Russell, Raiders moving forward

The Raiders and the agents for No. 1 pick JaMarcus Russell made significant progress Saturday night and their negotiations will continue after today’s game. Sources on both sides believe that a contract could be in place by Tuesday.

The final parameters could be very interesting because the total guaranteed money might end up being very close to what the club offered a couple weeks ago. The big question then will be why wasn’t this deal done earlier?

You can bet that Russell and his family have become very impatient with the talks, thus negating the rumors that the LSU quarterback didn’t want to play for the Raiders in the first place. If that was really the case, this deal would never get done.

Finally, it will be interesting if backup quarterback Daunte Culpepper is in uniform today. The Raiders owed him a bonus at the start of the season and basically guaranteeing him a total of $3.2 million, including bonuses and salary. Agents are saying that the Raiders were going to grind on Culpepper – force him to redo his contract -- in order to free up more money for Russell.

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