Hurry up and weight
By Jerry McDonald - NFL Writer
Sunday, March 9th, 2008 at 3:50 pm in Oakland Raiders.
You may have noticed in a CNN-SI column by Don Banks a rather heavy reference to quarterback JaMarcus Russell.
“At this point, quarterback is again a concern, because no one knows if JaMarcus Russell is ready to take over the starting job. There are rumors that he’s close to 300 pounds and not exactly prepared for his close-up,†Banks writes.
Russell’s weight was indeed a topic of interest in the hallways (plus the restaurants and bars) of the NFL scouting combine, where both information and gossip are generously doled out.
The highest estimate I heard was 320 pounds, and assumed it was only in half-seriousness, someone exaggerating for effect.
The reason I never mentioned it was I never spoke with anyone who had actually seen Russell. It was always from someone who saw someone who talked to someone else. I couldn’t even begin to trace the validity.
By contrast, I had no problem writing about the issues between Lane Kiffin and Al Davis because I had talked to people with direct knowledge of the situation, even if they weren’t comfortable being quoted as a source.
Russell could be a svelte 250 or a porky 275. In the limited clips I’ve seen of Russell his clothes are too baggy to determine what kind of shape he is in.
When Russell was hidden from view last year during the contract stalemate, stories tended to take on a life of their own. Remember how Russell’s family didn’t want him playing in Oakland? Something about not enough pass protection. That story went away as soon as the contract was finally finished.
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