On A Couple Of NFL Hopefuls

The Harvard Crimson has a story about the NFL hopes of tailback Clifton Dawson. According to the story he returned four kickoffs for 107 yards in the Texas vs. the Nation all-star game last month. I tried to dig up his rushing/receiving stats for that game in the week after it took place to no avail. I even emailed a writer who covered the game but he never got back to me; professional courtesy must have ended when I left the newspaper ;-). Whatever.

Harvard coach Tim Murphy feels pretty strongly that there's a place in the NFL for the Canadian. He told the Crimson:

"Clifton will make it in the NFL, period. He has the speed, toughness, attitude and blocking ability ..."

Speaking of NFL hopefuls, check out this video of former defensive end Anthony "Knuckles" Gargiulo '06, who has had several looks since deciding to give the pro game a shot (he's No. 91 coming off the end):

Green Alert Take: It's easy to forget just how good Gargiulo was. This is a pretty good reminder.

A subscriber sent along this New York Times link to another story about mental health problems among former NFL players. Excerpts from the disturbing story:

John Mackey and Ralph Wenzel were both on the San Diego Chargers in 1972, but have no memory of playing together.

They played together on the 1972 Chargers, even blocking on the same offensive line, but neither has any memory of it. Neither remembers playing for the Chargers at all.

Even after spending two hours together, and being reintroduced several times, neither man knew the other’s name.