by Jim Trotter
When training camp opened, Junior was nowhere to be found. A week passed . . . then two . . . then three. Junior joked when asked about his absence, telling the San Diego Union: “I’ve decided not to shave until I get signed, and right now I’m getting some hair on my face and looking kind of ugly. I told my agent when I start to braid it, we’re in trouble.”
An unintended consequence of his contract impasse was that Junior was losing the goodwill he had built up with his teammates during off-season workouts. They were starting to view him as a prima donna, not a happy-go-lucky kid eager to play for his hometown team. The day after making the joke about his beard, Junior and Feldman met with Beathard and proposed a contract that would average $1 less per year than McCants’s deal. Beathard rejected it. Not only that, he said, because he considered the move “showmanship,” he might not counter the proposal.
Things quickly went from bad to worse. Junior was so put off by Beathard’s response that he, Feldman, and DeBoer flew to Cancun to get away. “I think it was our way to let everybody know we were going to do our own thing until we got a deal,” Feldman recalled. “We body-surfed and hung out and danced and drank and did all sorts of crazy stuff. He was in great shape. He trained like crazy. So there was never a concern that he wouldn’t be ready once a deal got done.”
At that point Feldman was seeking an average of $1,199,999 a year while the Chargers were offering $850,000—the same offer they had made 23 days earlier. By way of comparison, the number 5 pick in the previous year’s draft, cornerback Deion Sanders, received an average of $1.1 million on a four-year deal from the Atlanta Falcons. Sanders had leverage, though. He was a talented baseball player, and the Falcons knew that Major League Baseball was a legitimate option for him.
Feldman began to feel the pressure a week later when three of his Chargers clients—Pro Bowl defensive end Lee Williams, who was seeking a new contract, cornerback Gill Byrd, and defensive tackle Joe Phillips—all fired him. “I don’t think Feldman’s in a position anymore to help me renegotiate my contract without a lot of hostility,” Williams told the San Diego Union. “I think it’s gotten to the point that there’s bad blood between him and this organization. Quite frankly that leaves him a lame duck where I’m concerned. It took me about five days to make this decision because Steve never did me wrong; all he ever tried to do was help me. I hate doing it, but it’s the big picture. He’s not very well liked around here. I don’t want to say there’s a war going on between him and management, but I know I’m in the middle of something. And I don’t want to suffer because of something that doesn’t pertain to me.”
On August 22, the Chargers made a take-it-or-leave-it offer and gave Junior until 5:00 PM the next day to accept it. The contract would pay him an average of $905,000 a year, roughly $300,000 a year less than what he was seeking. “If he rejects it, I guess it gives him a chance of not playing football this year,” said Beathard, who added that the offer would be reduced daily if not accepted. Junior accepted it, after the deadline was pushed back 20 minutes because Feldman couldn’t reach him by phone.
Happy days? Hardly.
Junior was supposed to report to camp that Sunday evening but never did. Feldman informed the team that Junior had missed his plane from Cancun, but he complicated matters by adding that his client was angry at the organization—not just about the way it handled negotiations, but also because Gina DeBoer had been fired during that time. The club said it was following an organizational policy that prohibited fraternization between staff and players; however, DeBoer said that she and Junior were told before the draft that their relationship would not be an issue with the team.
When Junior failed to report Sunday night, speculation mounted that he might renege on the oral agreement. Such talk irked an already irritated Beathard. “It’s just a game, and we aren’t going to play their game much longer,” the GM told the media. “The best thing I can say is, if the guy is as unhappy as we read in the newspaper, then maybe it would be better if he didn’t come here.”
When Junior did arrive, he still was unsure about signing. He met with Beathard, then walked outside, where he, DeBoer, and Feldman took a stroll around the University of California–San Diego campus, home of the Chargers’ training camp. Finally, after four days, three missed planes, and some figurative mending of emotional fences, he signed a five-year, $4.525 million deal.
There was no big press conference, no wide smiles as he sat before the cameras and scribbled his name at the bottom of a contract. Instead, an uneasy tension filled the air. He was happy to be a Charger, yet unhappy to be a Charger. The team received a two-game roster exemption to get him in shape, but the Chargers immediately announced their plans to play him that Saturday in Los Angeles in the preseason finale against the hated Raiders.
And so the real fireworks began.
6
“I’ve Got to Get Better”
LOS ANGELES SPORTING crowds are notorious for arriving late and leaving early, but September 1, 1990, was particularly dreadful. The LA Coliseum was virtually empty when the Raiders kicked off against the Chargers in the preseason finale for both teams. The announced crowd of only 25,071 barely registered inside the 90,000-seat stadium.
The sparse turnout wasn’t completely shocking considering the game meant nothing in the standings and clubs typically limit or rest their starters in the final exhibition game, fearful of exposing them to injury. But this game was slightly different for two reasons: Junior would be making his unofficial pro debut after missing all of training camp because of a contract squabble, and he’d be doing it in the place he called home during his college career. Perhaps the public was wise to save its money because Junior, who took the field late in the first quarter, was ejected after only two plays for punching Raiders left guard Steve Wisniewski.
The strike came at the end of a play that’s as fundamental to football as blocking and tackling: a tailback run into the middle of the line. Junior correctly diagnosed the play, but he charged too aggressively toward the line of scrimmage and missed the tackle on Napoleon McCallum, who gained six yards. Wisniewski, who had a reputation for playing to the whistle—and sometimes beyond—latched on to Junior from behind and pushed him toward the pile where McCallum had gone down.
“I knew something about Junior, being that he was at USC and we played in Los Angeles,” Wisniewski recalled decades later. “I really wanted to push his buttons and test him. I got a chance to block him, and I just ran him, ran him, ran him and blocked him into the ground. Then I purposely sat on him to see how he would react. I was slow to get off of him, to test his mettle. Sure enough, he finally jumps off the ground and starts swinging. He made several rookie mistakes. One, he swung with his bare hand. Two, he connected with my helmet. And three, I just pointed to the ref and put my hands up, and they ejected him from the game. It was really comical. I couldn’t believe what happened.”
Wisniewski was the type of gritty, nasty player you loved to have on your team but hated to play against. The six-foot-four 305-pounder liked to annoy and antagonize opponents with his words as well as his actions, and Junior was an easy mark for him. Junior, intense and energetic by nature, was particularly amped for the game because he knew all eyes would be on him after missing all of training camp. He wanted to show the team, the community, and his family that they could be proud of him and depend on him, but instead, he reverted to the overly aggressive kid from the Oceanside Boys & Girls Club.
His ejection was greeted with an air of disbelief. It was a wasted opportunity for the Chargers, who wanted to see if he was far enough along to contribute in the season opener the following week. Two plays were not enough to make an informed decision.
Coach Dan Henning immediately called for trainer Keoki Kamau to escort Junior off the field and up the long tunnel to the visitors’ locker room. Junior laughed at himself when Kamau arrived: “I didn’t even break a sweat yet,” he said. As they walked away Junior made a promise to himself regard
ing Wisniewski.
“I’m going to own that guy,” he said. “By the time we’re done, I’m going to work him over.”
“I know, Bug,” Kamau said. “Let’s just get through this thing.”
When they finally reached the locker room, Junior burst out laughing. “I can’t believe I just got kicked out of the game,” he said, incredulous.
“That was Junior,” Kamau recalled. “He was angry at himself for being in that situation and not reacting the way he would’ve normally reacted. He should’ve taken the high road, but being a young athlete, coming into the league, full of energy—it was, let’s go get this thing. Then he gets tangled up, and the next thing he’s out of the game. We’re walking off and he’s like, ‘This is unbelievable.’”
The expectation was that Junior would get a major dose of ribbing and snide remarks from veteran teammates who had gone through the meat grinder of training camp while he was on the beach in Mexico, but it didn’t happen, at least not to the extent that anyone expected. If anything, Junior had earned the private respect of some of his teammates who viewed his intensity, athleticism, and physicality as the missing pieces on a defense looking to take the next step.
“We knew we had a ‘player’—a guy who wasn’t going to back down, who was going to set the tone,” said cornerback Gill Byrd. “It didn’t matter that he was a rookie—he was going to give it his all. We looked at that as something good, because he was setting a tone that we hadn’t had in the past. We needed somebody in the linebacker corps who would elevate the play of everybody around him and play with a lot of passion. We had a lot of good, talented players on the team, but Junior had that something special about him as an athlete. It was different. You could see he genuinely loved and enjoyed the game. He was probably the best athlete with the biggest motor I had ever seen to that point. You knew greatness was there.”
There was no need for teammates to get on Junior because privately he was chastising himself. Feldman, his agent, had prescheduled a family get-together for the Seaus that night after the game. It would be a chance for everybody to celebrate the signing of his contract because there had been no opportunity to do that earlier. Junior had reported immediately to the practice field after coming to contract terms, so there had been no time to visit with family.
The mood at Feldman’s Newport Beach condo was far from festive. With time to think on what had transpired, Junior was even more embarrassed.
“He was devastated,” said Gina. “He said to me, ‘G, there’s so much I have to do to prove myself, to gain the confidence of our city and my teammates and coaches. I have so far to go.’ I was like, ‘It’s okay. It happened. You’ll be fine.’ I was trying to be positive and encouraging, but I didn’t know him yet as an athlete. I didn’t know how seriously he took this. He knew his talent, and he had something to prove to his teammates, the coaches, and his family. He wanted to make his father and mother and the Seau family proud again.”
It would not happen the next week because not only did Junior not start the season opener—Cedric Figaro did—but he also was completely ineffective as San Diego was outscored 10–0 in the fourth quarter and lost 17–14 in Dallas. Junior, who replaced Figaro after the fifth snap and played the rest of the way in nonpassing situations, had only four tackles and frequently was out of position. Not only that, but his 15-yard penalty for spearing contributed to a Cowboys drive that produced the decisive field goal.
When he got home and spoke to Gina, he kept repeating himself: “I’ve got to get better. I’ve got to get better.”
That chance would come the following Sunday in the home opener, against the Bengals. Henning moved him into the starting lineup in hopes of gaining a spark, but the crowd of 49,679—which was well below capacity—gave him a chilly reception during player introductions. A noticeable number of fans booed when he ran onto the field after his name was called.
If the greeting was embarrassing for Junior, it was awkward and uncomfortable for Gina. Her relationship with Junior had become so serious that her mother had flown in from northern California for the game. She had yet to meet Junior, and now she was forced to balance the good things she had heard from her daughter with the boos she was hearing from the crowd.
Some fans were upset that Junior had acted so put off after signing his multimillion-dollar contract. He had agreed to terms on a Thursday but didn’t show up for work until the following Monday, a day after he was supposed to report. Then he spent 90 minutes walking around the UC San Diego campus with his agent and girlfriend, trying to decide if he really wanted to sign the deal. “It’s not the best, but we’re willing to deal,” he told reporters.
In the local newspaper, one fan spoke for countless others in a letter to the editor. “I am tired of reading about how unhappy Junior is,” the fan wrote. “How many kids just out of college, with a degree, receive a salary of $1 million for their first job? Junior should be grateful that anyone is willing to pay him such a ridiculous salary. If this crybaby continues to pout, the Chargers should point him to the nearest fast-food employment office.”
Another wrote: “I’m currently in a homeless shelter, and I bet many people here who attend chapel services have acquired a more peaceful and invigorating spirit than you, Junior! Feeling empty these days, Junior? Oh, shucks. C’mon, meet me over coffee sometime at the shelter. I’ll even buy, Mr. Millionaire. Anything, if only I can encourage you to ‘wake up and smell the coffee,’ to ‘get a life’ of ultimate value and contentment.”
Junior had unintentionally become the symbol of the greedy young athlete who wants everything without doing anything. So fans booed whenever his name was called during the home opener. Their behavior clearly impacted him. He finished with only five tackles as the Chargers surrendered the final 14 points and lost 21–16.
“That hurt,” he said two years later of the treatment. “I’ve never had an experience like that, and it’s something I don’t want to go through again. That gave me a sense of the real world. I want to gain respect, and that was humbling. I think it helped me out as a player and as a person.”
It should have been a happy time for him: he was playing in his hometown, fulfilling his boyhood dream, and providing for his family. But Junior was miserable. The Chargers moved him to inside linebacker, and he hated it. He wanted to be back on the outside, where he had a clearer path to the quarterback. He expressed his feelings to the coaches and management, but they kept him on the inside. His emotions fluctuated between anger and self-pity. He had had so much success at outside linebacker in college that he couldn’t understand why the Chargers wouldn’t set him on the edge of the offensive formation and allow him to rush the passer, as he had done at USC. That was how he was accustomed to making plays. It allowed him to be special.
In the Chargers’ defensive scheme he felt like just another guy. Worse, his penalties were costing them games. Besides the one against Dallas, there was another for unsportsmanlike conduct in a 17–7 loss to Houston. Football was no longer fun for him, and it showed in his personality. He didn’t smile as much, and he kept his playful side behind a curtain of apparent indifference.
He would show up on time for work, then leave as soon as practice ended. It was the first time in his life he didn’t want to be in the locker room or to hang out with teammates. His parents’ home offered little refuge because his father was upset with the negative attention Junior had been receiving. Papa Seau felt that the family name had been tainted by the bad press.
“Junior was born with the Seau name, and Dad looked up to Junior to bring his name up,” said Mary, his oldest sister. “Dad was upset after [the negative reaction to the contract impasse]. I asked him, ‘Why are you getting mad at his glory? He worked for it, you didn’t.’ Dad said, ‘That’s so embarrassing.’”
The same sense of disappointment and shame that Junior felt after failing to receive a qualifying score on his SAT in high school came rushing back. A high point in his life had become a low po
int—again. He also raised eyebrows with his lack of humility, such as when he repeatedly spoke poorly of McCants, the linebacker selected ahead of him in the draft.
In April, before the draft, Junior tried to prop up himself by putting down McCants. “Everyone made him out to be Superman, but then they saw he didn’t fly,” he said. “Everyone wanted to give him his cake, but then he ate it. He came in fat because he thinks it’s easy. He didn’t excite me at all.”
The comment was out of character, but some wrote it off as predraft bluster. Six months later, however, before the Bucs and McCants were set to travel to San Diego to play the Chargers, Junior was still targeting the former Alabama star.
“I still hold it against him that he was portrayed as the linebacker of the year [coming out of college],” Junior said. “. . . I wish he played running back, then I would be satisfied because he would be getting hit hard and, hopefully, it would be by me . . . You can’t compare sacks between him and me in college either, because there’s no comparison. He would do me a favor if he brought up sacks because then I would say: ‘Line both of us outside and see who gets to the quarterback first.’ What he has to understand is that I’m a competitor. He was portrayed as the best and I went after him. Deep inside me—and I think a lot of people will vouch for me—I beat him. I beat him on the field and I beat him in the Combine workouts.”
Junior then noted that he was starting as a rookie while McCants was playing as a reserve. Junior ranked fifth on the team in tackles while McCants was 15th.