Snap Judgments
Don Banks, SI.com
On the surface, at least, you have to admit the story line has a familiar ring to it: As the NFL draft approaches, a highly rated collegiate running back with a national championship pedigree is trying to overcome a disheartening string of setbacks, most seemingly of the self-inflicted variety.
He didn't do much of anything at the Scouting Combine in Indianapolis, and his pro day workout didn't exactly bolster his sagging fortunes either. His judgment, commitment and maturity level have come into question because he's overweight and out of shape at the worst possible time, and as the final days of his pre-NFL career wind down, you can almost see his stock dropping despite the obvious talent that jumps out at you on game film.
OK, we'll say it: Is USC's LenDale White this year's Maurice Clarett?
No, not really. But there are echoes of Clarett's sad saga in White's tale of woe this spring. At least one highly respected club personnel man I talked to this week made the comparison, and if he's done it, others in the copycat NFL are likely to have arrived at the same observation. At a minimum, White appears to be this year's first-round enigma, with a penchant for making league talent evaluators wonder what in the world he could be thinking.
"He has cost himself big-time,'' said a club personnel man. "It's not to the level of Clarett -- it's not that bad and he doesn't have the same track record -- but there are some similarities in judgment. You talk about a guy making some bad decisions. He's a talented guy who is really [bombing] at the worst possible time. When it's [crunch] time and you have to know if you can count on a guy, you think about things like this. Again, he's not Maurice Clarett. But he's making you think about Maurice Clarett. And that's not good.''
Maybe the news this week that White has a hamstring tear and won't be able to run much for another month or so will actually help stop his perceived first-round free fall. Maybe the injury partly explains how he ballooned up to 244 pounds this offseason, has struggled to break a sweat for NFL scouts in his "workouts'' and has seemed anything but focused on making that all-important good first impression with coaches and club decision-makers.
In short, White hasn't been too bright, telling NFL teams he gained a bunch of weight going on a holiday eating binge at his mother's house before the Trojans' Jan. 4 Rose Bowl game against Texas, choosing to do little at the combine before he first hurt his hamstring and generally giving the impression that he is, as one NFL personnel man put it, "a million-dollar talent with a 10-cent head.''
"Put it this way -- he has not improved his stock whatsoever,'' another longtime club personnel man told me this week. "This kid doesn't know how to be a pro yet. It's not at the Clarett level, but he hasn't done himself any good.''
Here's one more key way that White isn't Clarett in USC colors: He won't drop out of the first round, let alone all the way to the final pick of the third round, where Clarett wound up going to Denver last year. But White once was considered a potential top 10 pick. Today most draft projections have him going somewhere in the 20s, which represents a substantial loss of revenue in terms of his first NFL signing bonus.
But the very fact that anybody in the NFL has made even a casual link between Clarett's fate and White's plummet is not good news for the former Trojan. In the NFL, a comparison with Clarett can only be construed as a one-way street heading in the wrong direction.
• Let me get this straight: Eric Moulds will be catching footballs in Houston and Peerless Price is back in Buffalo? This time, my guess is that Price will be thrilled if he can handle the Bills' No. 2 receiver duties.
• Speaking of onetime star players enjoying reunions with the teams they once prospered with, Tebucky Jones has returned to New England's secondary, and I bet he wishes he'd never left. The same might go for Lawyer Milloy and Ty Law. Who knows? Law might be the next prodigal son to make his way back to Foxboro.
• Is anybody anywhere busier than agent Bus Cook these days? His clients include Brett Favre, Steve McNair and Vanderbilt's Jay Cutler. Not much going on with those three, eh? Cook could hold a news conference every day if he cared to.
• And while we're on the McNair matter, give me a break with the players' union filing a grievance over the Titans barring McNair from taking part in the team's offseason workout program. OK, so McNair's feelings were hurt by Tennessee's ham-handed way of dealing with the injury-liability issue. Understood. But with McNair currently having a $23.46 million salary-cap number for 2006, the Titans were just doing what any NFL team would do in that situation: guarding their financial backsides in case McNair stepped on a banana peel and tore up his knee, thereby putting them on the hook for a cap number that neither side ever expected to be a legitimate working contract figure.
Grow up, Steve. The Oilers/Titans have done as right by you over the years as you have them. They screwed up the mechanics of their precautionary move last week, but that doesn't offset the good will of a successful 11-year relationship and the millions of dollars the organization has deposited into your bank account.
• Hey, has Brett Favre decided to retire yet? At one point this week, I stopped paying attention for about 10 minutes and wondered if I missed the story.
• So it's Adam Vinatieri for Martin Gramatica, huh? Sounds like a fair swap to me. Somehow I think Vinatieri's place in Patriots lore is safe for a while. Can you imagine the overcelebrating whirling dervish Gramatica would be if he ever kicked a game-winning field goal in a Super Bowl? It's probably not going to be an image we'll ever have to endure.
• If I'm Joey Harrington and I have the chance to back up either Carson Palmer in Cincinnati or Daunte Culpepper in Miami, I know the direction I'd head. And it'd be South. If I ever wanted a shot to win back a starting job, that is. Mr. Palmer is firmly entrenched in the Queen City. Mr. Culpepper has a bit of work to do on that front in South Florida.
• A word to new Lions head coach Rod Marinelli: You've got the job in Motown, so what do you say we drop the Sergeant Carter routine? The former Marine bit obviously won over Lions CEO/prez Matt Millen, but you can overdo the instill-some-discipline thing. But don't take our word for it. Just ask Les Steckel.
• Nobody this draft season has inspired more debate than Vince Young, but in the past week or so, I've talked to two people in NFL circles who are big fans of the Texas quarterback. Eagles head coach Andy Reid raves about how impressed he was with the way Young comported himself at the Maxwell Awards banquet in Philadelphia this winter. And Chargers linebacker Shawne Merriman -- the NFL's defensive rookie of the year in 2005 -- predicted Young will be an early success story in his first pro season.
"I really think Vince will make an early impact,'' Merriman said. "You hear the things people say about his game, but some of those same things were said about Michael Vick a few years ago when he came out. But over time Vick has proven he can throw the ball in this league. Somebody with Vince's type of talent, you have to incorporate what you're doing on offense with what he does best.''
• Anybody else amped up over Dick Jauron's impending return to the Windy City, when the former Bears coach leads his new team, the Buffalo Bills, into Soldier Field for a Week 5 game in Chicago? Well, it's not T.O. returning to Philly, I'll give you that.
