Clausen Puts NFL Teams in Pickle

To be honest, it is difficult to find fault with Jimmy Clausen between the goal posts.

The former Notre Dame quarterback could be taller. The Fighting Irish always listed him at 6-3, but the NFL scouting combine outed him at 6-2 1/2. Still, that height eclipses Mark Sanchez's measurement from a year ago. The former USC quarterback, who like Clausen was raised in southern California and left school following his junior season, was the fifth overall selection in the 2009 NFL Draft by the New York Jets.

Height is not a major concern in Clausen's case. Depth is.

Is Clausen a punk or is he just someone who got punked outside a bar in South Bend in November? Is he disingenuous -- phony -- in the way he presents himself to the media, or is he simply circumspect, the product of having watched two older brothers, both former SEC quarterbacks, be mistreated in print? Was that black eye Clausen acquired just hours after playing his final home game at Notre Dame Stadium a most fitting symbol of his immaturity or is it the most unfairly received stigma since the "A" on Hester Prynne's gown?

To be honest, no one in the media truly knows. NFL franchises, however, who employ private investigators to discover such truths before they make eight-figure deals with 22-year-old men, are desperately trying to find out.

"To be honest..." That phrase, as well as "each and every day" are chronic Clausen crutches in interview settings. In a seven-minute radio chat with Colin Cowherd earlier this week, he used the former four times. Listening to Clausen speak, it feels as if he has been just as well-coached in the art of providing pat answers as he has in decoding a disguised eight-man front. Fairly or unfairly, the media has always resented him for it. For not being candid.

As a freshman, Clausen was quarantined from the media, with one or two exceptions, all season long. Former Notre Dame coach Charlie Weis employed that policy with all freshmen during his five seasons in South Bend, so Clausen's silence was not abnormal.

In his final two seasons in South Bend, Clausen was always cordial with the media, but the wall of intimacy never crumbled. Replies were robotic, nearly Stepford-ian. Still, since Clausen was his starting quarterback, perhaps Weis should have made an exception. Especially as the national media, with no new Clausen-provided fodder on which to graze, continued to unfairly hammer him for an ill-conceived, two-mile, Hummer journey he'd taken as a high school junior. As if the Hummer were his idea. It may have been imprudent -- and impudent -- of him, but Clausen in more ways than one was simply along for the ride that day.

In his final two seasons in South Bend, Clausen was always cordial with the media, but the wall of intimacy never crumbled. Replies were robotic, nearly Stepford-ian. Last season, because they were the offensive team captains, Clausen and center Eric Olsen (whose candor was diametrically opposed to Clausen's calculation) met the media together each Wednesday afternoon. In the week before the October 31 Washington State game -- easily the most relaxed week of the season -- both were asked an innocent question: What's your most memorable Halloween costume?

Olsen, a gregarious Staten Island (NY) native (and Weis' personal favorite), launched into a tale about dressing up as Indiana Jones. When Clausen's turn came, he went to his favorite audible for a question he'd rather not answer: "I can't really remember."

Olsen interrupted, good-naturedly mimicking, "I'm Jimmy Clausen, I'm too cool for Halloween."

Clausen grinned sheepishly. It was a telling moment, though. Even his own center was calling him out for his aloofness.

Between the goal posts ... Clausen has always been the man with the golden arm. Frankly, he spoiled Irish fans with his uncanny accuracy the past three seasons. Last autumn, Clausen threw four interceptions versus 28 touchdown passes. One of the picks was a soft toss that slipped right through tailback Armando Allen's hands and the other a buttonhook that initially hit Michael Floyd between the numbers -- on the back of his jersey (Floyd misread the call and was blocking downfield, against Navy, when he should have been facing Clausen).

Clausen threw two legitimate interceptions in 395 attempts. That and his arm strength is why, like Sanchez, he will probably be the second quarterback taken somewhere in the top 10 picks in April's NFL Draft. And this only two seasons removed from being chronically -- and unfairly -- tagged as "overrated".

During an interminably miserable 2007 freshman season, Clausen was physically and mentally unprepared to play. Physically, because as someone recovering from offseason elbow surgery, he was limited in his ability to lift weights and add bulk. Mentally, because directing Weis' sophisticated passing attack as a true freshman would have been difficult for anyone. And that's before factoring in an offense that had lost its tailback, both wide receivers and four starters from the offensive line.

In 2007 the Irish allowed an NCAA-record 58 sacks (the previous worst in school history was 38, thus this figure represents an abominable 52 percent increase). While Clausen was not himself sacked 58 times, he absorbed most of the punishment. And stoically, from everything that could be surmised from afar.

This past season Clausen again demonstrated his toughness. Despite tearing tendons in his toe against Michigan State -- ironically, while being sacked for the first time all season and not until Notre Dame's third game -- Clausen never missed a start. One week later, he led the Irish back against Purdue on a breathless, game-winning drive that culminated in a game-winning, fourth-down touchdown pass to tight end Kyle Rudolph.

Afterward, on the turf at Purdue's Ross-Ade Stadium, Weis and Clausen shared a moment. It felt as if Weis were congratulating him for having achieved that Joe Montana moment. Weis, after all, had sat in the Notre Dame student section for all of them more than 30 years earlier.

One week after Clausen's Halloween press conference, Notre Dame arranged for four reporters -- from the AP, Chicago Tribune, Chicago Sun-Times and South Bend Tribune -- to have an exclusive audience with Clausen. The idea was to provide them enhanced access to No. 7 in a more relaxed setting in anticipation of a November Heisman run by Clausen.

Every aspect of this forum was to Clausen's advantage. So when one reporter asked Clausen what he liked to do in his free time, he might have provided a more insightful response than, "Sleep."

The Irish never won another game with Clausen at quarterback. Though he was hardly to blame.

In the abysmal loss to Navy that week, Clausen set career marks for completions (a school-record 37) and passing yards (452) but it was his grit that won admirers. On the final play of the third quarter, Clausen was flushed from the pocket and attempted to bull past Midshipman cornerback Kevin Edwards for a touchdown. Edwards knocked Clausen silly -- you can almost see the tweetie birds circling his golden dome in this photo. Still, he returned on first down of the next series and threw for 225 yards and two touchdowns in that final, futile fourth quarter.



If only the Edwards hit had been the hardest anyone struck Clausen in November. Appearing earlier this week on "The Herd," Clausen at last addressed the issue. Cowherd asked him point-blank what happened, and here was Clausen's reply:

"We were hanging out at C.J.'s Pub for a few hours and we decided to leave. My girlfriend at this time, I'm walking out of there with my arm around her. And this guy recognizes who I am and starts cussing at me and screaming at me and screaming at my girlfriend at the time. And, you know, I just kind of laughed it off. And as soon as I walked by him, he just kinda cold-cocked me in the side of the face and that's pretty much the whole thing."

"It was never provoked?" Cowherd asked. "Some guy just took a cheap shot?"

"Just took a cheap shot at me," Clausen replied.

It struck me while listening to this exchange that Clausen never said, "To be honest." Was he being more or less candid?

Whether that is all that occurred is a matter that teams such as the Buffalo Bills, St. Louis Rams and Seattle Seahawks are curious to learn. Not so much because a high-profile, 22-year-old isn't allowed to get into a scrape. But perhaps more so because, now that Clausen has for the first time provided a public account of the incident, any eyewitness who disputes his story opens up the question as to whether Clausen projects an image that is inconsistent with his true character.

There were too many moments in the past three seasons that felt mercenary, as if the Clausens (because it was never just Jimmy ... it was his parents and his older brothers, Rick and Casey) were treating Notre Dame as their gridiron Wally World. Moments after that final home loss to Connecticut, yet another devastating defeat in overtime to a team with less talent, defensive end John Ryan, a senior, took a knee and sobbed openly.

Clausen, who unlike Ryan knew that he was far from playing his final football game, ushered his family onto the field (even though family members are not permitted on the field) and posed for a photo. He knew this was his final game at Notre Dame Stadium.

Two weeks later, Clausen, wide receiver Golden Tate and now ex-coach Weis gathered for a press conference to announce that the two juniors were going pro. This in the same room on campus where Clausen had given so many vacuum-packed answers the past three seasons. When this reporter asked an admittedly convoluted question, Clausen smiled and said, "Can you repeat that, please? Golden didn't understand what you meant."

For the first time that anyone could remember, Jimmy Clausen allowed that there's a personality underneath that veneer after all. It's funny: in his final week in a Notre Dame uniform Clausen wore that tinted visor at practice so as to hide his discolored left eye. The visor also served to mask any expression Clausen might reveal. In a sense Clausen wore that visor his entire time in South Bend. For his sake, here's hoping he chucks it before draft day.