Nah, that's not the taste I want to leave in my mouth. I feel better now because I know I'll be playing with two legs. The linebacker failed to live up to them on and off the field throughout his career.
He was ultimately cut by the Raiders after just three seasons. The linebacker, however, stunningly announced his retirement in the following month at the age of After sitting out the season, McClain unretired, joining the Dallas Cowboys in , where he played 24 games over two seasons.
Getting reinstated is just one hurdle McClain faces. He likes to be around his people. And he'll do anything for a friend. Before his senior year, McClain was with some of his friends at a McDonald's in Decatur late at night. According to Adcock, who investigated the matter, words were exchanged with another group of young males and a fight broke out. It spilled into the parking lot and lasted several minutes before police arrived.
McClain was never charged with any wrongdoing, but Adcock came down hard on his star linebacker, who would be named a high school All-American at the end of the year. After every practice for the entire season, he had to run 10 extra minutes. Adcock also told McClain—the team leader who had already committed to Alabama—that he couldn't be a captain and he couldn't speak to reporters.
I didn't want his picture on the news. It was a tough-love thing. I told him, 'You've got to stay out of dangerous situations and stay away from dangerous people. Be as smart off the field as you are on it. Nick Saban was exactly what he needed. In Saban, McClain found a coach with a will as strong as his own.
After being on campus only a few months, Saban elevated him to the first string. But then, at a practice midway through the season, McClain changed a defensive play call. What happened next, according to multiple players, has become a legendary anecdote inside the football complex in Tuscaloosa. Saban, at the top of his lungs, asked McClain what he was doing; he told his coach, in the bluest of language, to be quiet.
He didn't start for five games. And yet, this was a defining moment in the relationship between the coach and the linebacker. A boundary was set. McClain understood he had crossed a line and he learned his lesson. He wound up starting the last three games of the season as a true freshman in The following year, he was first-team All-SEC.
Saban grew to adore him. Saban likes big linebackers—one of his pet phrases is, "Heavyweights knock out middleweights"—and in McClain, he discovered a player who was as much of a film junkie as he was. Several times, they watched game film for hours on end, just the two of them, their minds firing with strategies and ideas for how to defend different offenses in certain down-and-distance situations.
After Alabama won the national title in , Saban proclaimed that McClain was one of his all-time favorite players. McClain, a first-team All-American in '09, left school a year early to enter the draft.
The Raiders picked him eighth overall. The marriage was destined to fail from the start. According to several of McClain's friends, he made it clear to the Raiders organization before the draft that he wasn't interested in playing for Oakland. California may as well have been a foreign country to him; he wanted to be on a team closer to home.
But the Raiders were desperate for a run-stuffing, athletic linebacker who could anchor a defense for a decade, and so they selected McClain.
His friends say one of the first things he realized was that it wasn't anything like Saban's Alabama, where perfection is aggressively chased every day and complacency is considered an Old Testament sin. In his three seasons in Oakland, the Raiders went , and the losing siphoned every drip of joy out of the game for him.
McClain didn't do himself any favors, though. He had few friends on the team, according to two of his buddies in Alabama, and his attitude soured with every defeat.
His growing unhappiness translated into uninspired, ambivalent play, as he often acted like someone who didn't want to be an NFL player.
Eventually, the linebacker who couldn't watch enough film at Alabama basically quit studying his opponents. McClain was bound to explode, and he finally did in late November After sleepwalking through a drill during a practice in late November, then-Raiders coach Dennis Allen chastised his starting middle linebacker. McClain talked back—breaking the golden rule of professional sports—and the two got into a heated argument.
The Raiders suspended him for two games. In effect, his spirit to play football had been broken. It was the opposite of Alabama. McClain finished his first season with 85 tackles, 0. During the NFL season, in which the Raiders' defense struggled and was statistically the worst defense in the league, McClain saw his playing time decrease following a rout by the division rival Denver Broncos.
During a week 4 game against Denver, McClain played in 73 snaps, but following the bye, the Raiders made the decision to replace him with 4th round rookie Miles Burris in their nickel package, resulting in McClain playing only 17 snaps compared to Burris' 55 in the week 6 game against the Atlanta Falcons. Head coach Dennis Allen was quoted as saying that he has been impressed with Burris' ability to make corrections on the fly, saying the linebacker was not a "repeat offender" when it came to mistakes and a smart football player overall, indicating the coaching staff's belief that McClain was guilty of poor decision-making and too many errors.
According to sources within the Raiders, it was reported by NFL. McClain had been drafted with the hopes that he could help improve the Raiders' run defense, an area where the team had been consistently among the worst in the league. Throughout his tenure however, McClain has not only failed to help bolster the defense against the run, but he has also shown to be a liability in pass coverage.
McClain was released on April 5, by the Oakland Raiders. McClain signed with the Baltimore Ravens on April 10, He grew up in the projects of Decatur, Alabama. At 15, Rolando received a restraining order against his mother after she beat him and threatened him with a knife.
At 16, she was arrested after she threatened his entire high school which resulted in a school lock down. During the trial she was diagnosed as bi-polar. His estranged father was granted custody but McClain left to return to Decatur to stay eligible for football. He lived with several families including the Tim Thomas family his junior year. McClain could be considered to have been "on his own" since he was The top pick has not played in an NFL game since McClain was conditionally reinstated to the league over the weekend after not having played since Now 30, the former eighth overall selection in the NFL Draft has been suspended since December for violating the league's substance abuse policy.
Now 30 years old, the eighth overall pick from the draft hasn't played football since , but his pedigree should be enough to earn him a tryout. McClain had his best pro season in when he piled up tackles 79 solo , five sacks and 14 pass defenses in 15 games for the Raiders. The No. McClain will celebrate his 30th birthday this upcoming weekend, so he may have lost a step even if his off-field issues have been sorted out.
McClain suspension was arrested and charged with second-degree possession of marijuana, carrying a firearm without a permit and a misdemeanor equipment violation Friday, Anna Beahm of DecaturDaily. McClain was reportedly pulled over for an alleged window tint violation when an officer smelled an odor of marijuana and subsequently conducted a search. The year-old was suspended infinitely by the NFL in December after missing the season due to violating the league's substance abuse policy.
McClain is suspended indefinitely for violating the league's substance abuse policy, NFL.
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