Hoping to demonstrate again that one franchise's draft bust might become an Oakland bonanza, the Raiders on Tuesday signed free agent defensive tackle Donnell Washington, a two-year veteran released by the Packers on June 9. Washington, 25, was Green Bay's third-round choice in the 2004 draft, but he never played a single snap in a Packers uniform in two seasons with the team. Two different staffs grew frustrated at his chronic weight problems and apparent lack of motivation, and first-year coach Mike McCarthy finally decided to cut ties with the former Clemson star after a minicamp earlier this month.

Veteran defensive tackle Grady Jackson, one of the few starting-caliber players remaining in free agency just a month before training camps open, will visit later this week with Raiders officials as he seeks a new team for the 2006 season. Jackson, who played for the Packers the past three years, is coming off one of the most productive seasons of his nine-year league tenure, having started all 16 games in 2005, when he registered a career-best 72 tackles. Despite his performance, the Packers made little effort to re-sign Jackson once he entered the unrestricted free-agent market.

Revival of the city's bid for a National Football League team faces a challenge from residents who have filed suit to keep the city's Rose Bowl initiative off the November ballot. Pasadena First, a group of residents and preservationists organized to keep professional football out of the city, argued in a Superior Court motion June 22 that the ballot measure is "blatantly unconstitutional." The motion seeks a preliminary injunction. A tentative July 28 court hearing was scheduled. The November initiative, if passed, would give the NFL rights to play at the Rose Bowl for up to 55 years in exchange for a $500 million-plus renovation of the stadium and $500,000 annual rent.

Paul Tagliabue headed a NFL delegation which met with leaders of the Los Angeles business community on June 14, and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa expressed optimism about the return of a professional team to the area. "We're farther along than we have been at any time since professional football left Los Angeles," Villaraigosa told reporters with Tagliabue