Albert Haynesworth Has Lost His Mind

Added on Oct 01, 2010 by Jason Kearney in

NFL

When we last checked in with the Washington Redskins’ 300 pound, $100 million albatross Albert Haynesworth he was moaning about his situation on DC sports radio, talking about how playing the 3-4 defense for 9 figures is just like slavery. Now he’s gone and given what is presumably a ‘damage control’ and ‘image building’ interview with ESPN. After watching it, I have the feeling that somewhere out there Dennis Rodman is screaming at the screen yelling at Haynesworth to ‘get a grip on reality‘.

The segment starts off innocuously enough, with Haynesworth talking about that when he signed his hefty free agent contract with the Washington Redskins before the 2009 season he ‘wanted to be the greatest defensive lineman ever to play the game’. Good start–you figure that’s in theory at least the dream of every aspiring pro football player. I would point out the lack of conditionality in that statement–he didn’t say “”I wanted to be the greatest defensive lineman ever to play the game, as long as I did it for a coach other than Mike Shanahan in the 4-3 defense”.

Our story takes a dramatic turn when the talented Mr. Haynesworth is faced with the dilemma of cashing his $21 million bonus check in April 2009. Keep in mind that by this point the coaching change was already done, as was the team’s intention to switch to the 3-4 defense. Haynesworth provides the gripping details of how he didn’t immediately cash the check and weighed his options:

“Yeah, check sat at my house for a couple weeks before I cashed it. I was weighing my options about what I should do. … Do you want to take this? Do you want to commit yourself to playing a 3-4 [defense]? Do you want to go somewhere else and try again?”

This is where Haynesworth starts to take a hard left into Nutville. So you figured that by depositing all of that cheddar you were committing to playing in the 3-4 and generally getting with the program? And since by now we all know he deposited the check that should be the end of the story, when instead its only the beginning. He ‘protested’ by eating everything in sight and staying away from the team’s off season conditioning program and mandatory mini-camp. When he did report to camp, it took him more times to pass the team’s conditioning test than it did for Michael Vick to pass the SAT. And then he went and implied that Redskins’ owner Daniel Snyder thinks of him as a ‘slave’ because he expects him to play football for a mere $100 million.

And let’s put this into perspective–I’m nowhere near the Haynesworth income level, but I’ve had checks sit around for a week or so before I took them to the local check cashing store and/or the 7-11 for a carton of smokes and some beef jerky. Furthermore, don’t forget that Haynesworth had already banked over $10 million from the Redskins for the previous season–it’s not like he was waiting by the mailbox hoping to stave off insolvency. Maybe he did sit there and mull over his options for a couple of weeks, but it could also be that he was busy or otherwise occupied and cash flow wasn’t an immediate problem.

Haynesworth gives no rationale for this behavior in the ESPN interview, but does reassure the viewers that ‘he’s a good guy’:

“Some people think I’m off my rocker. Some think I’m just a guy who doesn’t want to do anything. Some think I’m a nice guy. Lot of different perceptions but if you meet me you will understand I am a good person.”

In all fairness to Haynesworth, he does strike me as a pretty good guy whom you’d enjoy hanging out with in a social setting. The kind of guy you’d like to have as a neighbor. That being said, his actions are also such that I’d want him nowhere near me in a professional capacity–and let alone with a $100 million investment on the table. He concludes by talking about how ‘hard’ the transition to a new scheme has been:

“It’s been hard, changing schemes. It’s been challenging.“

and generally reassuring us that he gets along with Shanahan:

“Everyone thinks we’re standing in a long hallway, with gun holsters, ready to draw on each other,” Haynesworth said of himself and the coach. “Nothing like that. … We’re completely fine.”

Here’s a tip for Haynesworth’s agent or media handlers–keep the guy off TV. Tell him to knuckle down and play football. If he’s serious about convincing us that he’s a good guy this will do it more effectively than a dozen TV interviews. As noted above, Haynesworth doesn’t seem like a bad guy but he does seem like someone who just doesn’t get it.