Five Days Later

Alright, I think enough time has passed since the Dallas Cowboys played the most embarrassing football I have seen them play in my lifetime to blog about it. Because for the past week, all that the local media has done is ask “Why? How? Who? Really? Wade’s keeping his job? Really?” But I started thinking of it in terms like this: “Why should I support this team?” Now that’s a bit of a rhetorical question because regardless of their record or stomach-turning football apathy, they’re my team and I will follow them to the gates of football hell which they now appear to be attempting to scale. For anyone that lives here in Dallas, it’s just obvious. It’s the Cowboys. That’s why you love them. What are you gonna do? Spend your fall and winter reading up on the Rangers off-season antics or plans for sucking the life out of baseball in the coming year? Are you going to start supporting the Giants or the Dolphins or something? No. But think about what someone from, ohhhhhh say, Philadelphia thinks about you backing the ‘Boys? Other than geographic ease and peer pressure, how do you defend being a Cowboys supporter (or in this case, “apologist” is probably a more accurate term) to anyone outside of Dallas?

I don’t see this roster being much different, talent-wise, from your Aikman/Irvin/Emmitt/Moose/Novachek years. So that means that it’s coaching and player’s attitudes that are getting in the way of the Cowboys being successful. But no one will admit that. And that’s quite possibly the most frustrating part. The loss to the Eagles was the most embarrassing and disappointing moment in my Cowboys memory. More than Romo fumbling a snap on a field goal. More than going 1-15. At least when we went 1-15, we knew we didn’t have much of a team and didn’t have lofty expectations. I think Wade is definitely part of the problem. I think it’s pretty obvious that when your calls are overridden by your quarterback, you lack the confidence, power and respect necessary to be a head coach. Put it this way: when Wade gets the boot and decides to get himself a part time job at Barnes & Noble, he will not be a key holding manager and will have to call for his boss for approval if he has to do a return. I like Wade. I would eat honey buns and watch Perry Mason with him. I would turn the volume down on the TV gently after he nods off in his armchair after a big plate of cornbread and glass of buttermilk. But clearly, he cannot coach and must do the honorable thing and commit coaching seppuku as a gesture of contrition to all Cowboys fans. Which is to say, it’s time to retire.

But I don’t think that’s the big problem. The Cowboys need a head coach but it also seems they need a junior high guidance counselor to break up the slap fights and pry Cowboy’s players fingers out of each other’s ponytails. Seriously, I wanted a football team not an athletic tribute to High School Musical. I used to fall for the easy default of “It’s T.O.’s fault, he causes drama.” But that’s not the case:

Tony Romo :
I said I wasn’t going to make fun of you anymore because of all your Good Samaritan acts this year. And while I still appreciate the fact that you can find both romance with ho’s and bromance with hobos, you said something after the Philly game which allowed me to repeal the “No Picking on Romo” law. Your post-game shower collapse was certainly not brought on by your firey, impassioned and angry statements in the post-game press conference. In fact, if I hadn’t known which game the comments were about, I would have thought you were explaining some sloppy play in a pre-season game of flag football. Your comments were something along the lines of, “Well, we didn’t play good football so we lost but we’re gonna come back next year and play better football, I guess. And maybe get into the playoffs and win a Super Bowl. Or something, you know.” Meh. No biggie. Why everyone be actin’ so upset? I told you we played bad football and we didn’t win. And that next year we’re gonna, like, maybe try to play better football and maybe make it to the playoffs, I guess. What more do you want people? Dude, you obviously aren’t particularly bothered about the season ending early. Maybe a little more recoup time for the pinkie and back? Probably take Jessica down to Cabo for some glass bottom boat action. Sweet!

And why not? I mean all the other guys started partying already? In fact, the flight back to Dallas was apparently a lively one with music cranking, a good game of dominoes going on, high fives and revelry. It’s just a shame that you guys had to waste all that time packing and flying up to Philly and stuff when you could have just thrown a kegger on the practice field at Valley Ranch and totally saved yourselves the embarrassment of showing up and playing like you did.

Jason Witten:
No one can question Witten’s toughness and, like Romo, I’m pretty sure he’s a thoroughly nice and decent and well-mannered human being. But now he’s been dragged into the drama further after Terrance Newman made cryptic comments about a “coward” tearing this team apart. There seems to be a lot of people who think that he was referring to you, Jason Witten. Saying that you were the “unnamed player” who leaked the story about T.O. throwing a fit over not getting the ball and not being included in “secret” offensive meetings. I don’t think any of us will ever, or at least not in the near future, know if this is true or not. If it is true though, what was the point of it? To get rid of T.O.? Let me just pull you aside real quick and show you a timeline of T.O.’s career and his track record of team-playerness. The wonderful thing about T.O. is that he’s his own self-contained career IED. You don’t need to put any accelerant on that fire.

But that brings us to Terrance Newman:
You’re calling Witten out for being a coward and not owning what you believe are his anonymous comments about the situation. Right. So you do that buy not naming the anonymous person you are calling a “coward”, right? Why in the world do you think it’s appropriate to say something like that to the press? Do you think that makes your football team look like a) a football team trying to regroup and figure out what went wrong or b) PMS-ridden teen girls trying to influence the outcome of this year’s superlatives race? It’s like you guys found out how embarrassing it is to lose to the Eagles so spectacularly and got off on it and now you’re just trying to recreate that experience every day by doing things like making bitchy comments about teammates. STFU. Hard.

Jerry Jones:
You’re the owner of a restaurant that has slime in the icebox, serves expired meats and allows, nay, encourages cooks not to wash their hands. Your organization is in serious trouble and you seem to only have anger towards the inspectors who want to see your Certificate of Occupancy. You need to admit that your Enormo-Dome that was built in the wrong city, your head coach who mouths “He can’t do that!” when his play calls are overruled on the field by the quarterback and the fact that your franchise is just coasting on its’ fame and iconic status are very serious problems indeed. Stop trying to get the 2018 Women’s Lacrosse Championship and focus on the thing that built your Super Everything Convention Center, the Dallas Fucking Cowboys.

Ironically, this week is National Hand Washing Awareness Week.