PFT news from Mars - 9/26/2006

DID LEAGUE PUSH TEXANS TO PASS ON BUSH?

There's a theory quietly making the rounds among league insiders regarding the decision of the Houston Texans to pass on Reggie Bush with the first overall pick in the 2006 draft.

As the theory goes, the NFL wanted to help rejuvenate football in New Orleans, and the league realized that the best way to make it happen would be to finagle a marriage between the Saints and Bush. So, as the theory (it's actually more like a "hypothesis," but we've always considered that word to be a tad effeminate) goes, the league made some back-door promises to the Texans, such as support for future Super Bowls or some other way to help owner Bob McNair make more money and/or eventually persuade the locals to name half of the town after him. In exchange for getting Bush, Saints owner Tom Benson would have then made promises to the league regarding keeping the team in New Orleans for a set amount of time and/or generally keeping his mouth shut and his head low (with the exception of the post-game victory "dance" on the new Superdome FieldTurf).

Though it's all pretty intriguing on the surface, we're not buying it. For several reasons.

First, the Texans' decision came about far too quickly in the days prior to the draft. If there were a conspiracy at work, the NFL would have been planting the seeds very early on in the draft season, so that no one would have been suspicious of any chicanery once the Texans went another way. Or a trade would have been brokered between the Texans and the Saints so that, at a minimum, the Houston franchise would receive some competitive compensation for its decision to give up the No. 1 spot in the draft. Since there was no trade, the notion that the Texans stayed put at No. 1, drafted a guy who wasn't their first choice, and paid him like the No. 1 pick makes little sense.

Second, we think that a key component of any such deal would have been a guarantee that former Texans G.M. Charley Casserly would be hired to fill the job in the league office previously occupied by Art Shell. Casserly's stated reason for resigning, after all, was his desire to pursue (and presumably to land) that vacancy. The fact that he didn't get it (the job went to former Falcons exec Ray Anderson) suggests strongly to us that there was no secret deal. And that leads directly to our third point.

Third (duh), Casserly is generally known in league circles as a guy who likes to talk. So if there was some type of a secret deal for the Texans to pass on Bush so that he could land in New Orleans, Casserly eventually would have said something to someone about it by now, especially after the preseason and/or the first week of the regular season, when the volume started to increase on the question of whether the Texans screwed the pooch by not pouncing on Bush. (Then again, there's also the chance that Casserly was intentionally cut out of any discussions regarding this specific matter, given his reputation for being a little loose in the lips.)

Bottom line -- if some type of fix were in on this one, it would have been far more polished. Or maybe the genius of the whole thing is that it was designed to not be polished, so that it would never appear to be an inside job. . . .

We're still not buying it. If the NFL were in the business of dictating draft order, there's a far more direct way to make it happen, via the league office's direct pipeline to the 17 guys who wear the white hats and the now form-fitting black-and-white horse racing shirts.

 

next we are gonna hear the game last night was rigged....

 

It's good to see PFT being rational about something, but they probably made it up anyway.

 

there's no reason to even post something this stupid to their website.

 

It's gotta be true, because PFT said Smith was holding out for more money by faking an injury.

Collin's website has more football truth to it than PFT could ever hope for.

(did I just praise Collin?)

 

I dunno. Making something ridiculous up so they can trash it seems like a good way to get some cred, at least from people who don't know any better.

 

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Like our game last year when we got our asses handed to us.

 

it was kinda backhanded, so it could serve either possible purpose.