Conwell will pick between Rams, Saints shortly
By JIM THOMAS Post-Dispatch
updated: 04/11/2003 08:34 PM
It has been six weeks in the making, but a decision finally is at hand for free-agent tight end Ernie Conwell.
Conwell, 30, received a contract offer from New Orleans on Friday. According to his agent, Michael Sullivan, Conwell will decide between the Saints and the Rams.
"It might take 24 hours, it might be Sunday, it might be Monday," Sullivan said Friday evening.
The Rams are believed to be offering Conwell a multi-year deal averaging about $1.6 million a year. It is an offer that has been on the table for more than a month while Conwell attended the NFL Players Association meetings in Hawaii and took free-agent trips to Jacksonville, Carolina, and New Orleans. Several other teams had expressed at least some interest in Conwell, but he had yet to receive another offer until the one from the Saints on Friday.
Complicating matters has been the fact that Conwell had minor knee surgery earlier this offseason. Some teams seem to have been hesitant to offer Conwell a contract until he was fully recovered.