Young finds himself in financial trouble, without a team

Six years after entering the NFL as the third player taken in the draft, Vince Young finds himself without a team and with just a fraction of the money he received from a contract that guaranteed him $26 million.

The question is, where did it all go?

In an increasingly caustic war of words, attorneys have been arguing for months over whether Young is an out-of-control spender who put himself deeply in the hole or simply a victim of inexperienced advisers, one of whom was his uncle Keith Young.

Either way, the quarterback whose future seemed unlimited after he led Texas to a Rose Bowl victory in 2006 is now back home in Houston and in a tenuous financial condition.

Young was cut by the Buffalo Bills, his third NFL team, in August. He was trying to make the Bills as a backup, the same role he filled with the Philadelphia Eagles in 2011.

The fall has been a dizzying one for the player who twice made the Pro Bowl with the Tennessee Titans. Young is suing his former agent, Major Adams, and a North Carolina financial planner, Ronnie Peoples, alleging that they misappropriated $5.5 million.

That notion is vigorously disputed by attorneys for Adams and Peoples, who say Young has nobody to blame but himself.

Peoples claims in the countersuit that every decision he made was approved by Keith Young. And he calls Vince Young’s unwillingness to accept responsibility “a common occurrence … as (former Titans coach) Jeff Fisher, (Texas coach) Mack Brown, numerous NFL executives, coaches, teammates, scouts, girlfriends and illegitimate children will attest.”

Around the league

The San Francisco 49ers are on top of the AP Pro32 power rankings. Alex Smith threw for 226 yards and two touchdowns and the 49ers shut down the explosive Lions in a 27-19 win over the weekend, giving San Francisco a second win over a playoff team from last season. The 2-0 Niners moved up from second in the latest AP Pro32 regular-season poll receiving 11 of the 12 first-place votes … .Atlanta Falcons running back Michael Turner was jailed on charges of drunken driving and speeding, just hours after he scored a touchdown in the team’s win over visiting Denver. Turner, 30, was booked into jail just after 5 a.m. … Jay Cutler acknowledges he was wrong to shove teammate J’Marcus Webb on the sideline during the Chicago Bears’ loss at Green Bay last week. He has no second thoughts about yelling at him, however.