Agent Says Raiders Offer Ismail Multiyear Deal to Leave Toronto

TORONTO — The Raiders have made a multiyear offer to Raghib (Rocket) Ismail that would pay the receiver-kick returner more than $1 million per season, his agent, Bob Woolf, said.

Woolf said an agreement could be reached within a week.

“Things are definitely heating up,” Woolf said. “Nothing has been agreed on, but I’m satisfied that things are moving along.”

Woolf is scheduled to continue talks with the Raiders’ director of football operations, Steve Ortmayer, on Friday in New York.

Where does that leave Ismail’s situation with the Toronto Argonauts of the Canadian Football League?

“That’s something else,” Woolf said.

“Good for him,” Argonaut owner Bruce McNall said when informed of the Raider negotiations. “I’m glad for him. I hope, whatever he decides, he’s happy with. I wish him the best of luck if that’s what he wants.”

McNall wants to get out of the four-year, $18-million deal he signed with Ismail two years ago. Woolf is maintaining that Ismail is still owed about $9 million by the Argonauts. He is expected to ask McNall to make up the difference after the Raider deal is settled.

McNall is not expected to agree.

The Argonauts’ problems with Ismail involve his off-the-field activities, rather than his play.

Signed largely for his ability to promote the CFL, Ismail has, according to the Argonauts, been a public-relations failure.

A private club memo related several instances in which he did not live up to his obligations, including one occasion when he sneaked out of a stadium in a laundry basket to avoid reporters.