Browns are on the clock
NFL plan will give Cleveland top pick in '99 draft
Posted: Friday July 24, 1998 04:44 PM
As two-a-days heat up around NFL training camps, we interrupt the start of
this broiling football tradition to bring you news of the league's 31st
team -- the Cleveland Browns, who begin play anew in 1999.
NFL owners meet Monday and Tuesday in Dallas to draw up an expansion
stocking plan for the Browns. It won't be the liberal deal that
Jacksonville and Carolina got in 1995, because the owners feel they let the
Panthers and Jags get too rich too quick.
But the plan does have one unshakeable tenet: Cleveland will have the first
pick in all seven rounds of the 1999 draft. So let's introduce Northeast
Ohio to its first rookie.
It'll be one of these three players -- Kentucky quarterback Tim Couch, who
will have one year of college eligibility left but who will be sorely
tempted to come out; Washington quarterback Brock Huard, who almost came
out this year; and Texas running back Ricky Williams, a Phillies
minor-league prospect who teams may shy away from because he says he wants
to play both sports professinally after college.
When the bizarre feud with owner Eddie DeBartolo forced 49ers president
Carmen Policy to resign as CEO this week, it changed the tote board of
favorites in the Browns ownership race. Now the Al Lerner-Policy team --
with Bernie Kosar set to come aboard, and with the backing of Cleveland
mayor Michael White -- is the overwhelming pick to get the nod when the NFL
awards the franchise in September.
Speaking of Cleveland, who's the next man to join the NFL's highest-paid
club? It's going to be Tampa Bay's Mike Alstott, who,
very soon, will become the richest fullback in NFL history, at about $4
million a season. Here's the Cleveland connection: The Bucs are signing
their young cornerstone players -- defensive tackle Warren Sapp,
linebacker Derrick Brooks,
cornerback Donnie
Abraham -- in some small part to keep them off the free-agent market
when the free-spending Browns enter the picture next off-season.
Bucs GM Rich McKay has had trouble getting this deal done because Alstott's
not a pure fullback; he's a running back in lots of Tampa's schemes when Warrick Dunn sits.
So what's the market value of this hybrid? McKay told Alstott's agent: "The
only way he shouldn't sign this deal is if you think he's the next Jim
Brown."
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