Grossman Already Making Impact : Outspoken No. 1 Draft Choice Is Loosening Up Chargers
Representatives for rookie defensive end Burt Grossman, the Chargers’ No. 1 draft pick, met with Steve Ortmayer for approximately five hours here Monday morning.
Ho-hum.
Sure, it’s good for Grossman and good for the Chargers that the two parties have finally looked each other in the eye. On the Chargers’ side was Ortmayer, the team’s director of football operations. On Grossman’s side was Cleveland agent Robert Jackson and adviser Gil Brandt, the former Dallas Cowboy talent scout.
“Good progress,” Ortmayer said when asked to characterize the meeting. But by Monday afternoon, Jackson was on a plane headed back to Cleveland and Grossman was still in Pittsburgh where he spent the day playing in a charity golf tournament.
It will likely be at least another week before Jackson and Ortmayer even find a middle ground on structure, much less contract value.
Maybe the real news concerning the controversial Grossman is the effect his candor is having on the Charger organization--an organization that was tight-lipped and up-tight in public last year thanks, in large part, to the intramural political plottings of former Coach Al Saunders.
“I think Burt is a refreshing guy,” Charger Coach Dan Henning said. “He’s a loosey-goosey guy. Burt Grossman is a guy who thinks he can lick the world. I don’t think there’s anything that’ll upset ‘ole Burt.
“My dad used to say that the Lord protects drunks and little children. Maybe you can add a third category to that and put Burt in there. They say that everybody tells white lies in their life. I don’t know if Burt can tell any white lies. That doesn’t mean he’s always right.”
On the day the Chargers made Grossman the eighth selection in the National Football League draft last April, the subject came up about the pets Grossman kept in his room at Pittsburgh. Included in the menagerie was a boa constrictor and a pit bull, “Bernie,” named after New York subway vigilante Bernhard Goetz.
Grossman said he had gotten rid of them all. And he said, “I’ll probably get a dog in San Diego. Either a dog or get married. There’s less aggravation with a dog. To get rid of a dog, you take it to the SPCA and it doesn’t get half your money.”
Grossman’s lines get repeated around the lunch and dinner tables at the Chargers’ UC San Diego training camp. And they get repeated laughs.
Grossman has also taken potshots at the contract demands of other first-round picks. And there are more than a few Charger veterans in the offensive and defensive line who can’t wait for Grossman to show up and learn the harsh realities of day-to-day life in the NFL.
But even the dead-serious Ortmayer chuckled briefly Monday before addressing the Charger organization’s official stance on Burt’s blurts.
“I’ve been around some of that in my time,” said Ortmayer, a former assistant with the Raiders. “And it’s OK if you can back it up. Generally, you have to be able to back it up.”
Henning compared Grossman’s outbursts with the ones uttered by Washington Redskins defensive lineman Dexter Manley. But Henning is smart enough to see the difference. Chicago Coach Mike Ditka once said Manley had the IQ of a “grapefruit.”
“This guy (Grossman),” Henning says, “is an intelligent guy.”
Manley’s mouthings are usually followed by hurried damage-control dispatches issued by Redskin Coach Joe Gibbs. Grossman is on his own.
“Maybe the Lord protects certain people,” Henning said. “Guys like Burt Grossman, he seems to protect ‘em.”
When second-rounder Billy Joe Tolliver signed and reported Sunday, it left Grossman as the Chargers’ only unsigned rookie. Tolliver practiced erratically Monday, displaying the arm strength Henning coveted before the draft and simultaneously showing his inexperience and rust by fumbling snap after snap.
‘When something happens bad, a lot of guys will get down or depressed,” Henning said. “But this guy (Tolliver) . . . nothing fazes him. Physically, and the way he throws the football, every time I look at him I think of Sonny. He has that kind of swagger about him.”
Sonny Jurgensen, the former Redskin quarterback, also had reddish hair like Tolliver’s. But he spent years in the Eagles’ organization understudying Norm Van Brocklin. That’s the way it is much of the time for quarterbacks.
Defensive ends such as Grossman often play immediately. Yet Henning said Grossman would have to play in at least two exhibition games before he’d be ready to start the regular season Sept. 10.
“It’s not like he’s coming into a situation where we don’t have any good defensive linemen,” Henning said. “He’d have to be effective in at least a couple of (preseason) games before we could count on him.”
Tolliver’s absence was topical because of his importance to the future of the offense. Grossman, when he signs, might be no less important to the defense. But his absence is topical because the front office, the coaches, the players and even the media can’t wait to see what he’ll do once he arrives.
This year’s Chargers are different that way. And maybe the tolerance of Grossman’s antics is the measuring stick.
Charger Notes
Steve Ortmayer, the Chargers’ director of football operations, wouldn’t confirm Gil Brandt’s presence in the Monday meeting about Burt Grossman’s contract. But a source said Brandt was there mainly as a quiet adviser to Grossman’s agent, Robert Jackson. . . . The Chargers are no longer worried about starting cornerback Gill Byrd’s knee injury. The injury occurred Sunday. But Byrd was back in pads and practicing full speed Monday afternoon. Byrd told Coach Dan Henning Sunday night that he felt fine after doctors drained fluid from the knee.