weapon that night because he was unnerved by a string of violent attacks on pro athletes, including an attack on his friend.

“There was certain things going on,” Burress said, “that were happening in the New Jersey area with a teammate of mine being robbed at gunpoint a few days prior to my incident . . . just having that kind of uneasy feeling.”

Burress said he is working with the National Urban League Gun Prevention Program to fight against gun violence and deaths.