The Sports Blotter
by Matt Taibbi

A LITTLE COLTISH

Something special is brewing in Indianapolis. In a phenomenon that appears to be without precedent in professional sports (although there are several examples from college), a wave of arrests is threatening, in the space of a single off-season, to place an entire starting unit of an NFL team under a jurisprudential cloud. It is early yet, but it may yet happen that not only the whole of the Indianapolis Colts' starting secondary, but also its reserves, will have either been arrested or named in serious civil litigation between Super Bowl XXXIX and opening day, 2005.

Last week, Blotter readers were brought up to speed on the troubles of Colts' starting safety Mike Doss, the former Ohio State Buckeye who brought glory to his old program by being arrested in Akron for carrying a concealed weapon, discharging a weapon within city limits, inducing panic and obstructing official business.

Doss was the common thread in three intersecting subsets of recent sportscrime activity. He was one of a number of current or former Ohio State Buckeyes to get written up in May (include DT Tim Schaefer and running back Erik Haw). He would also prove to be the first of two starting NFL strong safeties to be arrested last week for discharging a firearm in public (troubled Washington Redskins phenom Sean Taylor was the other; see below). And his arrest was the third controversy involving a Colt defensive back this offseason.

The first of the others was reserve cornerback Joseph Jefferson, a second-year player who last year was arrested on drunken-driving charges just days after being placed on injured reserve by the Colts. Jefferson had been driving erratically in the parking lot of a Bowling Green T-Mart when police pulled him over; although he refused a breathalyzer, he was nonetheless detained after police discovered a loaded handgun on this passenger seat of his car.

This offseason Jefferson was sentenced for that incident; he was given probation and community service. Not long after his case was wrapped up, the Colts' first round draft choice from this year's draft, former Michigan cornerback Marlin Jackson, was sued for $10 million for his role in a 1993 barroom brawl. Jackson, who was arrested for assault in that case, had hit a man over the head, opening a cut that required 17 stitches. He had fled the scene before police arrived and was only caught by chance some time after, when the victim spotted Jackson relaxing at an Ann Arbor cafe.

The Jackson suit is ongoing. Shortly after it was filed, Doss was arrested. And then, not a week after the Doss arrest, yet another Colt was hauled in—this time starting cornerback Nick Harper, on domestic violence charges. Details in the case are sketchy, but it appears that Harper came home late, inspiring an argument with his wife, who ended up with a black eye. Police arrived at their home at 6:34 a.m., and Harper ended up spending the weekend in jail, charged with domestic battery, a class A misdemeanor.

Doss and Harper are both established starters in the Colt secondary, while Jackson was likely to replace Donald Strickland as the starting corner opposite Harper. That leaves undersized free safety Bob Sanders with the burden of getting himself arrested or sued before September to complete the rare full-unit blowup. Strickland, Gerome Sapp, Jermaine Mays, Waine Bacon, Willie Ford, and Jerome Dennis round out the expected contributors to the 2005 Colt defensive backfield. We'll keep you posted if there are any more arrests among those contenders.

Few football teams have suffered whole-unit arrest incidents. The late-nineties Florida State wide receiver corps, hit with arrests of Peter Warrick, Laveranues Coles, and Ron Dugans, was the most recent to threaten along these lines.

MY NAME IS K-ROB, AND I'M AN...

Two more onetime NFL draft phenoms, both top-ten can't-miss types, went up in flames last week.

On June 1, the Seattle Seahawks released wide receiver Koren Robinson. The former #9 overall pick from the 2001 draft, Robinson had one good year, in 2002, when he caught 78 passes for over 1,200 yards. But the rest of his career was marked with alcohol-related busts and assorted off-field idiocies, of which the latest was a DUI two weeks ago. Ironically, Robinson spent most of his career trying to keep pace with the impressive arrest record of the wide receiver taken just before him with the #8 pick of the 2001 draft, David Terrell. He fell short there, but he did outshine the next receiver taken, Washington Redskin Rod Gardner.

Gardner mostly stayed out of trouble with the Redskins, but he also underperformed, while keeping questionable company. Recently, in fact, he hosted a birthday party at which a top-ten defensive stud of the 2004 draft, Sean Taylor, drank far too much and got into his car. Taylor was subsequently pulled over for a DUI, which began a full year of legal difficulties which culminated last week in an arrest for-- like Doss-- discharging a weapon in public. Florida authorities are calling Taylor a "person of interest" in a case involving an exchange of shots near Taylor's Florida home. The star safety has been excused from camp and workouts, and there are rumors that he will never play in the NFL again.