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Having finally landed, Kellen Winslow looks for a fresh start in Seattle
RENTON, Wa. -- Fresh off his second cross-country trip in the last week, former Tampa Bay Buccaneers and current Seattle Seahawks tight end Kellen Winslow is still getting up to speed in his new environs after the trade that got him out of Greg Schiano's doghouse and onto Pete Carroll's roster.Winslow was told last Saturday by Schiano, the Bucs' new coach, that he was persona non grata after missing a series of organized team activities, and the Bucs shipped the productive tight end to Seattle for a 2013 seventh-round pick (conditional sixth). So you'll forgive Winslow if he wasn't participating in team reps during Thursday's practice -- after flying from San Diego to Tampa to hear of the trade, and then from Tampa to Seattle to complete it, he might have been a bit jet-lagged.
"It's kind of shocking, but that's what it is," Winslow told Ross Tucker of SIRIUS NFL Radio on Monday morning. "[Schiano] said he was upset that I wasn't working out with the team in the offseason, and then, the first week of OTAs. But, look -- I've been there the last three years, and I've had a successful career so far, and you just don't get rid of one of your best players because of that. That's just what I was told, but I have nothing bad to say about coach Schiano -- it was just a disagreement on why I'm not there yet. I was training in San Diego, and I was going to start [in OTAs with the team] today, but I got the call on Saturday that they're looking for somebody else."
Similarly "lagged" in 2011 was the Seattle passing offense, especially at Winslow's position. Despite the free-agency acquisition of Zach Miller and a propensity for two-tight-end formations (39 percent last season), the Seahawks got just 25 receptions out of Miller, and he led the team. Winslow, in Tampa Bay's hamstrung offense, caught three times as many balls for the Bucs -- so, on the surface, Pete Carroll's excitement about the deal was understandable.
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"Kellen is a unique football player," Carroll said after practice. "He's got special talents. He's got a tremendous record of consistency, and I think we add a guy that we know can make things happen. But we think it's just a fantastic addition because he can make things happen, he can make plays, should be a big factor on third down and the red zone and we'll see how we fit him in. It's going to take us awhile to do that, but we're really fired up."
The injury history is an issue -- Winslow has had six separate surgeries on his right knee -- but he hasn't missed a game in the last three years and caught at least 66 passes in each of those campaigns. He's not a dominant player, but he is very productive, and that's a balm for a team that has had a bit of a black hole at the position for most of the last decade.
"I'll be good," Winslow said. "Zach Miller is a proven veteran here. Hopefully we'll be able to do something like the Patriots are doing with [Rob] Gronkowski and [Aaron] Hernandez. We kind of fit that mold, so I'm sure we'll be fine."
Matching their sets to the Patriots may be wishful thinking -- there's nobody catching passes of Gronk's caliber on this team -- but the point is well-made nonetheless. What Winslow allows the Seahawks to do is to keep Miller inline as the more traditional blocker, while Winslow lines up in different parts of the formation on the other side. Though Tampa Bay's 2011 offense was the ultimate cure for insomnia, Winslow was all over the place -- in the formation, flexed out, and sometimes, the man widest out from the line. He was also oftentimes the one tilting the field and forcing coverage out of the box, as much as anyone did for the Bucs last season. That's appealing to a Seahawks team desperate to do more with tight ends.
"He can do a bunch of stuff and he's done a lot of it in his career," Carroll said. "He's a wide receiver in a tight end's body. He's got all of that ability and route-running like I mentioned, but more than that he makes plays. As well as — the thing that I love about the guy the most — is that he's a great competitor. He just loves to play the game and we can't have enough of that around here."
Winslow agreed. "Yeah, you want to create mismatches so I'm kind of the knight in the chess game. You can move me around and control the middle of the field. So I guess you could label me as that. I do like to move around a lot though."
As to Winslow's reputation for off-field concerns and on-field attitude, it appears to be a manageable risk. None of Winslow's 2012 contract, inherited in the deal, is guaranteed, so the Seahawks can continue their practice of finding the fits with value gambles as they go.
"We like guys with special dimensions and he's got them," Carroll said of his newest weapon. "He's a real route-runner and a great, great catcher and he does stuff with the ball after he catches it, too. Zach is a dynamite 'Y' tight end in this offense — we use him for so many different special things because he's so good at it. To have the complement of these two guys going and the way we can mix it it's a really exciting aspect for our offense ... we're going to make the most of this trade and it's going to be really good."
As Winslow said on Thursday, "It's good to have a job." Now on his third NFL team in an eight-year career, the first-round pick of the 2004 Cleveland Browns has an opportunity to move past the past and get started on a better future.
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Report: Most NFL players would have no problem with an openly gay teammate
If football isn't the ultimate masculine/gladiator sport, it's certainly right up there. As a result of that factor, not to mention the perceived group-think of the locker room, meeting room and huddle, and supposed "caveman" mentality some believe it takes to play the game, there are some who would tell you that no openly gay player would be able to survive (literally or figuratively) in the NFL. But in a recent series of interviews with current and former NFL players, OutSports.com found that the perception is not reality. If the small group interviewed represent the majority, attitudes have definitely come around about any NFL player who would choose to come out.
Former star defensive end Jevon Kearse, who once lived with an openly gay male cousin, told OutSports that as long as such a teammate did what was expected of him between the lines, the personal stuff wouldn't really matter -- and that was the overriding message from the players interviewed.
"In the game of football, it's like a war out there," Kearse said. "Once you get out on the field, all that stuff is to the side. You're on my side. I played in the NFL for 11 years, I'm sure there were at least one or two guys along the line that were gay."
Kearse's former teammate with the Tennessee Titans, running back Eddie George, said the same, and added that he didn't believe an openly gay teammate would have been ostracized on any of his teams.
"I just don't care about that," George said. "If that's what you do, that's what you do. I don't hate you because of it or dislike you because of it. That's not my personal preference, but I respect your decision. I'm not going to like you less or not be your friend because of that."
That tolerance goes back further than you think. Vince Lombardi, seen as the ultimate authority figure, and championed as a pillar of supposed "clean-cut" values for generations of football fans, had an openly gay brother, and often told his players that anyone who had a problem with the concept of homosexuality could not play for him. It was the same as any other kind of bias to the coach -- and in an era where he had to wait far longer than he should have for a head-coaching job because of his Italian heritage, Lombardi despised prejudice of any kind.
No NFL player has ever made his homosexuality public while playing in the league, but the sheer odds tell us that just about every professional football player in at least the last two generations has had at least one gay teammate through his career. The sheer odds also tell us that there will be a wide variety of views on the subject on any roster. Former New York Giants defensive end Michael Strahan added his support to New York's same-sex-marriage legislation right about the time that former teammate David Tyree was telling an anti-homosexual publication that same-sex marriage would lead America to "anarchy."
"How can marriage be marriage for thousands of years and now all the sudden because a minority, an influential minority, has a push or agenda ... and totally reshapes something that was not founded in our country," Tyree said.
Strahan clearly disagreed. "I have plenty of gay friends, and I don't judge them. I want them to have all the same rights I have, and all the opportunities I have to be in a relationship, a great relationship, with the person that they're in love with."
So, maybe the picture isn't as rosy as OutSports paints it. Former running back Ahman Green, who has a gay sister and brother, isn't so sure about the acceptance of a player who admitted his homosexuality while still playing in the league.
"In our sport, to be honest, I think it would be hard for any guy to come out while he's playing," he said. "And that's not a happy thing to say. The gay community is just like everybody else, but they're treated differently. It's a double standard. If a guy was gay, he wouldn't come out while he was playing. He knows the possibility of the scrutiny he might face from the locker room, which would be unfair. I am very open-minded. It is what it is. People are born that way. You can't control it. Just like you're white, I'm black. But a lot of people don't think my way. I wish they did, because then there wouldn't be guys who wanted to stay hidden."
Perhaps the most encouraging part of the interview was the take of those players just coming into the league -- OutSports spoke with rookies Trent Richardson, Robert Griffin III, Doug Martin, Coby Fleener, Nick Foles, LaMichael James and T.J. Graham. To a man, the players who will comprise the future of the league didn't have a problem with the concept -- and many wondered why it was a big deal at all.
Richardson, the Alabama star who played his college ball in a state that struck down a same-sex marriage bill with 81 percent of the vote in 2006, said that he has gay friends and brought it back to the great equalizer -- how are you on the field?
"I never pay attention to it," Richardson said. "They do what they do. I don't have a problem with them. As long as they're playing good football and contributing to the team, I don't have nothing to do with that. It is what it is. I don't have any problem with any sexuality or whatever they've got going on."
Fleener, who played in and around a far more tolerant area of the country (Stanford), echoed Richardson's statements.
"As long as they competed on the field and gave it their all in practice, that's all I care about," Fleener said. "It's not something that's at the forefront of football. But especially at Stanford and in the Bay Area, it's something you deal with on a regular basis, more so than anywhere else in the United States. So I'm very comfortable with it, whereas in other areas it might not be the norm."
Griffin had a more personal experience -- he played with a high school teammate in Texas who came out and ultimately left the team as a result.
"When he came out, he stopped playing," Griffin said. "He might have stopped playing because of the negative feedback he might have gotten from being that on the football team. So, I think that's probably why he ended up quitting."
Perceptions are changing in the game over time -- perhaps it's that people expect football players to be homophobic by default? "I think because it's such a gladiatorial sport, when people think football they think testosterone and hitting and masculinity," Palmer said. "Whatever the reason, if there was someone who was homosexual in the locker room, that would be a very hard environment to come into because of the nature of the sport. But in my experiences, I really don't think we would have had that problem."
At some point in time, we'll all find out. Back to the sheer odds -- eventually, someone will come along and have the courage to take that stand. Then and only then will we know how the NFL really feels about true tolerance. For now, at least, the words spoken point us in an encouraging direction ... for the most part.
Dawgs By Nature
from SBNation
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Cantor: Browns Win Total for 2012 Season Set at 5.5
The teams with the highest win totals are the Green Bay Packers and the New England Patriots, each of whom were given 12. The Cleveland Browns, along with the Jacksonville Jaguars and the Indianapolis Colts, are tied for the lowest win total at 5.5.
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NFL Prepping Search for Replacement Officials as Backup Plan
This year, it could be the referees association...or not. According to the Washington Post, the NFL Referees Association and the NFL are heading to federal mediation. Unlike last year, in which the lockout would have prevented the season from being played, the league would simply find alternative referees is an agreement is not reached in time.
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Hensley: Weeden Ranked 4th in the Division, As Expected
Today, ESPN's Jamison Hensley took a look at the top five quarterbacks in the AFC North. Yesterday, we saw that a first-round running back for Cleveland was able to immediately snatch the No. 2 spot in the division at that position. Would Cleveland's first-round quarterback be able to do the same?
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Daily Dawg Chow (5/25/12)
In today's dose of Daily Dawg Chow, we check out the latest Browns coverage and more news from around the NFL.
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Cleveland Browns Caption Contest (5/24): WR Travis Benjamin
Welcome to a new (potentially daily) feature that you will see on Dawgs By Nature over the next couple of weeks in order to kill some time while highlighting some pictures from the Cleveland Browns' offseason activities. In the comments section, come up with a caption that you believe other readers will enjoy.
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