Terrell Owens wants a paycheck again

NFL free agent wide receiver Terrell Owens is ready to go back to work.

Front office executives aren't so sure. The 36-year old Owens remains a free agent with the NFL preseason less than a month away.

CBS Sports columnist Mike Freeman wrote that, "when speaking to several team executives about Owens, there was glee no team had signed him yet. ... Straight up, unfiltered, high-pitched glee."

Naturally, Owens is quick to blame ESPN for his unemployment, telling a Nashville radio station that, "I may do 99 good things right and if I do one thing wrong, ESPN and the people on there ... make it out to be the worst thing ever."

Sure thing, T.O. The reason you don't have a job right now is because of ESPN.

Teams should take it easy on the possibly-bipolar Owens. Instead of focusing on keeping himself in tip-top physical condition, he's working on his acting career with VH1 in his sur-reality show, The T.O. Show.

He's a fragile personality, and a diva whose ego needs to be stroked. Furthermore, his track record with NFL teams on the field is impressive: he's a six-time Pro Bowl wide receiver who has the most receiving yards of any active player. Off the field, though, is another story.

While in San Francisco, he publicly insinuated that quarterback Jeff Garcia was gay.

In Philly, he publicly feuded with quarterback Donovan McNabb, stalled in contract negotiations as he and his agent, Drew Rosenhaus, tried to get the dramatic receiver more money, and then held a press conference while doing sit-ups in his driveway.

In his brief stint with Dallas, he told the press that he felt that quarterback Tony Romo played favorites with tight end Jason Witten, cried in a now-YouTube-famous postgame interview that Romo was "my quarterback," and overdosed on Hydrocodone but denied that it was a suicide attempt.

Owens signed a one-year deal with Buffalo in an attempt to lay low for a year, quietly play hard and parlay that into a multi-year deal with another team. So far, he's striking out. And with NFL training camps fast approaching, his options may be limited to waiting until another team loses a receiver to injury before he's brought aboard.