ESPN The Mag: Mayweather's Money Issue All Access
THE SCENE in the parking lot of the Mayweather Boxing Club in Las Vegas has devolved into an extended documentary on the perils of celebrity. There's a betting slip on the loose worth $80,000, earned on the merits of the Miami Heat's first-half performance about two hours earlier on this Friday night, and the quest to find it has everything but a circus-music soundtrack.
It's not about the money. Really, it's not. Floyd Mayweather Jr. bets a lot, both in frequency and amount, and this betting slip is not extraordinary in any way. Just the night before, he lost $50,000 on the first half of the Thunder-Lakers game before doubling down on his beloved Thunder and winning $100,000 in the second half. This is a man who later that night will put on a pair of pants he hadn't worn in a while and pull four grand out of a pocket the way you or I might find a five in the dryer. Trust me: Eighty grand won't change his life.
Mayweather is standing next to his sleek four-door black Mercedes, one of the more sedate of his roughly two dozen cars, and is wondering out loud how many people he might have to fire over this debacle. A few leggy, extravagantly dressed women watch laconically, waiting to follow the champ to dinner. Curtis Jackson, publicly known as 50 Cent, sits in the passenger seat of the Mercedes, watching the events unfold with passing interest. Several members of Mayweather's loosely defined payroll are shuffling about in an unreserved panic, particularly those who were at one time in possession of the bag, the slip's last known residence.
The bag is important. The bag -- or The Bag, more like -- is a small leather duffel home to Mayweather's walking-around cash and gambling slips. Everyone must know where The Bag is at all times, for it is not unusual for the spirit to strike Mayweather and cause him to ask, with no warning, "Where my bag at?" The chain of custody is stricter than most evidence rooms.
The Bag is being scoured vigorously by Tom, one of many men who help Mayweather train by handing him his jump rope or tying his headgear or merely shouting compliments during a workout. He is at least the fourth person to riffle through The Bag, and he relays to his boss the obvious: no slip. The Mercedes trunk is popped, and a second bag is searched. This bag holds nothing more than 20,000 Mega Millions lottery tickets (prize: $656 million) bought by one of Mayweather's minions after he stood in line for more than two hours outside a convenience store in California. Imagine being the guy standing behind Mayweather's guy, there to buy maybe 10 tickets, waiting in line half the damned day only to watch the guy in front of you haul $20K in hundreds out of a bag. There are many Mayweather stories like this. It's easy to get sidetracked.
But back to the scene at hand. Because right now -- with the trunk open and the car doors flung wide and a now-silent Mayweather choosing to direct search operations with nothing more than a glare -- is as good a time as any to ask a few important questions: What are we to make of Floyd Mayweather Jr.? What should we see when we see him? Is he to be denounced for his singular brand of narcissism, ego and greed, or praised for his clear-eyed ability to maximize his worth in the sports marketplace? Can you do both?
The history of boxing is a history of broken dreams. Young men, mostly black and Hispanic, start with nothing and appreciate anything. They're told when, where and how much, and they never look closely at the money generated by their sweat and risk. They accept what's offered because they are beholden to those doing the offering. It's an enterprise fueled by paternalism: I was there for you when you had nothing. The most successful live well for a short period before ending up broke and befuddled, their money taken by unscrupulous managers and unchecked spending, their brains taken by the rigors of the sport. Their lives travel a road from subservience to dependence before they can identify either one.
"I was in that position at one time," says Mayweather. "Not anymore. Now they" -- meaning the promoters who have long dominated the sport -- "don't like Floyd Mayweather to enlighten a fighter. I don't like it when they take a third from a fighter, then he has to pay his trainer 10%. After Uncle Sam, the man putting his body on the line gets less than 50 percent."
MONEY IS IMPORTANT, its outward manifestations even more so. Along with gaudy possessions and unlimited subservience comes something far more vital: self-justification. It's wealth as affirmation. A case filled with more than $5 million in watches is not a mere collection; it is a statement.
Mayweather grew up in a boxing family in Grand Rapids, Mich. His father, Floyd Sr., fought 35 pro fights, including one against Sugar Ray Leonard. His uncle and trainer, Roger Mayweather, was the family's first champion. Floyd Sr., known around boxing as Big Floyd, spent five years in prison for selling drugs, and he's had a soap opera relationship with his son after training him through much of his professional career. Mayweather's mother was a drug addict, since recovered. Asked to describe his childhood, he grows defiant. "My father was a drug dealer," he says. "We didn't have nothing."
Echoes of Grand Rapids are in every six-figure bet, every exorbitant purchase, every angry defense of his place in boxing history. He's determined to shatter the paradigm of the ignorant, servile pugilist. His ability not only to understand but to capitalize on his value is unrivaled in the sport, an expansion of the models established by pioneers Sugar Ray Leonard and Oscar De La Hoya. In a sport that historically -- and, at times, criminally -- takes advantage of its performers, Mayweather uses the power that comes with being boxing's most valuable commodity to control the industry. It helps, of course, not only to be 42-0 and a five-weight-class world champion but to exhibit an unapologetic brazenness that incites allegiance and disgust in equal measure. Indifference, as any promoter will attest, is hell on sales.
"Love him or hate him, he's the bank vault," says Leonard Ellerbe, Mayweather's adviser and CEO of Mayweather Promotions. "Love him or hate him, he's going to make the bank drop." He is a one-man conglomerate, with a net worth -- not counting cars, jewelry and houses -- estimated at $100 million. Unlike manager- and promoter-dependent fighters, Mayweather dictates his share of fight revenue and his opponent's. He controls the gate receipts by setting ticket prices at the MGM Grand; for his May 5 light middleweight title fight against Miguel Cotto, they range from $200 to $1,500. He negotiates directly with HBO to set the price for the pay-per-view broadcast. HBO is advertising the fight for a "suggested" retail price of $59.95. (The Victor Ortiz fight, for which Mayweather earned $40 million, generated 1.25 million buys despite being pricey, at $59.95 for standard definition and $69.95 in hi-def.)
Mayweather resurrected the idea of renting movie theaters to show his fights live, and the Cotto fight is being aired in 440 theaters, most of which will charge about $20 per person. He helped HBO develop the idea for its 24/7 franchise, a documentary-style preview show that debuted for his 2007 fight with De La Hoya. The show is now a huge hit and standard fare for major fights
"He's transcended the sport to become the franchise," Ellerbe says. "The business model is 100 percent his. When you're telling a guy, 'I'm making this, you're making this, we're doing it this way' -- well, when all that is in your hands, you're the one in control."
As Mayweather stands outside the Mercedes now, his jaw set hard against the anger in his eyes, he can be excused if he doesn't feel totally in control. It's a troubling time for the 35-year-old boxer. He has been unable, after repeated attempts, to reach an agreement to fight Manny Pacquiao, in what could be the most lucrative matchup in boxing history. Instead, he is roughly five weeks away from facing Cotto and eight weeks from beginning a 90-day jail sentence for domestic violence against Josie Harris, the mother of three of his four children. The specter of those 90 days hangs over every early-evening workout, every seven-mile run down the Strip at 10 p.m. How will it tarnish his legacy? If past is prologue, not much. Mayweather has been mixed up in several violent incidents dating to 2002, when he pleaded guilty to misdemeanor battery after a fight with two women at a Vegas nightclub. None of it has affected his earning power. In the boxing business, fans don't expect purity. And the economies of both Las Vegas and his sport need him desperately. Perhaps that's why he was able to postpone his jail time until after the Cotto fight.
Control is no small concern. Mayweather's engine runs on it, along with equal parts confidence, machismo and flamboyance. During one of his recent workouts (he's known for his epic three-hour sessions), two long rows of folding metal chairs in the gym are filled. There are women in heels (stilts?) and painted-on clothes, children in shorts and tank tops, men who have somehow found their way into the inner circle. After a session on the mitts with his uncle Roger, the cheers reverberate from the margins of the ring. Floyd likes the gym hot, so the women are constantly fanning themselves or consciously not moving, anything to reduce the risk of having their makeup sweat down their necks. One of the women is Shantel Jackson, known as Miss Jackson. She is Floyd's longtime fiancée. She's wearing an engagement ring that has an 18-carat diamond with 10 one-carat diamonds dotting the shank. The main diamond is roughly the size of an unshelled walnut.
She's not the only one who's flashing. There's the omnipresent 50 Cent, who says of his relationship with Floyd, "It works because neither of us needs anything from the other." For Floyd's 35th birthday, 50 -- or "Five," in Floydspeak -- designed and commissioned an open-wheel Formula One car with a spaceship-style cockpit that seats two. Fifty claims it's street legal; it's preposterously cool. The cost: roughly $500,000.
Then there's the biggest outlier in the gym today: a seaplane pilot who runs a fishing resort on Canada's Andrew Lake, near the Northwest Territories. He winters in Vegas and spends most evenings sitting on the apron of one of the rings watching Floyd train. How he came to be here every day is unclear, even to him.
A member of Mayweather's team confides conspiratorially: "All those people in the gym? Floyd takes care of almost every one of them in one way or another. He's generous to a lot of people."
Their job descriptions, however, are whatever he needs them to be at the moment, in any moment. His security crew routinely receives calls at 2 or 3 a.m. to accompany the nocturnal Mayweather to a local athletic club for weights and basketball. On this day, his regular workout finished, the champ tells one of his helpers to beckon two women from his entourage into his locker room. As he showers, he calls for one of them, a tall, dark-haired woman named Jamie, to soap his back while he continues to carry on an animated conversation with five or six men in the room. Dressed for the club, she complies while making it clear she will not get into the shower. It's an uncomfortable moment, especially for Jamie, who goes about her work rather perfunctorily. To break the tension, 50 Cent summons his best Chris Rock.
"Damn," he says. "The man needs a little help. You can't trust nobody nowadays. What if something bad happens?" Who should be fired? That thought runs nonstop through Mayweather's head as he watches the betting-slip seekers stumble around the parking lot outside the gym. Who? Not Dave, his main runner, because Dave is trustworthy and responsible. Floyd is kicking himself over the Dave thing, because none of this would have happened if he hadn't been a good boss and let Dave leave early for the weekend (early in Floyd's world: around 7 p.m.) to be with his family in Los Angeles. "I didn't want him driving late," Mayweather says. "See what happens?"
The car idles with a throaty purr. The lot resembles an anthill in a tornado: Everybody's scrambling around trying to look busy, stopping occasionally to think ostentatiously, as if the spirit of the slip might divine itself onto their brains.
Mayweather keeps repeating the information as he knows it. Possession of The Bag went from Dave to Kip to Vito to Five-Three, or some variation thereof. He repeats the names in greater and greater volume as his anger rises. He's got Dave on the car speaker while he talks to Five-Three, so named for the car number from his days as a driver for a New York City car service. Five-Three politely but forcefully tells Mayweather that he handed him the slip, along with his car keys, and that Mayweather put it in the pocket of one of the many sweatpants hanging in the locker room.
Mayweather doesn't remember. He was busy at the time, talking about business, planning the rest of his night and occasionally walking out of the locker room to look at the Heat game on the television in the lobby to "check on my money." All he knows is he's wearing sweatpants and there's no betting slip in the pockets. In fact, that's all anybody needs to know.
In his nightly workout, Mayweather does 10 minutes of neck work, lifting a 25-pound plate with his head. Leonard Ellerbe, the spotter in glasses, doubles as CEO of Mayweather's company.
As it becomes clear that the slip will not be found soon, Mayweather leaves the lot and drives toward the restaurant. A phalanx of cars follows.
The mood in the car is somber. Mayweather turns to 50 Cent and says, "Five, I think somebody stole the motherf--ing ticket." He doesn't want to believe it, but he's left with no other choice. The money, nearly quadruple the U.S. median salary, is insignificant compared with the prospect of thievery. Thievery opens up possibilities no one wants to consider. Fifty, whose demeanor has not changed through the entire ordeal, turns his head slightly and says with languor, "I've seen stranger things."
Mayweather's brain, always active, goes into hyperdrive. He recounts the bag's chain of custody one more time, from Dave to Kip to Vito to Five-Three, as if sheer repetition can solve the mystery. He sets up hypotheticals, saying, "If Five gives me a bag, I ain't giving that bag to nobody else without asking Five for permission first." He tells Tom, sitting directly behind him, to make a call and tell the three guys involved that they can't come back to the gym until the slip is found.
"Okay, P," Tom says, using a nickname that refers to the Pretty Boy days, and one reserved only for those on the inside of the inside. Tom makes the call, delivering the news with all the emotion of a guy ordering a pizza. Mayweather says he's going to call the sportsbook and put a hold on the payout until the slip can be found, the same way someone might stop payment on a check. Fifty looks up from his phone and says: "Floyd, you don't make that call. That's not how it works. Have Dave call."
Mayweather, agitated, agrees with 50 Cent but decides to let it simmer. "We'll wait and see," he says.
CONQUEST BEGAT EPIPHANY. You don't just decide to make $40 million a fight. You don't just decide to be your own promoter and set ticket prices and pay-per-view prices; you have to put in the work in the ring. There are times when that ego comes in handy too.
After defeating Zab Judah in 2006, a fight in which Uncle Roger earned a one-year suspension for entering the ring and scuffling with Judah and his father, Mayweather did something unique in boxing: He became a free agent. For a guy who'd already built a 10-year résumé as an undefeated pro who put fans in the seats, this represented going all-in. He divorced himself from promoter Bob Arum's Top Rank by paying out a $750,000 buyout clause. Arum had offered Mayweather an $8 million guarantee to fight Antonio Margarito. The fighter and the promoter disagreed wildly on Mayweather's worth, and Arum publicly scoffed at Floyd's contention that a fight with De La Hoya could earn him $20 million.
On May 5, 2007, in his second fight as his own promoter working in conjunction with Golden Boy Promotions, De La Hoya's company, Mayweather beat De La Hoya, the WBC light middleweight champ, in a fight that generated a record 2.15 million pay-per-view buys. It produced more than $200 million -- including a record $19 million live gate and $120 million on PPV -- and made Mayweather realize he could take economic control. He says he went from making $5 million to $7 million per fight to at least five times that in each of his five fights since splitting with Arum.
"Floyd's nickname before that fight was Pretty Boy Floyd," says Richard Schaefer, president of Golden Boy. "Afterward, he became Money Mayweather. That's no coincidence."
Behind the scenes, Mayweather took the necessary steps to maximize his financial power. He made an adviser out of music-promoter-turned-boxing-impresario Al Haymon, a famously reclusive, Harvard-educated marketing genius. Ellerbe, who runs Mayweather Promotions, takes the fighter's ideas to the negotiating table, with Haymon's guidance always a phone call away (they speak 12 times a day). Ellerbe is also the guy who spends seven hours in a Mayweather-Cotto marketing meeting in LA while Floyd trains.
It costs roughly $10 million in fees -- site rental, infrastructure, promotions -- to put on a big fight. Mayweather Promotions essentially fronts the money, paying Golden Boy on a per-fight basis to handle logistics. As Ellerbe describes the relationship, "If you run a construction company, you have to hire someone to pour the cement."
Says Mayweather: "I feel that sometimes my name is spoken in a bad way, but never in business. In business, it's spoken in a good way. I've always done good business."
HE HAS MADE $30 million to $40 million for each of his past four fights. His last three have produced more than a million PPV buys apiece, another record. He partnered with 50 Cent on a movie production company and has his own record label. He says he eschews endorsement deals despite many offers -- "I don't want to sell myself short for a company," he says.
The formula is obvious: Who makes money on Mayweather? Mayweather.
"In everything he does, Floyd's betting on himself." Ellerbe says. "He puts up the money, bets on himself and hits a home run every time."
And there's nothing Mayweather loves more than a sure thing.
Which brings us, inevitably, to Pacquiao, the one fight the world wants to see.
Mayweather contends he doesn't need Pacquiao as much as the Filipino fighter needs him. This, more than fear, seems to be the root of the disagreement. Why? Because Mayweather took control of his career, and he believes Pacquiao is working under the old paradigm, generating money but not realizing it. According to Mayweather, the $40 million guarantee he offered Pacquiao far exceeds whatever he's made in any one fight; how Pacquiao's camp splits it up is not Mayweather's business.
Mayweather has been known to travel with jewelry worth hundreds of thousands, if not millions.
"The money that Floyd offered him, Floyd makes in every fight," Ellerbe says. "Factual." Michael Koncz, Pacquiao's adviser, met with Mayweather several times to try to hammer out a deal. "I was pleasantly surprised," Koncz says. "Floyd was very professional, very cordial and very knowledgeable. He's a good businessman, and there was not one curse word between us." Still, he says it would be stupid for his fighter, who is 54-3-2 in his career and an eight-weight-class champion, to accept $40 million on a fight that will reach $150 million to $250 million in revenue. Take away roughly $10 million in fees and a 50-50 split means at least $70 million each. "Why would Manny accept $40 million?" Koncz asks.
Because, Mayweather says, Pacquiao can't get that much anywhere else. But Koncz says Mayweather's math is faulty when he says the two men earn at far different rates. "Floyd's not making more than us," he says. "People have convinced him that Manny's making much less, and that's not true."
The sniping, going on two years, is nasty and often sophomoric. Pacquiao is proceeding with a defamation suit against Mayweather in response to his rival's suggestions that Pacquiao's success is due, in some part, to performance-enhancing drugs.
It's the ultimate test of Mayweather's boxing ability--and his business savvy. Regardless of what Mayweather thinks of Pacquiao's tactics, it's clear his adversary is not the traditional subservient fighter. Pacquiao isn't taking what's offered with a smile and a thank-you. He and his people have watched Mayweather. They now understand a boxer's worth too.
During one of their talks, according to Koncz, Mayweather dropped his guard.
"What if I lose?" Koncz says Mayweather asked. Taken aback, Koncz answered: "Well, what if you do? Then we'll have a rematch and make even more money."
THE MERCEDES is stopped at a light across from the Wynn Country Club when Tom's cell rings. It's the first phone activity in the car since Tom, on Floyd's order, cut off gym access to the three workers. In those few minutes, Floyd's demeanor has gone from vocal agitation to quiet anger. The call returns everything to high alert.
"They found the ticket, P," Tom calls toward the front.
"Where was it?" Floyd asks.
Tom hesitates. He closes the phone and places it in his lap.
Should he say it?
A moment passes.
Floyd asks again.
Oh, what the hell.
"It was in the sweatpants, P."
Tom looks absently out the window. Fifty sneaks a glance to his left, a little smile on his face. The mood shifts. What now? The threat of a rat, or rats, has lifted. Three men are exonerated by a search of a pants pocket. At least one part of the champ's life has retained its order. Control is restored.
A Hayes song drifts through the cabin of the Benz.
What now? They await his reaction.
Mayweather gives a satisfied nod but otherwise doesn't respond.
Their restaurant of choice tonight is a Japanese place the fighter frequents with his crew. Inside, the mood lightens. Floyd's buoyancy returns. He addresses the group by telling his first-time visitors that he drops 10 grand a week in the place. "You order whatever you want," he says. "Everything's on me."
As the waitstaff scrambles to seat the party of 18 around two teppanyaki tables, Mayweather discovers that his favorite chef is not working. This won't do. He calls the waiter over and speaks to him briefly. The waiter nods vigorously and pulls out his phone. Within 15 minutes, Mayweather's favorite chef is standing before him, smiling and bowing as he sharpens his knives and heats up the grill. The champ, it's safe to assume, is a good tipper.
Before the food is served, though, Five-Three and Vito arrive at the restaurant. They find their boss, leave a bag -- not The Bag, but a bag nonetheless -- next to his chair and depart quickly. Mayweather opens the bag and places the contents on the table: $80,000 in hundreds.
Mayweather smiles and nods. The slip was found, the money delivered. His friends surround him, honored to be in his presence. Kip the bodyguard patrols the parking lot outside the restaurant. The stack sits in front of Mayweather, another victory, its precision and order glorious in its symbolism. He looks down at it, pleased.
Love him or hate him, he is the champ, still undefeated.
Projected Post-Spring Depth Chart: Defense
By Brandon Castel
COLUMBUS, Ohio — Spring practice is over, and a new crop of freshmen are set to embark on their collegiate journey this summer.
That includes a talented group of defensive linemen and a few key linebackers who could be asked to step in and contribute right away for Luke Fickell and the Ohio State defense.
Head coach Urban Meyer wanted to coach his first 15 practices without preconceived ideas about who his best players were going to be, but he also made it a priority to have the majority of his two-deep set by the end of spring practice.
There weren’t a lot of changes on the defensive side of the ball, but a few players made a lasting impact on the coaches during the 15 spring practices.
Ohio State plans to release an official post-spring depth chart—the first of its kind under Meyer—sometime next week, but we decided to get a head start on filling out the two-deep on defense.
In case you missed it, here was our best guess at the offense
Defensive Depth Chart - the-Ozone Best Guess
STRONGSIDE DEFENSIVE END
63 Michael Bennett (6-3, 277, So.)
93 Adam Bellamy (6-4, 292, rJr.)
*+11 Se’Von Pittman (6-5, 245, Fr.)
(Comments: Though Bellamy started spring practice with the first-team, it seemed like Bennett was destined to be in that first group. He is an excellent young talent who all but wrapped up a starting spot this spring. Bellamy gives them a versatile fifth guy who can play inside or out.)
NOSE TACKLE
53 Garrett Goebel (6-4, 285, rSr.)
51 Joel Hale (6-4, 295, So.)
#72 Chris Carter (6-4, 358, rFr.)
(Comments: The decision to move Carter to defensive line seemed insignificant at the time, but he actually looked pretty good in the spring game. Given, it was against backups on the offensive line, but not many teams have a 350-pound nose tackle they can throw out there.)
DEFENSIVE TACKLE
52 Johnathan Hankins (6-4, 317, Jr.)
57 Chase Farris (6-4, 286, rFr.)
96 Kharim Stephens (6-2, 280, rSr.)
+86 Kenny Hayes (6-5, 285, rFr.)
(Comments: Hankins should be one of the more dominant defensive linemen in the Big Ten. Had his knee scoped at the end of spring ball, but should be fine for the start of fall practice. Farris also had a nice spring and could be in the rotation to start fall camp. Hayes missed most or all of spring practice with an unspecified health issue.)
WEAKSIDE DEFENSIVE END (LEO)
54 John Simon (6-2, 260, Sr.)
88 Steve Miller (6-3, 255, So.) OR
50 J.T. Moore (6-3, 250, rSo.)
+43 Nathan Williams (6-3, 255, rSr.) ~ No football activity in spring (knee)
(Comments: Simply put, Simon was the most dominant player on the football field at OSU this spring. He could have a monster season, especially if the Buckeyes get Williams back from micro fracture surgery. He didn’t do much in the spring, but is expected to be ready sometime during fall camp. Miller and Moore will have to show more in the fall if they want to hold off incoming freshmen Adolphus Washington and Noah Spence.)
WEAKSIDE LINEBACKER (WILL)
10 Ryan Shazier (6-1, 226, So.)
*42 Luke Roberts (6-2, 230, Fr.)
(Comments: It’s clear that Shazier is the star of the LB group at Ohio State heading into his second season. He added 10+ pounds of muscle in the off-season, and now has some power to match his explosive speed. The key for Shazier will be harnessing that speed and playing under control.)
MIDDLE LINEBACKER (MIKE)
14 Curtis Grant (6-3, 235, So.)
+32 Storm Klein (6-2, 242, Sr.)
36 Connor Crowell (6-1, 233, rFr.)
(Comments: The key here will be the development of Grant, who was working as the 1st team MLB before a stinger kept him out of the spring game. Klein should also be healthy in the fall after missing most of spring ball, and Crowell flashed some potential in the spring, but Grant is the key guy here.)
Etienne Sabino
Photo by Jim Davidson
STRONGSIDE LINEBACKER (SAM)
6 Etienne Sabino (6-3, 237, rSr.)
*+15 Josh Perry (6-4, 231, Fr.) OR
59 Stewart Smith (6-3, 230, rSr.)
(Comments: Sabino established himself as the starting Sam LB in the spring, but the Buckeyes are very thin at both outside linebacker position. Perry has a good-looking frame and Smith had a solid spring, but there should be some opportunity here for the new guys.)
NICKEL BACK (STAR)
2 Christian Bryant (5-10, 190, Jr.)
3 Corey Brown (6-1, 197, rJr.)
(Comments: The Buckeyes didn’t play a lot of nickel defense in the spring, and they would like to be in base 4-3 more of the time if they have the right linebackers, but the “Star” spot still might be the most suited for Bryant. The only other guy we saw there this spring was Brown, who seems to be pushing for some playing time.)
CORNERBACK
7 Travis Howard (6-1, 196, rSr.)
9 Adam Griffin (5-8, 180, rSo.) OR
*23 Tyvis Powell (6-3, 196, Fr.)
(Comments: Griffin had a pretty solid spring, all things considered, but there are still serious depth issues at cornerback. Powell has great size, but doesn’t move like a cornerback just yet. He might be playing safety right now if they had more corners, but he came along under Kerry Coombs tutelage in the spring.)
CORNERBACK
25 Bradley Roby (5-11, 185 rSo.)
12 Doran Grant (5-11, 188, So.)
13 Julian Vann (5-10, 178, rSo.)
(Comments: New CB’s coach Kerry Coombs said Roby will be an All-American if he works hard enough. Coombs also said he has no reservations about starting Grant at corner if one of their main two guys was out.)
SAFETY
2 Christian Bryant (5-10, 190, Jr.)
19 Orhian Johnson (6-3, 210, rSr.)
28 Ron Tanner (6-0, 192, rFr.)
(Comments: With Bryant banged up at the end of camp, Johnson saw a lot of time with the 1st team defense this spring. He also comes into the game in nickel situations, but Bryant and Barnett will likely start the season at safety.)
SAFETY
4 C.J. Barnett (6-1, 202, rJr.)
3 Corey Brown (6-1, 197, rJr.)
+21 Jamie Wood (6-1, 207, rJr.) ~ Underwent shoulder surgery in Jan.
(Comments: Barnett missed the Spring Game with a leg injury, but he is one of the team’s top playmakers on defense and should be ready to return for summer conditioning. Brown gives them good depth at safety, while Jamie Wood and Zach Domicone could both be back in the fall.)
Key
*Class of 2012 member who enrolled early for spring practice
Returning Starter
+Has missed all or part of spring practice because of injury
#Position change this spring
Randy Moss’ daughter sweeps every major Kentucky
As noted by Larry Brown Sports, among other outlets, Boone County (Ky.) High senior Sydney Moss recently swept all the Kentucky player of the year awards, earning the prestigious Gatorade Kentucky Girls Basketball Player of the Year award, the Associated Press Kentucky Girls Basketball Player of the Year award and, most recently, Kentucky's traditional state "Miss Basketball" honor.
Those platitudes followed an impressive senior campaign in which Moss averaged a whopping 22.8 points, 10.1 rebounds, 4.2 assists and 4.2 steals per game. Ladies and gentlemen, those are some serious girls hoops statistics.
The younger Moss, headed to Florida, where her father may or may not be able to follow her collegiate career as closely as he was her senior season.While spending the season away from the NFL, Randy Moss attended multiple Boone County games, including the team's state Sweet 16 elimination, a game in which his daughter did everything in her power to keep her team alive, scoring an incredible 41 points.
If Sydney Moss gets 41 points for the Gators in fall 2012 and winter 2013, a lot of folks in Gainesville will be happy, as will at least one in San Francisco.
Harper doesn't have to be savior for Nationals, but he can help now
WASHINGTON -- Justin Upton was walking by the pool of a resort in the Bahamas, an offseason respite after leading the Diamondbacks to a division title, when he saw someone familiar.
He hadn't yet met the 19-year-old with the rattail haircut, but Upton and Bryce Harper certainly knew who each other was.
The mutual recognition goes well beyond the casual international encounter. As the Harper Era begins -- the Nationals' prodigy played his first major league game on Saturday -- no one has a better understanding of Harper's situation than Upton who, by chance, was his opponent on Tuesday for his home debut at Nationals Park when he went 0-for-3 in a 5-1 loss.
Both, after all, are No. 1 overall draft picks and five-tool prospects who played a different position in high school before moving to the outfield in the minor leagues and then making their major league debuts at 19 as injury replacements.
"I wish I had known to relax and just play the game," Upton said of his rookie year. "I'm happy for him. To be in the big leagues at this age, it can be fun if you let yourself have fun."
Harper said he felt comfortable this weekend in Los Angeles, where he showed all five tools in just two games against the Dodgers by demonstrating great strike-zone awareness in taking a walk on close pitches, smacking a double off the fence, nearly beating out an infield single, unleashing a terrific throw home that beat the runner and crashing into the outfield wall to make a leaping catch.
"I'm trying to stay as calm as I can," he said. "Take one at-bat at a time. One pitch at a time. And make things happen, I hope. I'm just going to come out here every day and give 110 percent and play hard and try to walk away with a W."
Many of Harper's answers on Tuesday may have been full of clichés, but he knows humility plays better than brashness when you're a rookie of whom so much is expected. Harper is the latest teenager to debut in the last 25 years, joining an illustrious group that includes Ken Griffey Jr., Alex Rodriguez, Andruw Jones, Adrian Beltre, Gary Sheffield and the Upton brothers, Justin and B.J. But the track records in their debut seasons isn't great -- no teenager in the last quarter-century has had double-digit at-bats and an OPS of at least .760.
No one, however, knows quite what Harper's life is like in the modern world of media and hype. An SI cover boy at age 16, he's been in the national spotlight for years.
To wit: Never having seen the Lincoln Memorial before, Harper went sightseeing on his off-day in D.C. While passing a slow-pitch softball game on the Washington Mall, he was asked to pinch-hit -- and he did, with the footage swiftly hitting the Internet.
For the most part Harper has joined the Nationals under the best circumstances -- a promotion predicated by injuries to a big-league club in first place in the NL East. There's no guarantee that the prodigy remains in the majors for good; if he is returned to Triple A, well, that was just part of the plan all along, alleviating pressure on him to excel immediately.
"I don't think I have to prove anything," Harper said. "I'm trying to stay up here as long as I can and play as hard as I can every single day."
Said Nationals general manager Mike Rizzo, "If he's ready mentally, physically and emotionally to stay here, then he'll stay. He may change the developmental plan for us."
Given the personnel and record of the team Harper has joined, he doesn't need to be a savior. That much was apparent in the small (though spirited) crowd of just 22,675, barely half the more than 40,000 fans of the sellout that witnessed Stephen Strasburg's debut two years ago.
Harper, who struck out and grounded out twice, did receive a standing ovation for his first at-bat and again for a 290-foot, sixth-inning straight-line throw home from deep leftfield that narrowly missed getting the runner at the plate on a sacrifice fly.
No matter the expectations for Harper in 2012, the reality is that Washington could use a jolt. Its lineup -- depleted without Ryan Zimmerman and Michael Morse, both of whom are on the disabled list -- has scored just seven runs in its current five-game losing streak. Its left fielders were batting .097 at the time he got his call.
"He belongs here right now," manager Davey Johnson said. "He fits. He gives us a little more left-handed presence in the lineup, which we've been looking for.
"The only thing that I've been thinking about, really, is how long I hit him seventh."
Harper was only hitting .250 with one home run and a .333 on-base percentage in 20 games at Triple A but had gone 9-for-31 (.290) in his last 10 games. But he also admitted that he may have been pressing in order to hurry his big-league promotion.
"In Triple A, it was like, 'I've got to prove, I've got to do stuff to get back up to the big leagues,'" he said. "I wanted to be there so bad. Once I got up here, it was like a calm went over my body. You're here. Just play your game like you know how to play."
Johnson, who managed the 1980s Mets with youthful stars Doc Gooden and Darryl Strawberry, said Strawberry was an example of a hitter who played better after reaching the majors.
"I do think the driving force of getting to the big leagues puts more pressure on you at that level, trying to do too much," Johnson said. "And that's the one thing, to be a good hitter, you have to stay within yourself."
There are players in Harper's own clubhouse who can appreciate at least some of his experience. Third baseman Ryan Zimmerman was drafted as a 20-year-old in June 2005 and debuted that same September. Starter Stephen Strasburg was a fellow No. 1 overall pick whose big-league debut was, Rizzo said, the second most hyped game he had ever been apart of, trailing only World Series Game 7 in 2001.
And starter Edwin Jackson also changed positions in the minors -- from outfield to pitching -- and was called up at 19 years old before making his debut in a start against Randy Johnson on his 20th birthday.
"I'm sure he has more pressure than I had," Jackson said. "He's been on the clock since he signed. Media nowadays is different from it was back then."
The best comparison remains Upton, who joined a first-place Diamondbacks club for a 43-game call-up in 2007. He started slowly -- hitting .221 with two homers -- but the team was playoff-bound anyway. And Upton batted .357 (5-for-14) in the postseason as Arizona reached the NLCS.
Rizzo was the Diamondbacks' scouting director when Upton was drafted and the Nationals' G.M. when Harper was drafted.
"Some guys have the propensity to take it to the next level anywhere they play, and I think he's one of them," Rizzo said, referring to Harper. "The only person that I've had in my career that mirrors him a little bit is Justin Upton. Those are the two elite position players that I've had."
Upton was a 20-20 player and All-Star by 2009, when he played most of that season as a 21-year-old, and a fourth-place finisher for NL MVP as a 23-year-old in 2011.
The expectations on Harper are even higher. For now, the Nationals will be plenty happy with Harper just being a contributor. Stardom will come.
