Howard says he'll quit if not a FA
 

Howard done for season with future still in question

SAN ANTONIO (AP) - Defensive end Darren Howard says his career with the New Orleans Saints has effectively ended because of coach Jim Haslett's decision to sit him out for the remainder of the season.
Haslett said Wednesday that Howard would not play again this season because of an injured right knee. The move will allow more playing time for rookie defensive end Jimmy Verdon, a seventh-round pick from Arizona State.





"This situation has nothing to do with Darren Howard's knee," Howard said. "This is all about Darren Howard and the New Orleans Saints not growing with each other. That's the bottom line."

Howard, 29, was designated as the Saints' franchise player in 2005, making a base salary of $7.8 million. He was inactive for Monday night's 36-17 loss to Atlanta Falcons and his contract expires after this season.
"This is not a discipline problem with Darren whatsoever," Haslett said. "We have an opportunity to play a young kid, who I think is going to be a good player. Darren probably won't be back with us next year because of salary-cap reasons."

Howard said he does not want to re-sign with the Saints and would "quit" if team officials prevented him from testing free agency.


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RE: Howard says he
 

L8tr Darren....

RE: Howard says he
 

The man just cannot get on the field 16 games .

Have a great time elsewhere ....

RE: Howard says he
 

Can't have him aggravating that knee when he's trade bait for next season. Play Verndon. The rest of the season's down to talent evaluation.

I never thought Howard played as well as he was touted anyway.

RE: Howard says he
 

Howard had times where he was a beast, and other times where he was a bust. The guy could never stay helathy. I'll admit that I was an advocate of re-signing him this past offseason, but I was hoping he'd finally live up to the potential that hung over his head. Unfortunately, DH has worn out his welcome. It seems like this team is nothing but a bunch of quitters when things don't go their way....Haslett is going to resign, Brooks threatened to quit with all the moving (so Haslett helped him quit by benching him), and Howard now wants to quit. Fine by me!!!! Get all of your collective quitting arses out of here. Get someone in the lineup that is HUNGRY to play and not whine over every little obstacle. These guys are professionals....FREAKIN ACT LIKE IT!!!!

RE: Howard says he
 

Nothing like a little threat like that for me to want to designate him a franchise player so he will quit. Then he quits and we don't have to pay him. Fine by me!

RE: Howard says he
 

I got a question that maybe one of you fine gentlemen could answer for me... If he is going to be a free agent at the end of the season, do we still have the ability to trade him?

RE: Howard says he
 

He'll only be a FA if we do not tag him with either a franchise tag or a transition player tag.

RE: Howard says he
 

To my knowledge, we can only trade him if we have him under contract. And that contract expires before next season. So... if we want anything for him in trade value, we have to sign him to a new contract (or tag him, which is effectively the same thing). He'll want $$, but we must make sure that if we -do- sign him, we don't sign him for so much that another team doesn't want to pick up that phat contract.

So our chances of getting anything out of him are pretty slim.

That's the way I understand it.

RE: Howard says he
 

Try and trade him before the contract runs out, if not franchise him then get a draft pick or two for him...Speaking of the injury prone anyone heard anything on Chase Lyman?