With the NFL draft just a few hours away, there is one big-time player that will not be in attendance at Chicago’s Auditorium Theatre tonight. LSU offensive tackle La’el Collins, who was invited to attend the 2015 NFL Draft as a potential first-round pick, left Chicago on Wednesday and returned to Louisiana in the wake of recent events. Last Friday night, Collins’ ex-girlfriend Brittany Mills was murdered in her apartment by an unknown suspect. The 29-year-old was shot several times in her stomach upon opening the door of her home to the assailant. Mills was pregnant at the time of the shooting, and was able to be transported to a hospital and successfully deliver the baby before she passed away.
Now, Baton Rouge police are conducting a full investigation into the shooting death of Mills. As part of their investigation, they wanted to question Collins, who they believe was romantically connected to the victim at one time. However, there is no indication that the NFL prospect is being looked at as a suspect. For now, they are just looking to talk to anybody who might have knowledge on the matter.
This is a very sticky situation. NFL teams know this, La’el Collins knows this, and his agent Deryk Gilmore knows this. While police have insisted that Collins is not currently being questioned as a suspect, most NFL teams still do not want to take their chances on a player dealing with this kind of negative drama. That being said, Collins and his agent are aware that his draft stock will most likely drop if he stays in the draft, due to the situation at hand. Earlier today, Gilmore made a request to the NFL for Collins to pull out of the draft and join the supplemental draft this summer, but the request was denied. According to the NFL’s Collective Bargaining Agreement, “no player may elect to bypass a Draft for which he is eligible to apply for selection in a Supplemental Draft”.
Prior to this incident, most people projected Collins to get drafted in the first round tonight. Some even predicted that he would go in the top 10. Now due to these unfortunate circumstances, he will have to sit back and wait for who knows how long as other players’ names get called before his. That is, unless one team decides to give him the benefit of the doubt and take a chance on him. While I understand where the NFL is coming from and why a team would hesitate to draft someone whose name is being indirectly linked to a murder (especially seeing as how many players were involved in questionable situations last season), it seems unfair to punish this young player for something he likely had no control over. But hopefully, this is just a small obstacle that he will have to overcome on his way to a great future in the NFL.
