OK, this is getting weird.
In response to reports that 49ers receiver Michael Crabtree is considering sitting out the 2009 season and re-entering the draft (the whole thing got going right here), agent Eugene Parker tells Calvin Watkins of FanHouse that Crabtree has no such plans.
“No comments have been made to ESPN or anyone else,” Parker told FanHouse.
But that’s a load of crap, on its face. Crabtree’s cousin and adviser, David Wells, told ESPN’s Joe Schad that the player is prepared to skip what would be his rookie year, and try again.
The team also is now downplaying the notion that Crabtree’s representatives have suggested a season-long holdout.
Based on everything we’ve seen and heard, we firmly believe that the threat has been made, and that the team and the agent are now trying their damnedest to reel in the rhetoric, for fear of ultimately finding themselves in a very high stakes game of chicken.
Here’s the simple reality. We reported that the threat had been made. Then, Joe Schad of ESPN.com chased down David Wells, who confirmed the threat and repeated it. So Parker and/or the team can now tell anyone they want that the threat wasn’t made, but the timeline on this one convinces us that it was.
Bottom line? If the threat wasn’t made, it’s one hell of a freaking coincidence that David Wells said what he said to Schad only a couple of hours after news of the threat first emerged here.
Meanwhile, we’re now officially hoping that Crabtree sits out for the 2009 season, since Peter King has promised to change his name to Derek Jeter if that comes to pass.