(Philadelphia, Pa) — The NFL’s Downtime cycle just got a little quieter as the 2008 NFL Supplemental Draft scheduled for mid July has been canceled because of a lack of entrants (i.e “No One Applied”), according to several reports. The NFL sent out a memo to all 32 teams informing them of the announcement on July 2nd.
The cancellation of the NFL’s “special” circumstance draft comes as a surprise as in recent years several players have utilized the process to get into the NFL (2007 – Ahmad Brooks of the Cincinnati Bengals; 2008 – Paul Oliver of the San Diego Chargers and Jared Gaither by the Baltimore Ravens). I guess high profile players with issues — Southern California middle linebacker Rey Maualuga, Mississippi State offensive tackle Michael Brown, and others — will have to find other avenues into the NFL (Arena Football, AFL2, or Canadian Football League).
Since the Supplemental Draft’s inception in 1977, thirty-eight players have been selected with nine never playing in a regular-season game (Future HOF Cris Carter is the high water mark selected by the Eagles in 1987 – 4th rd).
Now that event is crossed off NFL Calendars, we will now turn our attentions to the start of training camp (July 20th for Washington Redskins and July 22nd for Houston Texans.
Lloyd Vance is a Sr. NFL Writer/Analyst for Taking It to the House and an award winning member of the Pro Football Writers of America (PFWA)
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