The Michael Crabtree saga (so far)

[Auggie]

By Elizabeth Merrill, ESPN.com: 9-24-09

Their million-dollar smiles are frozen on a stage in New York City, awash in San Francisco 49ers gear. There's little brother Cornelius, sheepishly grinning in a red-and-black cap. Cornelius is the young man who -- in the frenzy after the greatest catch of the 2008 college football season -- Michael Crabtree grabbed and hugged while the citizens of Lubbock, Texas, danced and celebrated. There's his dad, Michael Sr., grinning and looking proud on draft day. Heck, even Michael is smiling. He's about to become a multi-millionaire, about to take the first step toward doing what he confided only to the closest of his friends: that someday, he wants to be the Michael Jordan of football.

The picture doesn't tell everything, that Crabtree is none too pleased about being the second receiver picked. He holds up his 49ers jersey and mugs for the cameras. And the summer of discontent begins.

The first thing to know about holdout negotiations is that it's generally taboo to say anything. Agents go underground, mothers and cousins and childhood chums rehearse their "no comments," and the two sides hunker down because one little slip of the tongue could be interpreted as a sign of one camp's flinching.

So for the better part of 57 days since Crabtree's holdout began, one of the NFL's biggest mystery men has remained unknown. Maybe Crabtree prefers it this way, because he never quite got used to all the attention and the way it happened so fast. Maybe he's blocked out all the critics who have called him a diva and are dumbfounded by his refusal to take the $20 million on the table.

LOT MORE: http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?page=hotread2/crabtree

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The article goes on to mention his inner circle consists of former NFL superstar Deion Sanders, Texas state Sen. Royce West and Crabtree's cousin, bail bondsman David Wells. I didn't know Sanders was involved. Nor a state senator.