Gaffney, Not Bunkley Busted On Weapons Charge

[reese125]

I know hard ball negotiating has been going on for some time now, but man, I feel like Rosennerd really put a monkeywrench in all of the agent industry. Somehow it seems like these guys are above all that is holy more and more now

[BigEd76]

Not sure if it's been mentioned before, but this Wichard guy has already dealt with the Eagles twice this offseason (Darren Howard, Jeremy Bloom) and some of his top clients include Jason Taylor, Dwight Freeney, Terrell Suggs and Adam Archuleta....

[mussa]

what a damn joke.  everything else has been going great for the eagles and now are most promising draft pick, has missed 18 practices and has yet to get close to any deal. lovely!

[Rome]

Someone actually did the research.  Bunkley's situation is even worse than I thought.

Joy.

Posted on Tue, Aug. 01, 2006

Bunkley bucking history with holdout

By Bob Brookover
Inquirer Staff Writer

BETHLEHEM, Pa. - It could all turn out all right for Brodrick Bunkley. The Eagles' first-round draft pick could sign a contract, report to training camp, and have a monster rookie season.

That's certainly the scenario the Eagles are hoping for even as they struggle to figure out what it is that Bunkley's agent Gary Wichard is seeking from them. The defensive tackle's camp holdout extended to 12 days yesterday as the 14th overall pick missed his 19th and 20th practices.

No progress was made on the negotiations, and Wichard continued to ignore all phone messages from The Inquirer. Attempts to reach Bunkley also failed.

If recent history repeats itself, this is an ominous situation for Bunkley and the Eagles, who had hoped to receive a major contribution from their first-round pick this season. Defensive coordinator Jim Johnson addressed the rookie's absence after the team's morning practice, saying that Bunkley has already missed a lot.

"He'll never make up the techniques that [defensive line coach] Pete Jenkins is teaching," Johnson said. "This is the first year for Pete and he's trying some new techniques, and [Bunkley] is missing those. You just don't catch up."

Johnson said he has seen it all before.

Rookies "are lost anyway for a while," he said. "You just have to face the facts that a rookie has a hard time learning things right away. Sometimes it takes them a full year to learn. I can give you a lot of examples of that, so if you miss it, it's almost like a double whammy. It's hurting him. There's no question about it."

That may sound like coach-speak, but there are some daunting statistics to support Johnson's claims.

Since 2001, there have been 11 rookie defensive tackles that were unsigned and missed time in training camp. In the majority of those cases, the players struggled during their first seasons; in many cases, the players continued to struggle beyond their first year.

Only two of the 11 rookie defensive tackles that did not report to camp on time - Tennessee's Albert Haynesworth and Arizona's Darnell Dockett - managed to play all 16 regular-season games as rookies.

Here are some detailed examples of the struggles encountered by rookie defensive tackles who did not report to camp on time.

Ryan Sims, the sixth overall pick of the Kansas City Chiefs in 2002, missed 41 days of training camp as a rookie. He played in just six games and had only five tackles before suffering a dislocated left elbow. He remains an extreme disappointment for the Chiefs.

Wendell Bryant, the 12th overall pick in the 2002 draft, missed 49 days before joining the Arizona Cardinals. He played in 14 games as a rookie and had 11 tackles and 11/2 sacks. He did not record another sack after that and is now out of football.

If, as anticipated, Bunkley does not sign today, it will be the third-longest training camp boycott by a rookie defensive tackle in the last five years. The other double-digit absences since 2001 were Cleveland's Gerard Warren (10 days in 2001), the New York Giants' William Joseph (12 in 2003) and Seattle's Marcus Tubbs (10 in 2004).

Warren, the third overall pick, played in 15 games and had five sacks as a rookie with the Browns, but his numbers declined each year after that and he is now with the Denver Broncos.

Joseph's three-year career with the Giants can best be described as disappointing. Tubbs, the 23d overall pick, had a poor rookie season that ended prematurely with an ankle injury, but he rebounded to play well last season for the NFC champion Seahawks.

An examination of the first-round picks at defensive tackle in the last five years who reported to their rookie training camps on time reveals that they have had tremendous success.

Eleven defensive tackles taken in the first round reported on time. New England's Richard Seymour, probably the best of the 11, and Travis Johnson, a Wichard client and Bunkley's teammate at Florida State, are the only two who did not play all 16 games as rookies. Seymour missed three games and Johnson missed one, but both still had good rookie seasons. Seymour, in fact, had a great one and has been to four straight Pro Bowls since.

The rest of the cast: Jacksonville's Marcus Stroud (three Pro Bowls) and John Henderson (one Pro Bowl), Pittsburgh's Casey Hampton (two Pro Bowls), the New York Jets' DeWayne Robertson, New England's Ty Warren and Vince Wilfork, Chicago's Tommie Harris (one Pro Bowl), San Diego's Luis Castillo, and the Eagles' Mike Patterson.

You will not find a single Pro Bowl player among the players that did not report to their rookie camps on time.

Maybe everything is going to be OK for Bunkley and the Eagles. Maybe he will have just as good a rookie season as Corey Simon did after his 12-day absence from the Eagles' camp as a rookie in 2000.

At the very least, though, it appears as if Bunkley has already rolled the dice with his NFL career.

[PoopyfaceMcGee]

It sounds like Bunkley's agent is a class A douche.

[ice grillin you]

Bunkley isn't winning any friends in the locker room holding out like this.

I don't give a shtein what any of the players say publically.  They're sweating their asses off and being ground into the dirt twice a day up there and where is Bunkley?

Not good.  If this shtein goes on much longer, he's going to be useless this season.

What a f'ing waste.


worst post ever?

you have any idea how many players have stayed away from eagles camp only to come back and be embraced by the players...and many of those were holdouts...bunkley is not a hold out...if anything the players love another player sticking it to a front office that is not known as the most player friendly...and even if that is being extreme they absolutely to not begrudge him anything...

as for your ridiculous worthless comment....trainign camp would normally be starting right about now...so he really isnt behind where a normal rookie would at this point...

bunk will sign sometime after the hof game...probably a week from today and no one will remember any of this even happened...so settle down and stop getting all emotional because a player wont do what your beloved front office wants when they want

[MadMarchHare]

Wait, IGY, so the last 18 practices have meant nothing?  They've installed no packages, practiced no defensive calls, learned nothing over the last 10 days?  Come on.  He's going to be far behind.  No doubt he makes the team, but he gets way less play time than was expected of him when he was drafted.

And hopefully he's in good physical shape when he shows up.  Based on his combine pic, I'd say that's likely, but game shape may take some more time.

[ice grillin you]

Wait, IGY, so the last 18 practices have meant nothing?  They've installed no packages, practiced no defensive calls, learned nothing over the last 10 days?  Come on.  He's going to be far behind.  No doubt he makes the team, but he gets way less play time than was expected of him when he was drafted.

they mean nothing in terms of bunkley being ready for the season...rome said missing those extra practices would make him 'worthless' for the season...if there wasnt the extra game this year camp would be starting now...and hed be getting the exact amount of time that every other eagle rookie in their history has gotten (except for the ones this year) so are you saying the normal length training camp isnt enough?...that starting with this year they should always begin a week early??

And hopefully he's in good physical shape when he shows up.  Based on his combine pic, I'd say that's likely, but game shape may take some more time.

this is true but i would hope that he would have been in shape had he arrived at the start of camp...and i hope he comes to camp next year in shape

he will be behind the other eagles in this years camp...but when he comes in he wont be behind in terms of their not being enough time for him to get ready for the season

romey and some others here are getting way to excited about this...at least at this point...and it has nothing to do with bunkley not being ready or missing 18 practices...its because when a player disses the front office it means he is in turn dissing them personally

[Rome]

Did you read Brookover's column?

Case closed.

[PoopyfaceMcGee]

Oh well.  I guess they should have drafted Santonio Holmes.

[ice grillin you]

yeah and if he comes back next week he held out less time than any of those guys

check the calender...its not even august yet dook

if he holds out until the middle of august then everything changes

like i said tho hell be signed on or before next tuesday

eagles camp started last year one year ago today...so he could sign tomorrow and miss no time off a normal camp

settle down

[Rome]

My calendar says August 1st, IGY.

And he's now missed 19 practices.  But I guess you know more about this than say Jim Johnson does, right?

Christ...   

[T_Section224]

check the calender...its not even august yet dook

what calendar are you using?

[ice grillin you]

lol..yeah jim johnson is going to come out and applaud a player for not being there...dont worry bunk youre fine get in when you can

thats your problem...you follow what the team says like its a religion

the team doesnt always tell the truth and the team says things that generally are going to support the organizations position...but its not always correct

anyway if it was so important for him to be in there why doesnt the team do what it takes to make that happen

[ice grillin you]

what calendar are you using?

sorry the batteries in my sun dial died yesterday