Clarett chased and maced

[football junkie]

Maurice Clarett was arrested this morning when he made an illegal U-turn. Police found a hatchet, three hand guns and one AK-47 in his SUV. Clarett was quiet drunk when the incident took place and is now facing multiple felony charges.

My question is this, if the NFL had let Clarett come into the draft in 2003 or 2004 and play in the league would any of this be happening?

And should the NFL stick to the current ban on freshman and sophmores declaring for the draft?

[D.C.]

The judge in the case has ordered a mental health evaluation after the latest incidents. Article (http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=2546878)

It's a sad tale...

[football junkie]

This guy needs a mental health evaluation? Who would have thunk it?

[Packer Backer]

He ought to be locked up. He has no regard for himself, or anyone else for that matter. Just another case of an athlete from the hood that thinks he's above the law. Another tragic tale of wasted youth.

[football junkie]

Good thing the NBA doesn't have the three-year waiting period or we might be talking the same way about another phenom from Ohio -- King LeBron.

I still maintain that if the NFL lets this kid get drafted in '03, he would have been a first round pick and some NFL team would have given him plenty of money and a coaching staff would have tried exteremly hard to surround him with the right people and the right environment and a lot of discipline and a lot of football and Clarett would be famous instead of infamous.

The system created Clarett and now he's going to do some serious time in lockdown.

[racosun]

This guy was a creep during his short tenure with the Buckeyes, although a good football-running creep. He's obviously very immature, and easily distracted, and someone put dollar signs in his eyes during his freshman year. He felt entitled after that. Too bad, too. I agree, he would have been a first-round pick for sure if he was allowed to enter that year. I guess his best chance was with Denver, but rumors are he was showing up drunk or drinking before and during practices. He was all attitude, and from somebody that should have been thankful, he was awfuly cocky. You reap what you sow, I guess. It is a sad story, though. Almost another Len Bias.

[football junkie]

This is a little hypocritical isn't it? How many dollar signs were put in front of LeBron while he was still in high school? How exactly did he afford that to drive that Hummer? Working at Burger King? I don't think so.

And this is all over college too. Two players at Oklahoma just got caught for taking money for jobs they didn't do. Cases of players being bought in college sports are just like cockroaches -- for every one you see there are a dozen you don't.

And what ever happened to Reggie Bush and his family living in a million dollar house in San Diego, owned by a sports agent, for over a year while paying no rent -- this all happening while Bush was playing at USC. That story seemed to vanish awfully quick once the NFL got involved in quashing it.

[racosun]

I agree with ya, buddy. The NCAA needs to be overhauled. LeBron's hummer was eyebrow-raising for sure. There are always big-time athletes who are taking money from somebody just for playing college sports. Some take HUGE sums of money, saying they'll pay it back when they hit the pros. In Clarrett's case, he took a monster loan from someone in California, and never made it. Now he says he's getting death threats all the time, and that's the reason for the loaded guns and bullet-proof vest. Reggie Bush's house is sickening, too. How can he get away with that? When it came to light that Chris Webber took money during his Fab Five days, Michigan had to give up those Final Four and Big Ten banners. Will the NCAA take USC's National Title back? Will Ohio State have to give back their title because of Clarrett? Perhaps it's all who you know, and some of these "boosters" that gave money to these kids are too well-connected to be traced or punished.

I'm sure there'll be plenty of opposition, but I'm all for paying college athletes legit money to play for their school. Some of these kids can go out and bring in millions of dollars for both their respective schools and the NCAA, but aren't allowed to work a double-shift at Burger King because it looks suspicious. Booster money will never end, though, no matter what kind of solution is proposed.

[football junkie]

I'm sure there'll be plenty of opposition, but I'm all for paying college athletes legit money to play for their school. Some of these kids can go out and bring in millions of dollars for both their respective schools and the NCAA, but aren't allowed to work a double-shift at Burger King because it looks suspicious. Booster money will never end, though, no matter what kind of solution is proposed.


Are you willing to raise taxes to pay student-athletes? Although some big schools could certainly afford to pay players, the vast majority of schools could not.

And where do you draw the line with salaries and eligible sports? If the top running back or power forward at a big conference school gets payed a modest $25,000 a year to play (compared to the possible millions he could be making in the NFL or NBA), does that mean the long snapper is also making the same amount for being on the team?

And if the football players and basketball players are being payed, are the men's baseball, woman's basketball, volleyball or softball players pulling down a cool $25K a year for being on a team? They're student-athletes too.

What about the schools that don't make the big bowls? Where is the money going to come from? Should we cut the physic's department's budget to pay the salary of the 4th WR on the football team? Sorry, no electron microscopes this year, we had to pay the field hockey team.

Remember most of these players are already going to college for free on athletic scholarships -- including room and board.

To pay the student-athlete you would either have to be willing to raise taxes and create a huge government entitlement program, transfering vast amounts of money to people who are already getting a free college education or very selectively pay only certain players at certain schools -- and I'm afraid that would violate Article IX immediately, besides the huge inequity of it.

Or I suppose if you're opposed to raising taxes you could cut other government spending, like military spending. It may be that the soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan don't really need metal plating on their humvees. Or maybe we could cut WIC -- single mother's with young children don't really need assistance with food, medicine and clothing -- not when our valiant young football and basketball players getting free room and board and a college education need to be paid.

If there were some way to make it work and make it fair I'd be all for it. But I think the only real solution is what the NBA has done -- for the last ten years they've been accepting high schoolers directly into the league and it has resulted in the development of players like Kevin Garnett, Tracey McGrady, Kobe Byrant, LeBron James, Jermaine O'Neal, and many, many more. MLB has always accepted high school players into its draft and league. The NFL simply has to change. Then the truly needy players can take care of their families and we can cut a big part of the boosters' influence out of the equation.

[Argonaut Fan]

I think that the ban on Freshmans and Sophmores is a good idea. Imagine if Bush had been allowed into the draft, and then done the stuff he's done in the past couple years. You can never tell if a player is mature enough when he is still that young. If a player is mature enough to play in the NFL, he should be mature enough to respect the rule, and wait until he is old enough. Evidently, in Clarret's case, the rule worked. It weeded out an immature kid who would not have been able to handle the pressure of the NFL.

[football junkie]

I think that the ban on Freshmans and Sophmores is a good idea. Imagine if Bush had been allowed into the draft, and then done the stuff he's done in the past couple years. You can never tell if a player is mature enough when he is still that young. If a player is mature enough to play in the NFL, he should be mature enough to respect the rule, and wait until he is old enough. Evidently, in Clarret's case, the rule worked. It weeded out an immature kid who would not have been able to handle the pressure of the NFL.


How can an 18 year old adult not be mature enough to play in the NFL but be mature enough to play in the NBA or MLB? Oh yeah and be mature enough to join the military and die in Iraq?

And if Bush had been in the NFL the last couple years, he wouldn't have had to have his family living in a rent-free house owned by a sports agent because he could have bought them a mansion -- that was precisely my point.

This issue is about economics.

[redbuck]

Other than the known arrests, there are a lot of rumors about Clarett which may or may not be true. Most were perpetrated by him and later shown to be fabriactions because he was mad at Ohio State because he didn't fill out forms right to go home to a drug dealer's funeral (and it was, I know someone from the neighborhood).

In 2002 Clarett was a great player in his first game, a 175-yard performance against Texas Tech. After his second game, a less impressive 69-yard game in a 51-17 rout of Kent State, Clarett went on the radio and said nothing about the impressive victory his team put up, instead focusing on how unfair it was that he only got 69 yards. How it was unfair I never really understood.

But the truth was Clarett certainly was a major piece that pulled the Bucks through some tough games that year. Whether they would have won them without him I don't know. I doubt they would have pulled off one or two of those games, but they seemed to be a team of destiny. They defeated #17 Penn State, #21 Minnesota, Purdue and Illinois without him, and although he gets a lot of press for his final touchdown in the Fiesta Bowl was a nonfactor in that game.

We had high hopes for the 2003 offense, which didn't pan out. Clarett was caught sneaking into the press box during the season's second game after being kicked off the sidelines for being obnoxious there during the season opener.

After Clarett was ruled inelligible he got bitter, charging Ohio State will all kinds of crimes. All were shown to be false claims in later investigations and Clarett was scheduled to go on radio the night of his recent arrest and appologize for not taking Jim Tressel's messages to heart, the New York Times reported last week.

Clarett disappeared to Texas, supposedly training. After being drafted by the Broncos and stupidy refusing a generous contract, Clarett found his way off that team, despite Mike Shanahan claiming he has never seen teammates reach out to one player the way the Broncos did to Clarett.

Since then Clarett has been getting fat, presumably living off crime money and dealing with his girlfriend. Great idea when you're in legal trouble and out of money to go having a child out of marriage with your girlfriend, but Clarett hasn't really ever shown himself to be the most brilliant individual.

According to psychologists, Clarett was shielded from problems and so got the idea that he was "scheduled" to make millions if he just did what he wanted. He got in a little trouble so blamed others for his getting off schedule.

Recently Clarett seemed to be getting his life back together. He was back in Ohio for some reason and was scheduled to begin playing football for the Youngstown Hitmen (no joke) arena football team.

But then came the four guns, vodka and child in the car. Pretty average cargo for a new father.

What a lowlife. It's a shame too. Because what was the best 15 weeks of my life - the 2002 Ohio State football season, is tainted. And it was such a great "team" in the truest sense too.

I have no symathy for this overgrown infant.