Daddy Manning Doesnt Want Little Eli To Play For Chargers

Chargers insist they will follow their plan

ESPN.com news services
The Chargers have the top pick in the draft. Ole Miss quarterback Eli Manning is projected, by most accounts, as the top player available.

One problem -- Manning does not want to play for San Diego. He'd rather be in New York with the Giants, who have the fourth pick.


Manning's agent, Tom Condon, informed the Chargers that Archie Manning does not want his son to be drafted by the team. Chargers general manager A.J. Smith confirmed the news Wednesday night, a day after the elder Manning visited team officials at the Chargers training complex.


"Tom Condon informed us about the wishes of Archie Manning in regards to his son, Eli," Smith told ESPN.com's John Clayton. "We had a good visit with Archie and we told him we may be selecting his son with the first pick in the draft. Tom told us Archie's wishes are that we not do that and that New York would be a good fit."


ESPN's Chris Mortensen reports that Condon informed the Chargers about the Mannings' feelings last week prior to Archie's visit. After hearing of the news, NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue contacted the elder Manning and asked him to meet with Chargers president Dean Spanos.


Spanos, according to Mortensen, met with Archie Manning and asked him to visit with Chargers coach Marty Schottenheimer. But despite the visit this week, the former NFL quarterback remains convinced that San Diego is not a good fit for Eli -- although the Manning family did not want their feelings to be made public, according to Mortensen.


Archie Manning, reached Wednesday night by the New York Daily News, said he was aware that the Chargers had decided to discuss the matter publicly.


"My understanding is the Chargers have said that. I'm not going to comment on it tonight," Manning told the newspaper. "I've got to huddle with Eli and Tom and see where we are on this thing. The only thing I'll say is I never talked to the Chargers about the Giants. I was asked to come to San Diego and see them."


Will the Mannings' stance affect the Chargers' thinking going into the draft? Smith would not guarantee Condon that the team would grant Archie Manning's request.


"We told them we will do what will be in the best interest of the San Diego Chargers," Smith told Clayton.


Earlier this month, Giants general manager Ernie Accorsi called the Chargers to express an interest in trading up from the No. 4 pick to No. 1 in order to select the younger Manning.


A third team entered the bidding Wednesday for the first pick when the Browns called. Cleveland wants to move up and pick left tackle Robert Gallery of Iowa.


The Chargers face some interesting decisions. Do they trade the pick to the Giants, allowing them to take Manning and giving the impression that the player was dictating the draft? If they take Gallery or another player -- or if they trade with a team such as the Browns that wouldn't select Manning -- they would be giving Manning to their division rival, the Oakland Raiders.


"We haven't decided what we are going to do," Smith said. "We could stay there and pick. It could be Eli. It could be someone else. We will do what we think is best. For now, we are staying where we are and then see what develops over the next couple of days."


The San Diego Union-Tribune reported that Archie Manning has been doing background checks on the Chargers this month. The newspaper reported that Manning's actions aren't unusual -- he looked into various colleges before both Eli and Colts quarterback Peyton Manning went to school.


The elder Manning then met with team officials this week.


"It was an opportunity to just sit down and just visit," Schottenheimer told the Union-Tribune. "He came in around the late afternoon and left first thing this morning. I don't know that there was any quizzing going on. He wanted to visit with us, and we wanted to visit with him."


Archie Manning may fear that Eli will fall into the same situation that Archie suffered while quarterback of the downtrodden Saints in the 1970s. He played in the NFL for 14 years, 11 of them with the Saints, without ever making the playoffs.


The Chargers have not had a winning season since 1995 and have only four winning seasons in the past 20 years.


While quarterback and a tackle are high on the Chargers' list, they have several other desperate needs. Trading down would allow them to stockpile picks and possibly players, as well as avoid paying a hefty signing bonus that a top pick would command.


"I know [the Chargers] have a lot of different options," Condon recently said.


Condon also represents Peyton Manning, who was selected by the Indianapolis Colts with the first pick in the 1998 draft. Condon said the Colts didn't decide until the night before that draft that they would take Manning, leaving the Chargers to take Ryan Leaf.


Leaf cost the Chargers an $11.25 million signing bonus and turned out to be one of the biggest busts in NFL history.


Four years ago, the Chargers traded the draft's top pick to Atlanta for the fifth pick, receiver-returner Tim Dwight and additional picks. The Falcons took Michael Vick and the Chargers got LaDainian Tomlinson. San Diego is 17-31 since that trade.


"I could care less about the Ryan Leaf decision," Smith told Clayton. "I've heard it so many times that we can't take a quarterback because of what happened in the past. Whether we decide to take a quarterback or not has nothing to do with Ryan Leaf. I didn't take this job with the idea that we can't do something that might help the team."


Despite the feelings expressed by the Manning family, the Chargers may see Eli as the only hope to resurrect the franchise. Manning's stature entering the NFL is very high.


"I think you're probably pretty safe picking Eli Manning," Seattle Seahawks coach Mike Holmgren told the Indianapolis Star.


Information from the Associated Press was used in this report.

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I absolutely hate when parents get involved with atheletes careers. I would kick my dad's ass and publicly say what my intentions were.

 

Crap, Rocket River beat me to it. Can someone merge our threads? We have two different articles.

 

Sheesh. I though San Diego was one of the top destinations for athletes, behind the likes of Phoenix and Orlando.

There is no way that the Chargers front office is that bad. There must be more to this than we know.

Perhaps Manning's agent has some prospective marketing deals lined up if he can get his client on the big stage in the Big Apple?

New York's golden boy... could replace Derek Jeter.

Gotta be lots of $$$ making opportunities.

 

What a jackass Archie is.

Now, the Chargers get hosed because their trading partners have a huge bargaining chip because they know Eli ain't playing for them.

And...if by some chance Eli ends up in San Diego, Archie has alienated his own kid because the team knows he doesn't want to be there.

Archie should stick to gambling on football instead of commenting on it.

 

Not necessarily. There's really no clear #1 choice this year, so I don't think this will affect their trading plans. Gallery and Fitzgerald can easily be #1 picks as well. If I were the Chargers, I'd stay at #1 and scoop up Gallery. With a real offensive line, Tomlinson could average 5 yards a carry...

 

If the Chargers preferred gallery over Eli, this wouldn;t even be news. Tagliabue made Archie meet with San Diego. It won;t affect their trading plans, but it certainly will affect the offers they get.

 

A definite power play. But at least the Chargers know where he stands before the draft.

 

If this is annoying (my habit of posting my own stuff)... please let me know and I will refrain from doing so in the future...

Parental Power Play

 

ESPN Insider says that the Giants and Chargers should have a deal done by the end of the day. I dont know how clutch feels about us posting insider articles so I'm not.

 

doesn't it make you just love pro athletes when they act like they are above the rules and better than everyone else

 

I kid, I kid. I just can't really complain about stuff like this without being a hypocrite. I love stevie, but think what he did was r****ded.

 

I copied this from what I wrote at another forum...





Chargers would be foolish to take a QB at #1

They could trade down to #4 and get the Giants 2nd round pick. Giants would then get the #1 pick and take Eli. Chargers could then trade to the #7 spot with Cleveland so they could take Sean Taylor, and the Chargers would receive another 2nd round pick.

So, in trading the #1 pick for the 7th pick, they pick up 2 early 2nd round picks.

They would end up with 4 picks in the first 40.
#7
#33
#37 (from NYGiants)
#40 (from Cleveland)

If they really wanted to take a QB and give up on Brees, then they would take Rivers/Rothlisburger at the #7 pick. More than likely though, you'd want someone for Brees to throw to. Roy Williams would probably still be available at that point.

And if this whole Clarrett/Mike Williams fiasco is approved after the draft, the Chargers could take Mike Williams in the Supplemental Draft. They would give up their 1st round pick for 2005, but they would now have Roy Williams, Mike Williams, and 3 early 2nd round picks.

Am I just expecting too much from the Chargers? :lol

Although, they would probably never do this.

 

Actually I hear that Cleveland would rather have Winslow at #4.

 

If you're saying the Giants and Browns would never do this you're right. Team don't give up generally high draft picks so easily.

 

I still don't think so, because teams looking to move up are bidding against other teams for the right to select Manning, Gallery, etc., thus driving up the price, anyway. And like I said, they can always stay put and draft someone else (unlike the Francis situation). Besides, I still haven't heard hard confirmation that Manning is/was San Diego's final choice. They may be employing a bit of subterfuge, just like EVERY other team. For all we know, their REAL target is Larry Fitzgerald...

 

Chargers needed bail-out
4/22/04
By Vic Ketchman, jaguars.com senior editor

Archie Manning is just what the Chargers needed. He could turn out to be the Saint that saved San Diego.

Manning, once one of the NFL's best losing quarterbacks and now one of America's most overbearing fathers, did the Chargers a great service when he announced that San Diego would not be a good place for his son to play football. All of a sudden, the Chargers aren't facing the pressure of deciding what to do with the first pick of this Saturday's NFL draft.

The Chargers were in a potentially embarrassing spot. You might recall that in 1998 they traded up to draft Ryan Leaf, who would become one of the game's all-time quarterback busts. Three years later, the Chargers traded away the first pick of the draft, which Atlanta used to select Michael Vick. A round later, the Chargers selected Drew Brees, who now officially qualifies as a bust.

Let's get this straight: The Chargers moved up for Leaf, and effectively chose Brees over Vick. Wow! No wonder the Chargers have the first pick of the draft.

But it could've gotten worse, had Manning not shot off his mouth. Instead, Manning has provided the Chargers with a great bail-out opportunity.

Should they ignore Manning's request that they not draft his son, Eli, the Chargers would run the risk of a fourth consecutive embarrassing decision at the quarterback position. And a team attempting to get a new stadium and avoid having to move out of town can't afford another such humiliation.

Take the bail-out, guys. Hey, we wanted to draft Manning but the kid's old man made it impossible.

By citing the Giants as the team for whom he wants his son to play, Manning has put the pressure on Tom Coughlin's club to ante-up and make a trade. And now that the finger has fallen on the Giants, fan pressure could make this a very costly deal. The Chargers could come away with a mother lode of picks that could rejuvenate the franchise, maybe even save it in San Diego.

Eli Manning isn't the kind of player who can do that. He's not a one-man gang. He's not a savior player. His brother may be – some would also ask, what's he won? – but Eli doesn't have that kind of dominant ability.

We may never know, now, whether the Chargers would've actually made Manning their pick. What we do know is that Chargers GM A.J. Smith sure jumped at the opportunity to go public with old man Manning's request that the Chargers not draft his son.

This is going to cost the Giants plenty. Imagine the outrage among Giants fans if their team doesn't make the deal.


^ That kinda goes along with why I think the Giants would give up a 1 and 2 for the Chargers #1 pick. And if Cleveland wants to move up to 4 for Winslow, they may be willing to give up the same.

 

No compliants here!

I like to read your stuff, but am too lazy to check your site on my own!

 

I misread the title at first and thought "Why would he care whether Eli played for the Chargers? Was he that upset about being traded for Dominique?"

Then I realized it said Daddy, not Danny.

 

Miguel,

Is that you behind the Francis "mask"? Great picture, LOL!