As it turns out, there are more than one failed first-round picks from the 2005 draft named “Jones” who have gotten a workout after a year out of football.
Adam Schefter of ESPN reports that the Bengals kicked the tires of former Titans and Cowboys defensive back Pacman Jones on Thursday.
As previously reported, receiver Matt Jones currently is holding offers from the Titans and the Bengals.
Pacman Jones was the sixth pick in the 2005 draft; Matt Jones went off the board at No. 21.
As one league source explained it, not much should be read into the fact that a guy has gotten a February workout. Even if a player is signed, he’ll be one of 80, 27 of whom will be cut before Labor Day.
Still, the Bengals’ decision to flirt with Pacman is curious, to say the least. Even though the Bengals recently have taken pride in their willingness to roll out the red carpet for guys who have worn orange jumpsuits, there’s a point where the habit becomes ridiculous. (Of course, maybe we’re already past it.)
Then there’s the question of whether Pacman is even close to being in football shape. In a Twitter entry from February 2, Jones said that he “just got done working out first day in 6 months.”
Another Twitter entry that Pacman has since deleted also could raise eyebrows. After ESPN televised an interview of Loleina Tonga, the woman who drove the truck from which the late Chris Henry jumped or fell, Pacman wrote that, essentially, if Henry had been the one driving the truck and Tonga had been the one who jumped or fell out, Henry would be in jail.
Actually, it’s hard to disagree with Pacman on that point.
If he really has changed (after all, he has stayed out of trouble for more than a year), we wish him well. And maybe it makes sense for him to honor the memory of Henry, Pacman’s friend and West Virginia teammate, by playing for the Bengals.