On Wednesday, the shrapnel from Chad Johnson's offseason interviews that previously had hit the Cincinnati Bengals organization, its head coach, Marvin Lewis, and almost every player — save fellow receiver T.J. Houshmandzadeh and quarterback Carson Palmer — struck Palmer.

Palmer drew Johnson's ire after saying Johnson had told him he would attend the mandatory minicamp in mid-June. Johnson saw Palmer's comments on the Web. Then Johnson called ESPN.com reporter John Clayton to dispute what Palmer had said. Johnson has declined to speak to Cincinnati-based reporters since October.

"I want to make this very clear,'' Johnson told Clayton. "I don't know where he got that. I made no assertion to Carson that I would do that. Nothing has changed from what I've been saying for three months that I don't want to play for the Bengals. ... I want to be traded before the draft, and if that doesn't happen, I want to be traded as soon as possible. I don't intend on reporting to anything."

Source: Cincinnati Enquirer and Yahoo Sports

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