Back in Black
By zbest
Since the end of the NFL Draft several things have come up, limiting my time to blog: the flu (lost 5 weekdays), major reports due at school and work (continue to lose free time), family obligations/graduations 3,000 miles away (lost a week), and a change in Internet provider that should’ve taken 2 days, but ended up taking 10. Needless to say, the last 6 weeks or so have been hectic, and in between everything, I proposed to my girlfriend (soooo wasn’t planned, but came together perfectly), who obviously said yes. I’d be stupid to think that I haven’t lost free time due to our engagement, so I guess I have to add that to the list. I thought my life was getting back to normal when I made the time 2 weeks ago to put up my last posting. I wrote about the future of the NFL’s salary cap and how the Raiders fit in on our flight to the east coast for my soon-to-be brother and sister in-law’s graduations, but I had no idea how much I was going to need to catch up on when I got home.
The Oakland Raiders’ quickness to sign Darren McFadden not just shows that they don’t want a repeat of what happened last year with JaMarcus Russell, but it also shows how unconcerned Al Davis is with the cap space in the near future. Since the owners opted out of their collective bargaining agreement with the players, the Dallas Cowboys have allotted a little over $51 million in guaranteed money (between 34-year old Terrell Owens, Terrance Newman, and Marion Barber). That’s nearly half of what the Raiders spent this off-season on 9 potential starters (Javon Walker, Justin Fargas, Gibril Wilson, Kwame Harris, Drew Carter, DeAngelo Hall, Tommy Kelly, John Wade, and Kalimba Edwards). I have no issue with how the Cowboys spent, just that I think it’s a sign that Jerry Jones understands what the near future has in store. This is only the beginning; the contracts are going to continue to swell.
My life is starting to get back to normal, and I should be completely caught up and blogging by Monday (we’ve been home from our trip for over a week, yet I still have clothes in my suitcase). I did make time during the last month to email all my resources (in other words, the only 2 NFL writers I know) to find everything I could on the Raider mini-camps and on goings. So I’ve got a couple clips worth posting, and plenty that I want to write about.