Chiefs’ Thomas Seriously Injured

Derrick Thomas, nine-time Pro Bowl linebacker for the Kansas City Chiefs, was seriously injured in a one-car accident on an icy road Sunday that killed one of his close friends.

Television reports said Thomas, 33, sustained a broken back, although a team spokesman and a hospital spokeswoman declined to confirm that.

Thomas and his companions were en route to Kansas City International Airport to fly to St. Louis for the NFC championship game when their car rolled over several times on a snowy highway about 1:30 p.m. CST.

Both Thomas and the man who died were thrown from the vehicle, the Missouri State Highway Patrol said.

The dead man was identified as Michael Tellis, 49, of Kansas City, a close friend who helped Thomas set up charity golf tournaments and other projects.

An icy snow began falling in the Kansas City metropolitan area around noon. The weather was also being blamed for a pile-up on Interstate 29 northwest of Kansas City in which eight deaths had been confirmed by Sunday night.

Thomas, from Alabama, was taken in the first round of the 1989 draft and has been with the Chiefs ever since. In 1990, he set the NFL single-game record with seven sacks against Seattle.

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Fred Taylor of the Jacksonville Jaguars lost about $3 million in a fraud scheme that ensnared more than a dozen NFL players, the Miami Herald reported.

The running back lost his entire $5 million signing bonus--more than $3 million after taxes--from the six-year contract he signed as a rookie in 1998 after investing in the scheme, the newspaper said.

Taylor says he questioned agent William Black about his investment but received only “lame excuses.”

Aside from Taylor, former University of Florida standouts Reidel Anthony, Jacquez Green and Ike Hilliard lost money.

So did former Carolina Panther receiver Rae Carruth, who is in a Charlotte, N.C., jail charged with murdering his pregnant girlfriend. In the weeks leading to the murder, people close to Carruth said he complained of money problems.

Black was charged in October with unlicensed agent activity in Florida. If convicted, he could face a $5,000 fine and up to 15 years in prison.

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Al Groh, one of the more nondescript assistant coaches in the NFL, will be announced today as coach of the New York Jets.