As the 49ers and receiver Michael Crabtree, the tenth overall pick in the 2009 draft, continue to basically stare at each other and say nothing, other teams and players are suffering the consequences.
Picks eight, nine, eleven, and twelve continue to be unsigned, due in large part to the absence of a deal between Crabtree and the 49ers.
And some big-name agents are among the waiting: Tom Condon and Ben Dogra at CAA, Dave Dunn and friends and Athletes First, and Joe Segal.
Condon and Dogra have Broncos running back Knowshon Moreno (No. 12). Dunn has Packers defensive lineman B.J. Raji (No. 9). And Segal has Bills defensive end Aaron Maybin (No. 11).
Given the possibility that Crabtree’s agent, Eugene Parker, eventually will get the Niners to cave, it arguably makes sense to hold out the players drafted in the vicinity of Crabtree. As we’ve recently mentioned in connection with Jaguars tackle Eugene Monroe, the big-money windfall deals currently stretch to the seventh pick. If Crabtree and Parker can drag the large dollars all the way to No. 10, the guys picked just in front of him will benefit -- and the guys taken just after him might, too.
Meanwhile, there’s no indication that Crabtree and the 49ers are any closer to a deal. There’s a theory making the rounds that Parker might have promised Crabtree that he’d be a top-five pick, and that Parker’s last-ditch effort to make good on that guarantee might be to get Crabtree paid as if he had been picked in that range.
Regardless of what happens next (and, frankly, given Crabtree’s boast that he can run a 4.4 on crutches, we’re not ruling out a decision to re-enter the draft in 2010), it’s a huge mess. And while it could all end at any moment, there’s no reason to think that that moment is coming any time soon.