Introducing, the first annual Atlantic Division Scum Bag Team. There were some tough decisions to be made, but I'm sure you'll all be quick to correct me on any errors I made in the comments section. Suffice to say, in a division that holds 7 of the top 20 players in the league in penalty minutes, there were lots to choose from.

LW-Scott Hartnell-Philadelphia Flyers

This was probably the hardest pick , especially in a division featuring perennial All Scum Bag team member Matt Cooke. You wouldn't think you'd have much to fear from a man who looks like the ginger love child of Kenny G and Tom Arnold, but don't let his rugged good looks fool you. Hartnell ranks second on the Flyers with 130 PIM, good for 4th in the division, and is (with good reason) known as one of the leagues biggest agitators. With the "new, reformed" aforementioned Cooke, Hartnell has a good chance to hold this spot down for years to come. (Side note: Check out the wiki picture for Hartnell for some pure LOLZ)

C-Zac Rinaldo-Philadelphia Flyers

Staying within the slum of the NHL, we have Hartnell's teammate Zac Rinaldo. Rinaldo leads all Atlantic division players with 190 PIM, good for second in the league. Rinaldo was also suspended earlier in the season for a hit to the head on Detroit's Jonathan Ericsson, after being fined for cheap hits multiple times prior. He's also starting to develop quite the reputation for slew foots. (Let it be known, though, that his slew foot on Parise led to Kovy's clobbering of Schenn) Although the kid is still a rookie, he looks to already be fully entrenched in Flyers hockey (which isn't a compliment from where I'm standing). I don't imagine this is the last time we'll see his name on this list.

RW-David Clarkson-New Jersey Devils

This was a tough one for me to type out, as I love Clarkie. Even when he's being an idiot. (See the 2-0 game against the Rangers where he ran Dubinsky) Clarkie leads the Devils with 134 PIM, good for 3rd in the division. Although Clarkson has stepped slightly away from the agitator/enforcer role (and watched his production increase accordingly), he still allows people to bring him back down into that game at times. Honestly, he only gets the nod here due to lack of quality candidates. The only other guy really in the running was Brandon Prust, but he gets a pass. It's strange that there's such a log jam at positions like LW, and a real lack of turds on the other side.

D-Deryk Engelland-Pittsburgh Penguins

Chris Pronger's absence for most of the year makes this section of the division a little trickier to figure out. We'll start with Engelland, who faced a 3 game suspension for a nasty hit on Marcus Kruger earlier in the season. While he lacks the penalty minute quantity of many of our previous entries, he more than makes up for it in quality (or lack thereof). He serves little, actual usefulness outside of fighting and being a goon. His penchant for trying to goad non-fighters into fighting him is deplorable. Perhaps that's why seeing him bloodied up by John Scott was so gratifying.

D-Chris Pronger-Philadelphia Flyers

Because Pronger is still too big of a scumbag to not include on this list. 13 GP, be darned!

Awards

Rookie Of The Year:

C-Zac Rinaldo-Philadelphia Flyers

See above

Most Improved (Got Worstest?):

LW-Brandon Dubinsky-New York Rangers

I used to actually have a good amount of respect for Dubinsky until the last month or so. I always appreciated the hard nosed, two way game that he brought to the ice. But ever since Torts called him out for not fighting enough, he's become a giant sleeze ball. It all started during the previously mentioned game against the Devils where he fought Clarkson. Dubinsky had been a low life all game long, so Clarkie dropped gloves with him. After the game, Dubinsky claimed that Clarkie only fights guys smaller than him (which facts easily prove otherwise), in spite of the fact that they are virtually the same size. During the next game between the two teams, Ryan Carter made sure to let Dubinsky know he too exception to those comments. By pounding in Dubinsky's face with his fists. Dubinsky claimed he suffered a hand injury during the fight (despite landing no punches). Later on, it became a "sinus" injury. During tonight's game, he avoided Carter on the opening faceoff because of his "sinus" issue. But lo and behold, there he was again scumming it up in the second period boarding Alexei Ponikarovski, but made sure he didn't get in a fight afterward to protect his "sinuses". Quite the heel turn Mr. Dubinsky has pulled.

Lifetime Achievement Award:

LW-Matt Cooke-Pittsburgh Penguins

Enough said.

So who makes your list? Did I mess this all up? Let me know in the comments.

Granted, we have only played one game so far, but coming into this season, our top three corners looked like a strength on this team.  We were returning two Pro Bowlers and had a solid slot guy.  Does the Washington game give us reason to doubt those preseason expectations?

Mike Jenkins:

The guy has picked up right where he left off last year.  A lot of people (including Terry) were convinced after his rookie season that he was a bust and that, in spite of his first round pedigree, it was truly Orlando Scandrick (more to come on him later) that was the real stud corner of this draft class.  One season later, and I think he's becoming the best CB in the NFC, if he isn't already.  Jerry Jones- PAY THIS MAN!  I don't want to deal with a Revis-like situation with this guy.  Let's get him locked up and make sure he's a Cowboy for the foreseeable future.


Terence Newman:

There were some (not many) that thought that Newman was still our best CB last year, with Jenkins a close second.  If the Washington game was any indication, there has been quite a clear passing of the guard.  Newman seemed to frequently lose his guy in coverage, and really seemed to struggle with Santana Moss (again, more on him later).  Is this a case of a speed corner starting to age and beginning his decline or a bad game?  That remains to be seen, and is a story line worth watching over the course of the season.  Personally, I think Newman can still play, but I worry that he will lack the consistency he has shown when healthy during his career.

Orlando Scandrick:

After a great rookie campaign, Scandrick seemed to regress last year.  Many chalked it up to a sophomore slump and pointed to his improved second half play as reason for optimism.  This year's season opener again showed the lack of consistency that plagued Scandrick last year.  Moss abused him from the slot, and you have to think that other teams on our schedule with great slot receivers (Eagles, Vikings, Colts to name a few) are going to see that on film and look to take advantage of that.  When the guy shows up, he's stellar, but you just don't know what you're going to get from the guy.

None of this even takes into consideration the fact that we only have 3 true corners on our roster.  We're one injury away from Akwasi Owusu-Ansah or Alan Ball playing considerable time at CB.  In addition, we play teams like the Saints and Colts who are going to go 4 and 5 wide and test our hybrid guys.

This all has me feeling like it's not as solid of a position as we have been feeling, and we need to consider making CB a top draft priority again next year.  We have no guys on our practice squad at the position to develop and we already know what we're getting with the three guys we have.  Newman can't last forever, and I'm not sure Scandrick is a guy you can count on to play the outside all game long.  Unless they see AOA as a CB down the road (which I think they don't), this team desperately needs to invest some high round currency in next year's draft into the position.

With the uncapped year coming up, the rules for restricted free agency are much different.  As I was browsing the tender amounts today, it got me to thinking about something.  Marcus Spearswill be a restricted free agent this offseason, with 5 years of active service.  It has been well discussed on this blog that losing Spears or Bowen is a real possibility.  He's obviously played well enough to warrant the salary that comes along with the first round tender ($2.621 million).  But since he was originally a first round pick, wouldn't the original pick compensation tender also allow us to pick up a 1 if he were signed away, and at a much lower price ($1.226 million)?  Am I interpreting the rules correctly here?  And if I am, doesn't this seem like the best of both worlds for us?  If someone were to sign him away, we would end up with another first round pick, something Spears surely would never fetch in a trade.  And if he signs his tender, then we end up with a solid, but not spectacular, starter for less than $1.25 million.  Seems like a win-win situation to me.

2010 Pro Bowl Rosters

Donovan McNabb was named as the Pro Bowl replacement for Drew Brees today, since Brees will not be playing, due to his team reaching the Super Bowl.  Just one question.  Can someone please explain to me why?  Here's a statistical look at how he compares to our very own Tony Romo.  Please pardon the poor copy and paste job.  (Regular season statistics provided exclusively)

GS       Att         Comp      Comp Pct      Yards            Y/A         TD     INT     Sack  Sack Yrds   Rating

Donovan McNabb

Tony Romo

I've never been too shy about letting my feelings about Jason Garrett as an offensive coordinator be known.  I've always thought he ran a very vanilla, predictable offense that didn't play to our strengths.  I didn't understand how he was being considered for head coaching gigs, and I surely didn't fathom his billing as an "offensive genius".  But I'm not ashamed to say that he definitely lived up to that name in week 1.  He picked Tampa's defense apart very methodically and did a great job of using motion and formations to exploit them and get us in favorable mismatches.  Part of me wonders if it was that he felt he could do more with his personnel this year and part of me hopes he's evolving into a very solid offensive mind.  I hope it's the latter.  I'll reserve judgement on him in general for at least a few more weeks, but for at least one week, you've definitely earned my respect Red Jesus.

Per the official site

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Let me preface this by saying that this post isn't based in facts or anything I've read, but merely one man's opinion that scares the living daylights out of him.

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From the DMN

Quite frankly, it's about time in my opinion.  Every single one of us have noticed all season long that our talent, especially at WR, is being misused.  I know Witt is great, but we have some great playmakers in this offense that aren't being used.  I know they throw the ball to TO 3000 times a game, but it's the way they try to get him the ball.  Smoke screens aren't effective in the NFL.  Give this guy the ball on slants and drags and let him make plays.  Use Roy in the same way.  These are big, stong dudes.  I also have to applaud them for doing it in private.  If TO had ripped Garrett in the press, it would have been news.  But since he did things the right way, behind closed doors, this will be a side note.

Apparently Pac had a second opinion done with a move favorable result.  From PFT

The early indications this week were that Cowboys cornerback Adam “Pacman” Jones had suffered a neck injury that was career threatening. But a second opinion gave Jones good news.

Adam Schefter of NFL Network is reporting that another doctor has told Jones he could resume playing in a few weeks. That doctor told Jones he has fluid in his spine but will not need surgery.

With only three games remaining in the regular season, even an injury that keeps Jones out for a few weeks could lead the Cowboys to put him on injured reserve. But Jones is hoping that he can play for the Cowboys in the playoffs, if they make it.

Jones has been ruled out for Sunday’s game against the Giants.

Unfortunately for me, this past weeks game was my first Cowboys game.  It was quite an experience, in spite of the outcome.  The sight of the Boys coming out for pre game warm-ups is something I'll never forget.  But enough about that, here are some things I noted from the game, without the benefit of instant replay, multiple camera angles, or Tivo to back me up on this.

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It seems we will have to face the Skins with top back Clinton Portis afterall.  On the good news side, CB Shawn Springs, who completely manhandled TO in our last game, will be inactive for the game.  It remains to be seen how effective Portis can actually be with his injured MCL.

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TO should most definitely have a good game after the bye.  Not only is Romo back, but his personal whipping boy just joined the division.  Who knows maybe you guys think more of the guy than I do.  I just know Owens has a pretty good track record against him.  Then again, so does every other receiver he's covered this year.  If Michael Jenkins can score two long TD's on him....

Link

The Washington Redskins have reached a one-year contract agreement with free-agent cornerback DeAngelo Hall.

Everyone complains about our playcalling and our game plans.  And deservedly so.  I have a really hard time believing that Jason Garrett is HC material.  What's sad is, the problems our offense has are so obvious, and yet nothing is done to correct them.  I think these simple steps would turn us into the juggernaut we have the potential to be.  I'm sure some of this won't make everyone happy, but that's how it is.

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What worked:

1.  It was nice for our running game to finally get going again.  I guess it helps when your RB's have more than 8 combined carries.  Barber continues to be a battering ram.  No matter what, he always ends up with positive yardage.  Felix Jones is a freak.  Not since the days of Primetime have I been on the edge of my seat everytime a Cowboy touched the ball because I thought he would take it to the house.  He has that kind of big play ability.  I still think we could get him more involved in the passing game.  And his blitz pickups seem to be getting solid as well.  He has proven to clearly be more than just a scat back.
2.  Our defense is starting to be more aggressive and make some plays.  They forced two turnovers Sunday, and Pac dropped 2 sure picks.  After a horrible game against the Redskins, our run defense showed up.  Granted, it was the Bengals.  But we had constant penetration and our backside contain was ok instead of pathetic.  And lo and behold, Marcus Spears does still play for the Cowboys.  I was starting to wonder.
3.  Think our starting fullback returning to the lineup and the running game existing was a coincidence?  Not likely.  Cricket played an outstanding game.  He was real good in pass protection and did a great job leading the way for Barber and Jones.  He would have had an even better game had Romo hit him on some of the checkdowns he was open on.  (More to come on that later.)
4.  We finally started using some press coverage in this game.  Granted some of the times we were in it be backed out, but at least it was part of the game plan.  I think it obviously worked to some degree.  Although they haven't shown it much this year, the Bengals have a fairly potent offense, and they possess some playmakers on that side of the ball.  And for all of that, in spite of the fact that they had great field position all game, due to turnovers and poor special teams play, the two TD's they scored were on blown zone assignments.  And we did that without our best cover corner.  I think if our secondary can get healthy, and stay healthy, and our coaches learn to design their game plan around the talent there, we have the ability to really be a lock down defense.
5.  We won.  I know it wasn't impressive, and we should pound a winless team, but we won.  I, myself, was nervous in the second half.  CIN was coming back.  We were playing sloppy football.  And yet, when we needed to make big plays on both sides of the ball, when we really needed them, we did.  I feel like we usually struggle when it comes to winning games like that.  You let a team hang around, and eventually, they get it going and beat you.  But I think we showed just enough resiliency to match them and eventually, one up them.

What Didn't Work:

1.  TONY ROMO.  Listen.  I love Romo as much as anyone (save Terry), and I defend him to the death, but at some point, the madness has to stop.  I understand he's a gunslinger, and "you have to take the good with the bad with him", but there's a difference between being confident and thinking you can make plays you can't and just playing recklessly.  When you get out in space, take care of the football.  When no one is open throw the ball away.  Or better yet, hit the FB's and TE's who are wide open underneath for easy yardage.  I can handle an INT once in a while.  But one a game?  One in 8 straight games?  If he was going to emulate one thing from Brady, it shouldn't have been standing tall in the pocket, it should have been taking care of the football.
2.  Special teams coverage continues to be an achiles heel for this team.  It's tough for our defense to continue to stop people when the other team is starting at midfield.  Containment is crucial.
3.  Our offensive and defensive playcalling could still use some work.  I can't for the life of me figure out why TO isn't in motion more to avoid getting jammed at the line.  When he gets a free release, he is unstoppable.  Defensively, I think we need to mix our coverage schemes up more.  We're obviously not a very good zone coverage team, and we don't have zone corners.  I think we blitz enough, but it seems as though they aren't called at the right time.  Which leads me to...
4.  Pressure.  The only time we see it is on the last desperation drive of the game.  If we took away those drives, I think Ware probably has one sack.  We have a hard time generating pressure when we bring four, and it seems like we're even worse when we bring more.  Bradie James is horrible on the blitz.  I'd like to see us blitz Zach if we are going to blitz our LB's.  Also, the Anthony Henry wrinkle we used against GB was very effective.  I'm not sure why we don't see more secondary blitzes.  I'd like to see some other guys bring pressure consistently.  I think Ellis and Canty have been way too quiet this year.  Thank God for Rat.
5.  If there's one problem with this team that I think will kill them in the end, it's their lack of intensity.  I don't know if this comes from the HC and his demeanor or what.  But what I do know is that if we don't start getting as fired up to play teams as they do us, it's going to be a long year.  Teams treat playing us like their Super Bowl.  We get every team's best every week, and we settle for going through the motions and squeeking out wins due to our superior talent.  I would love to see our defense to come out jacked up, and get after some people.  Until this team starts to have any kind of fire, we don't need to be worrying about a Super Bowl.  We'll be lucky to win a playoff game.  (No, I'm not playing the Chicken Little card.)  This is the most talented team in the league, but talent alone doesn't win championships.  There has definitely been more than one Super Bowl winner full of role players.

Considering how well we played, the bads are fairly ticky tacky on this one.  Feel free to say what you thought worked and what didn't again.

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ESPN's Scout's Inc. recently did a survey amongst themselves to see who would be the best QB in the league after Peyton and Brady are gone.

Tom Brady is out for the season with a knee injury, and Peyton Manning is not himself after missing the entire preseason with a knee problem of his own. So with the NFL's top two quarterbacks on the mend, which young signal-callers are poised to step into the void and take their games to the next level?

Scouts Inc.'s pro scouts debated that topic. They considered possibilities such as Green Bay's Aaron Rodgers, Cleveland's Derek Anderson and Buffalo's Trent Edwards. But the finalists had stronger résumés. Our experts whittled the list down to five names: Denver's Jay Cutler, New York's Eli Manning, San Diego's Philip Rivers, Pittsburgh's Ben Roethlisberger and Dallas' Tony Romo. From there, they sat down at the Scouts Inc. roundtable and took a vote on the best quarterback in that group.

Now, I'd say it's fair to say that those 5 are probably the best candidates for the job.  No argument there.  I think after this year Rogers will be in the same breath as the rest of these guys, but it's valid to not hold him in this argument based on only two and a half games of work.  Obviously, I'm slightly partial in this debate, but I tried to go into with an open mind.  Needless to say, I can't say I agreed with the results.

Manning and Roethlisberger won points with their Super Bowl rings, Cutler and Romo were lauded for their physical skills and Rivers got credit for playing in last season's AFC championship game with a torn ACL. All have been impressive through the first two weeks of this season. Each scout ranked the list from 1 to 5 -- with five points awarded for a first-place vote, four for second, three for third, two for fourth and one for fifth -- and in the end, Big Ben's combination of size, arm strength, leadership skills and other intangibles gave him the slight edge over Eli Manning.

Granted, I think Ben started to become a legit passer last year, and not as much as a bus driver, but the thing is, the Steelers don't ask Ben to win games, and for the most part, he doesn't.  They rely on a strong running game and defense to carry them.  It was quite obvious that they weren't the same team last year when Willie Parker went down.  Eli Manning always gets me fired up.  Just because the guy won a Super Bowl does not make him an elite QB.  See Dilfer, Trent.  Do I think Eli is a better QB than Dilfer?  Yes.  But he's far from elite.  The real stumper for me was that Romo got 2 5th place votes.  I find that ironic that he was rated above all of these guys in their preseason rankings.  Here is the full link.

What worked for Dallas against the Eagles:

1.  Although he went over a 100 all-purpose yards and had 3 TD's, I thought we did a good job of keeping Brian Westbrook in check.  Did he catch some passes and do some things against us?  Of course.  But he's a great player, and he's going to get his.  The thing you have to make sure of is that you don't let him beat you.  Although he had some decent pickups, he didn't have any of those HUGE backbreaking plays he always seems to have against us.  I thought we did a great job of stopping them on the inside draws and off tackle plays that he usually kills us on.
2.  Aside from the opening kickoff and one good return, I thought we played very well on special teams.  Felix Jones broke one for a TD and consistently got good yardage on his returns.  I didn't like that we had a kick return and a punt return called back on penalties, but it's obvious our return teams are much improved from last year.  On coverage, we held them inside the 25 for most of the night on kickoffs and didn't let them get going on punts, which we we didn't have very many of.  We were facing what, in my opinion, might be the best young 1-2 punch of returners in the league in Jackson and Demps.  And of course, Folk is automatic.
3.  Zach Thomas was the anchor of our defense.  He didn't miss tackles, flowed well to the ball, and did an excellent job of diagnosing the plays and reacting to them.  He also made a great play down the field in coverage on LJ Smith, though I think it was equal parts luck and skill.  He was, in addition, very effective on the inside blitzes, as he was against Clevelan.
4.  I thought we did a good job of taking advantage of the fact that the Eagles were selling out to stop the run.  I wish we would have taken more shots down the field, but when we did we had guys running open.  We connected on some big plays down the field, and had a couple of near misses to Witten and TO.  They both did a great job of running down the field routes and creating seperation.  I would have liked to have seen us take some shots down the field to Stanback or Austin though.  I think Stanback showed us on that Jones TD how fast he is.
5.  This game was a huge gutcheck for this team, and I think although it wasn't with flying colors, they definitely passed.  They were down early, made some big mistakes, and hurt themselves often, but when it came down to it, they made the plays they needed to for them to win the game.  Overcoming adversity is the sign of a championship caliber team, and we overcame plenty last night.  From the Romo mistakes, to the penalties, right down to the hype of this game.  We had several players leave due to injury, and their backups came in and played well during their absence.  I thought aside from his facemask, Watkins did an admirable job replacing Roy.  When Witten was in the locker room getting worked on, Curtis and Bennett made some nice plays to keep drives going.

What didn't work for Dallas against the Eagles:

1.  I know Romo put a strong emphasis on his footwork and pocket presence in the offseason, and we saw it on full display against Cleveland.  As well as that worked against the Brownies, it didn't against the Eagles.  Romo looked anxious and razzed on his first throw, and continued to for the duration of the game.  He was back to having those happy feet again, and, for the most part, didn't set his feet and throw with good mechanics.  It looked to me that several times he unloaded the ball too quickly in anticipation of a blitz that never came.
2.  The Eagles didn't do a whole lot of blitzing in this game (compared to their usual anyway), but when they did, it was very effective.  I saw several ole's and missed assignments by the RB's.  I know that Proctor missed the inside guy on one play and had to grab him, negating a big play.  The Eagles also routinely got good pressure in only bringing four guys, as it seemed our tackles consistently had problems with the speed rushes from Cole and Parker.
3.  I thought that we used Bradie James against Brian Westbrook too much.  Although James is fairly good at coming up and making sure tackles in the running game, he does not have a skill set that allows him to make plays in the passing game against an athlete of Westbrook's class.  Although he didn't shut him down by any means, I thought Kevin Burnett did a much better job of keeping tabs on Westbrook in space.  I had said in another post that KB and Zach Thomas as our two LB's in nickel situations would be very effective against a lot of the Eagles' personel groupings.  I was a little disappointed that we didn't get to see that matchup a little more.
4.  I was both shocked and disgusted in the playcalling on both offense and defense last night.  Offensively, I would have liked to have seen us work out of the shotgun a little more.  It seemed to me that we had our most success, both running and passing, when we spread them out and gave them different looks.  I thought we were extremely ineffective at trying to run the ball straight ahead, especially in two back sets.  Delays seemed to be pretty effective against the upfield rush, and I thought we should have used them a little more to try and counterpunch their aggressiveness.  Defensively, we played way too much zone coverage.  We shelled out all of these draft picks for these guys so that we would have the ability to play man coverage, press receivers, and get after the QB a little bit more.  And yet what happened last night?  We played soft zone all night and let McNabb pick us apart, gave receivers 8-10 yard cushions, and futilely tried to get pressure with our four man rush.  And even when we did get pressure, the tackling was so bad that McNabb just walked out of the pocket and picked up the first down with his arms or legs.
5.  Penalties!  The most frustrating thing about the penalties that we took last night was that they were all bad penalties.  They weren't effort penalties.  They were all caused by a lack of discipline or poor techinique.  Had guys used better tackling technique last night and been in better position, we wouldn't have had so many broken tackles and facemasks.  Instead of going low and wrapping up, everyone was headhunting, and it cost us by extending a lot of drives.

Just my two sense on the game.  Feel free to add in what you thought we did or didn't do well last night.

From what I'm told, cornerback Terence Newman and linebacker Anthony Spencer will be active tonight.

Newman (groin) will not start - Adam Jones gets that duty again - but he will be available for the nickel and dime packages, which means a lot against the Eagles. And Spencer, who is coming off knee surgery, brings another pass rusher to the field, which means a lot going vs. Donovan McNabb.

Link

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After years of backing up former league MVP Shaun Alexander, Maurice Morris will be the Seattle Seahawks' starting running back -- on Sunday.

On the eve of the Seahawks' first regular season game, coach Mike Holmgren is sticking to his plan of having co-starters replace the departed Alexander. Morris and Julius Jones, the former starter in Dallas, will split the majority of the carries as the team continues to revamp a running game that has struggled at times the last two seasons.

Link

You know, I was, for the most part, somewhat sympathetic of Julius Jones during his time in Dallas.  I tried not to be a hater.  That all changed when he left town flapping his gums.  Guess no one ever told him, karma's a b-tch.  I don't usually like to see ex-Cowboys fail, but I'll make an exception in this case.

Reports out of San Francisco are making things sound as though J.T. O'Sullivan is looking like the frontrunner for the starting QB job.  If this is the case, it should be obvious who the odd man out is.  Former #1 overall pick Alex Smith has salaries set to jump up around the $10 million mark after this season, a price not likely to be paid for a backup.  So my question to you is this, would you consider Alex Smith as our backup QB?  Before you lose your cool on this one, consider this.  Alex Smith has had a different OC each year he has been in the league.  The best weapon he's ever had to throw the ball to has been Arnaz Battle.  The guy has never had a chance to make it in this league.  Assuming he is cut, and can be had on the cheap, would you guys be willing to roll with him our #2?  He has all of the tools, and has experience as a starter.

Is it just me, or is anyone else nervous about Jenkins and Jones holding out?  They both share the same agent in Eugene Parker, which you would think would be a good thing, because they would most likely sign within minutes of each other.  Here's where the problem(s) come in.  Eugene Parker is also the agent for Steven Jackson and Devin Hester and, as several reports I've read have it, he's working feverishly to get extensions done for both of those players.  The other problem I see is that maybe the fact that they're both holding out isn't a coincidence.  Perhaps Parker has assured them that this tactic will give them leverage in their talks for an extension (though everyone should know by now that it obviously doesn't).  My fear is that he has put the same bug in the two rookies' ears in order to try to get them signed for more money.