Maurice Clarett Warns Chargers Not To Pick Him In Supplemental Draft

COLUMBUS, OH--In another embarrassing blow to the struggling franchise, former Ohio State running back Maurice Clarett has asked the San Diego Chargers not to pick him in the upcoming supplemental draft. The request is similar to one made by Ole' Miss quarterback Eli Manning, who informed the Chargers he would not play for the team if drafted. The difference is that Manning is a highly touted pick with plenty of leverage, while Clarett is desperate to get into the league any way he can—well, almost any way.

“I won’t be playing for the Chargers this year, or any other year,” said Clarett. “It’s nothing personal, but I won’t jeopardize my career by signing on with a loser franchise like the Chargers. They have no prospects, no hope, no talent, and worse yet, they have Marty Schottenheimer as their head coach. Marty Schottenheimer! And people are upset at Eli Manning for not wanting to play there? The guy’s my hero.”Like Manning, Clarett warned that he will sit out the season if he’s taken by the Chargers, even though doing so could seriously damage his career.

“I’m desperate to get into the NFL—as desperate as anyone has ever been. But I’m not that desperate,” said Clarett. “Sure, it’s my life dream to play in the NFL, but I’ll live. There are plenty of other places to play, anyway. I here that Manitoba is lovely during the winter months.”

Clarett’s agent, Jimmy Sexton, has held closed-door meetings with the Chargers, warning them not to pick his client. The Chargers have not indicated publicly whether they will heed Sexton’s warning, but sources say that if Clarett is available, the team will probably selected him.

GM AJ Smith says the Chargers are keeping all their options open, regardless of Sexton’s and Clarett’s statements.

“We’ve heard the requests by Maurice and his agent, but frankly, we’re going to draft who we want to draft,” said GM AJ Smith. “Look- if we passed over every player that didn’t want to play for us, we wouldn’t even have a team. Just look at Philip Rivers. We had to talk him off a ledge after he found out he was coming here.”

Still, the Clarett statement took many in the league by surprise. After leaving Ohio State and announcing his intention to go pro, he was blocked from entering the NFL draft by the Commissioner’s office. His representatives then appealed to the Supreme Court, which upheld the league’s ruling. With the supplemental draft as his only hope, most experts believed Clarett would jump at the chance to play for any team. But Clarett is holding firm to his position not to play for the San Diego.

“Let me just reiterate my stance,” Clarett said on the Dan Patrick radio show. “I love football more than life itself. I’d give my right arm to play in the NFL. But I’m not a masochist. I mean, did you see the Chargers play last year? It’s not that they’re bad, it’s that they have no hope of getting any better. If you had a lousy team, would you bring in Marty Schottenheimer to right the ship? The guy took a decent team with a pretty good young quarterback and turned them into the 1978 Buccaneers. I hate to be cruel, but San Diego is the place football careers go to die.”

Schottenheimer has shrugged off Clarett’s criticisms. The veteran coach insisted he still believes in his unique style of coaching, despite the lack of success he’s had in his recent stints.

“I think my track record speaks for itself,” said Schottenheimer.“Well, not the last few years. But the years I spent in Cleveland. They were good, right? Anyway, I don’t understand why Clarett is so adamant about not playing for us. My style is perfectly suited to him. I run the ball constantly. I run the ball when we’re down by three touchdowns in the fourth quarter. I don’t even care if we win or lose, as long as we get to run the ball 30-40 times a day. Hmmm…I wonder if it’s all the losing that’s turning people off to the Chargers…Nah, it must be something else, like the perfect weather and beautiful girls.”

Now that Clarett and Manning have taken a stand against playing for San Diego, others are looking to follow suit. Some current Chargers are said to be considering sitting out the 2004 season in an effort to force a trade, and a Freshman quarterback from Iowa State has already told the team not to select him in the 2007 draft.

“Since the Chargers will most likely have the number one pick in the 2007 draft, I have to advise them not to pick me,” said Kris Myers, the highly-touted gunslinger from Des Moines. “I don’t even know if I’ll be a top ten pick by then, but I wanted to err on the side of caution. Don’t pick me, AJ. Please, please don’t pick me.”

Smith was taken aback by Myers statements, as well as the statements of his current players. The outpouring of antipathy towards the franchise has the Chargers brass searching for answers, but they haven’t been easy to find.

“We had a couple scouts down in Iowa checking out that Myers kid, but I guess we should cross him off the board,” said Smith. “We’ve got bigger problems anyway. LaDanian Tomlinson just called and told me he was going to sit out the season if he’s not traded. So did Tim Dwight. At the rate we’re going, we won’t have any players at all next year, except for Rivers. We have that guy right where we want him—locked in the basement of Qualcomm Stadium.”