Add one more Alabama player to an NFL roster. ... receiver
Matt Caddell signed a deal Sunday night with the St. Louis Rams.
That's now four Alabama players who will get a chance in the NFL despite the
Tide getting shut out of the draft over the weekend.
Wallace Gilberry signed with the New York Giants while Justin Britt and Simeon Castille joined the Cincinnati Bengals.
Record-setting WR DJ Hall, though, was not one of those who signed a deal on Sunday night.
"We've contacted a number of teams and we haven't secured a deal for him yet," his agent, Ed Rowan, said.
Since everyone was wondering about it, I asked Rowan if he thought any of Hall's off-the-field problems (he was suspended twice) hurt him in the draft.
In short, the answer was yes, it probably did hurt Hall. It wasn't the only factor but it was a factor.
"It certainly probably could have been (a factor)," Rowan said. "I can't speak for the NFL teams. DJ had some growing pains like 95 percent of America's youth from the ages of 18 and 21. When you're an Alabama football player, you're held to an extremely high standards.
"We make no excuses for anything. He certainly didn't. He was completely forthwright and remorseful for anything he had done to cause damage to his character or the team or whatever. (The off-field issues) certainly probably didn't help matters, I would think."
"That had a lot to do with it."
Hall also was hampered by the shoulder injury he sustained during his sophomore season. It was surgically repaired but he never regained full strength in the shoulder, Rowan said.
"It was fine. (Lyle) Cain, he did the surgery and he did a fine job on it. What he did was arthroscopically was remove the tip of the shoulder bone near the clavicle and it was fine. It was a very recoverable injury. For whatever reason, he didn't have a whole lot of his strength in that shoulder. It was really preventing him from doing his bench-press.
I finally got him to go to (another doctor) he checked him out and his shoulder was fine. It was just a matter of conditioning his shoulder. That was never done. That was never done at Alabama. They've got a great staff up there. I know (head football trainer) Jeff Allen up there. He's got my four-star seal of approval. But his shoulder wasn't in shape and you need to be able to bench press and run the 40-yard dash. They say 90 percent of it is what the player did on the field during his tenure at the school.
But that obviously wasn't the case with Hall or else he would have been drafted.
Wallace Gilberry to the Giants, Simeon Castille to the Bengals
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