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Free agent Rodney Harrison is expected to announce his retirement from football on Wednesday, according to the Boston Herald.

Mancini’s Take: After multiple knee injuries, it finally seems as if it’s time for Harrison to start the next phase of his life. The Patriots have moved on by bringing in a host of players to compete at the strong safety position, including Patrick Chung with their 34th pick in the draft and free agent Brandon McGowan with Brandon Merriweather looking like the early favorite to start. Harrison is expected to join of the cast of thousands on NBC’s Sunday night football pre-game show. Unlike some of my other colleagues at the Bible, I always enjoyed watching the ole safety frustrate and intimidate his opponents with his hard-hitting and relentless style of play. A lot of people would prefer to call him dirty. I disagree. The guy was just the type of old-time defender who let receivers know that they were going to get plastered if they caught anything in his area. It’s called marking your territory. That’s nice to see with the way all these rules are set up to benefit offenses. Ross, where do you stand on the former Patriot and San Diego Charger?

Mandel's Take: Sorry, Rev, but I have to disagree with your overall assessment. Harrison was a dirty player. Yes, he was a hard-hitter and a terrific player, but the fact that he constantly took cheap shots at the opposition diminishes his legacy in my mind. You can't tell me the late hits, blows to the head--especially the one he laid on Jerry Rice back in the day--and hits out of bounds were "marking territory". There are plenty of ways to play hard and intimidate within the rules, but Harrison needed to go that extra mile. It's no wonder he was voted the league's dirtiest player by his peers and by the coaches. Add to that the fact he was busted and suspended for HGH and you have yourself a player who put himself above the rules. Was he a great player in his prime? Sure, but he was also a cheat and a cheap-shot artist. Perhaps he needed one to be the other. The lasting image I'll keep of him is one of him flailing while attempting to break up that Manning-to-Tyree miracle in Super Bowl XLII. A bit of poetic justice.

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