Titans Accuse Redskins of Tampering

According to Jason Cole of Yahoo! Sports, the Tennessee Titans are formally accusing the Washington Redskins of tampering with defensive tackle Albert Haynesworth prior to signing him to a free-agent contract just hours after the signing period opened this offseason. The fact that tampering may have occurred in this case is not as surprising, though, as the fact that the Titans are pressing the issue.

It's no secret tampering occurs every year. It's just not realistic to think the details of some of these multi-million dollar deals are hammered out in just a few short hours. But rarely does a team file a complaint with the league.

Per the report, the league has interviewed at least two people and they likely will look into cell phone records and internal comunications to see if the Redskins had any early contact with Haynesworth's agent.

The Redskins face the possibility of lost draft picks should the league deem them guilty of the charges. The San Francisco 49ers were stripped of a fifth-round pick in 2008 for tampering with Chicago Bears linebacker Lance Briggs.

I'm not so sure, however, that a fifth-round pick is enough of a penalty to deter teams from trying to gain an advantage in signing blue-chip players.