It's not personal, Jerry Reese insisted. It’s only business, no matter how ugly his feud with angry Osi Umenyiora gets.

That was the reaction by the Giants GM to essentially being called a liar by Umenyiora for the second offseason in a row. In an interview on ESPN Radio in New York on Tuesday, Reese dismissed the defensive end’s sharp words as “offseason chatter.”

That’s exactly what he called it last summer, too.

“I don’t carry grudges,” Reese insisted. “That’s the offseason. That’s part of the job. In the offseason there’s always some controversies about contracts. It’s never personal. I don’t think it’s personal with respect to players. It’s definitely not personal with respect to me. It’s just part of the business.”

It’s been a dirty business between Reese and Umenyiora, though, as the defensive end continues his years-long battle for a lucrative contract extension. After several years of threatening to hold out or even retire, Umenyiora began making his fight personal in 2011 when he swore in a court affidavit that Reese reneged on a promise to give him a new contract or to trade him.