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Sean Taylor: No truth at all to contract rumors

By Skin Patrol

I am not picking on PFT as they are repeating what others said, rather I am using them as the most recent example. The Sean Taylor is absent narrative has gone a little something like this:

The fourth-year safety has skipped voluntary offseason practices in the past, opting instead to work out in Miami.  The team expected him to arrive last week, when the sessions began.  Some players believed that he stayed away because of displeasure with his rookie contract.
None of the players have been mentioned by name, nor am I calling anyone a liar. I do not doubt that many of his teammates did speculate on Sean Taylor's absence, and perhaps money was mentioned. Rather than excogitate reasons why Taylor wasn't at the OTA, let's just ask him. That's exactly what Redskins.com did in an interview with Sean (hat tip: Extreme Skins). Taken roughly from that interview:

Question: Gone over things with the coaches? Is everything smooth now?

Sean Taylor: I don't think there was a problem. I should have been here with everybody else. I am sure I will make it up within the next couple of weeks... [which will] help us get ready for the minicamp coming up.

Question: Lot of speculation that you might not be happy with your contract. Is there any truth to that?

Sean Taylor: There is no truth to that at all. I'm definitely happy, I mean the Redskins drafted me... they drafted me at number 6 and, I mean, I have a seven year contract and I've played three years of that contract, and I'm fine.

Question: Have there been any discussions about possibly working a deal bla bla bla...?

Sean Taylor: I don't even handle that and I don't talk about it and I prefer not to. I mean, that's something where it comes a point in time, they want to talk about it, it's necessary, then we'll talk about it. But until then... that's never been an issue with us.

Question: LaRon Landry was drafted bla bla bla...

Sean Taylor: We're trying to do anything we can to make the team better, and also to win games. If drafting safeties, linebackers, receivers, quarterbacks, whatever. You got to make the proper draft choices to make our team better. When one guy goes down you want to throw a guy in that spot to continue to compete. I like the fact that we drafted a safety and I like the draft choices we made this year.

Question: You're 24... mentor to LaRon Landry?

Sean Taylor: I don't think I'll be a mentor. There's a couple guys back there and we'll all help him along. We're a family this year you can see that everyone is here for one purpose: to get better. That's what we're working on right now.

Question: Excited to move more towards free safety instead of strong safety?

Sean Taylor: We play anything. Your job at safety is not in just one area. You're going to be a strong every down or a free. Offenses move around and you can move from one side to the other. We'll try to bring everyone along at the same time. There might be some things LaRon can teach me as well. We have a couple of safeties back there and are really deep at that position.

Question: Lots of teammates excited to see you?

Sean Taylor: Duh, 'yotch! I'm Sean Taylor!

Scratch that last part, he didn't actually say that. But the rest is pretty damn close to verbatim from the interview -- don't believe me see for yourself at Redskins... it's Dot, Com!

Update [2007-5-15 18:11:38 by Skin Patrol]: In another interview, Fred Smoot said that he was happy to see Taylor, that he's a man of few words (right, Fred), and that he spoke with Shawn Springs and expects him there soon.

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