NFL Player news

[rjs246]

Darrell Jackson is the only name there that I would have any interest in at all.

[Father Demon]

Porter, maybe.  Depending on incentive-based contract and the trade price.  Doubtful, but maybe.

[rjs246]

I would take Porter in a heartbeat. Reid would never touch him. I didn't even consider him actually.

[Quasimoto]

We all want Porter or Stallworth so we'll end up with McCardell

[General_Failure]

Six years too late.

[MURP]

what you really meant was:

We all want Porter or Stallworth so we'll end up with a traded undrafted RFA who causes HYSTERIA!#%()@#&*%(@#%&(@*#%&

[Feva]

Once a-farging-gain... the Eagles' WRs are gonna farging suck...

Just farging pay Stallworth.

Jesus.

[DH]

The fact that this team is trying to push Avant & Baskett down our throats is insulting. Baskett is nothing more than a complementary WR, and Avant, if used properly is a possession guy. If they go into this season with Reggie on one end and either Baskett or Avant on the other, its going to be mayhem.

Funny how LB and WR are the two least valued positions for this FO, but theyre the positions that continue to bite us in the ass year after year.

[Cerevant]

So, how's Pinky feeling these days?

[ice grillin you]

GET GAFFNEY!

[rjs246]

Good news if turns into a trend.

[Diomedes]

Good news for who? 

[rjs246]

For humanity in general. Fat people are a scourge on this planet. Dumb people are even worse. Combine the two and you have a modern football player.

[Diomedes]

Gotcha.

Article makes me wonder..are they basing the average on the "official" figures listed by each team? We all know those numbers are utter crap.

[Father Demon]

Empire Built On Pain

Anybody can look good at a news conference. There was Gene Upshaw in a very nice suit clarifying exactly why the NFL Players Association doesn't have enough money to take care of its penniless and wounded legends. Next to him, Washington player Troy Vincent wore an equally nice suit, and he explained politely that players today are tired of these former players asking for money all the time.

So, no, it should be no surprise. But it still breaks the heart to hear that Willie Wood, the Hall of Fame safety who made the Green Bay Packers on a tryout, could not afford to move into an assisted-living care center as he approached his 70th birthday. It bends the mind to think in this billion-dollar NFL era that amazing players like Joe "The Jet" Perry and Lem Barney get a scant few hundred dollars a month from their NFL pensions.

Herb Adderley, one of the players who defined how to play cornerback, suffers from terrible post-football injuries and gets $126.85 a month from his pension, according to his former Packers teammate Jerry Kramer.

There on Thursday was Upshaw, the union's executive director and a former great player himself, standing in front of the assembled Super Bowl media and throwing out vague figures and hazy accomplishments and lame excuses about why there's no money for these player who made the league great. He went cold when a reporter asked him the only question that mattered: How could the NFL let so many of the players who built the league suffer now that the league is printing money?

"You never hear about the guys we help," he grunted.

The trouble here is that the NFL is thriving like never before — and the people in power don't even seem to care about the past. Upshaw famously told The Charlotte Observer last year: "The bottom line is I don't work for (these former players). They don't hire me, and they can't fire me."

Mike Ditka sent a letter to all 32 NFL owners asking them to match the $100,000 he had donated to help these struggling former players. Ditka says he got two responses, and those checks were so small he sent them back in disgust.

There are some people, though, who do care about those beat-up warriors who thrilled America and built the NFL yard by yard, tackle by tackle. If you go to www.jerrykramer.com , you can make a donation to the Gridiron Greats Assistance Fund. This is money that will go directly to players in need.

You can also bid on prize possessions — Hall of Famer Joe DeLamielleure donated the bracelet that O.J. Simpson donated to his offensive lineman after he became the first man to rush for 2,000 yards.

"That bracelet means the world to me," Joe D. said. "But at some point, you have to decide what's really important in life. And to me it's important to help all those players the NFL has forgotten."

In Thursday's sham of a news conference, Gene Upshaw said he was "not opposed" to the Gridiron Greats Assistance Fund. That was nice of him.