Dallas Cowboys are marketed as “America’s Team,” but they’re pretty much America’s scourge right now. Signing Greg Hardy has made them America’s villains, or at least it would if the New England Patriots weren’t also so detestable. You can also have to be formidable in order to be genuinely hated and the Cowboys are still winless in five tried since they signed Hardy.
Last Sunday all the NFL talk shows were ripping Jerry Jones’ team over Hardy. This week, the melodrama was all about Dallas Cowboys wide receiver Dez Bryant.
“How ’bout Dem Cowboys!?” Becoming the major talking point, for all the wrong reasons, two weeks in a row with different guys.
NFL Network’s Ian Rappoport On the Dez Bryant locker room outburst situation:
“Jason Garrett addressed the entire team, not just Dez Bryant individually – although he did that as well – to try to help them learn from the Dez Bryant outburst in the locker room. He should have handled it better and they made that incredibly clear. It’s not just that he needed to walk away, [what] he should have done [is] – this is what Garrett told the team – really address the reporter directly in a much more reasoned manner to handle it right there instead of yelling and taking it much louder and more public than he did. Garrett wanted to use this as a teaching moment. In today’s NFL, social media is so prevalent players need to be smarter and aware that everything they say can actually end up on the news, not only that night but on Twitter in the next couple minutes.”
– “He is very emotional and that’s one of his greatest assets on the football field. When he’s away from the football field in situations like that, it becomes a great liability.” – Michael Irvin on Dallas Cowboys wide receiver Dez Bryant
FOX NFL insider Mike Garafolo also appeared in-studio on FOX NFL KICKOFF and said new issues arose this week in Dallas beyond Dez Bryant’s confrontations with reporters:
“This loss against the Eagles last week, a lot of veterans believe that was the breaking point for some guys where they said, ‘Even when Romo comes back, we’re going to have to be perfect, just to have a chance [to make the playoffs].’ As one veteran put it, ‘I don’t even know if Tony can save us right now,’ and they think that’s what led to that Dez Bryant blow up. But that was just one thing in another crazy week for the Cowboys. On Thursday, sources say Greg Hardy missed most of the morning and was late as he continues to get away with stuff.
And then on Friday, Rolando McClain shows up – and even though he had practiced fully the day before – and says, ‘I’ve got a hip problem, I’ve got a foot problem, I don’t know if I can play through all of this stuff,’ and even says, ‘It might be time for me to retire again.’ That was taken with a grain of salt because he says that semi-regularly, but it’s just that with the Cowboys right now, everybody says, ‘What’s going to happen today?’
Former two-time Super Bowl-winning Dallas Cowboys head coach Jimmy Johnson joined FOX NFL KICKOFF and said current coach Jason Garrett is undermined by the presence of owner Jerry Jones:
“Jason Garrett has a difficult job there because when I was there, all of the players looked to me and they understood that I was either going to cut them or keep them or fine them and they had to answer to me. Now, they don’t really have to answer to Jason Garrett, they have to answer to Jerry Jones and I think in some ways he is an enabler. Greg Hardy getting into it with the special teams coach and knocking the clipboard away, that wouldn’t have happened. The losing has a lot to do it with it; if they were winning, you wouldn’t have these problems. Jason understands the situation there and he understands the role that he has been put in. He understands the organization. Jason is a very smart football coach and a very good football coach, but at times I think that his players go over his head.
Dez Bryant, Greg Hardy, Jerry Jones, and many more names, the Dallas Cowboys are just a sick joke right now from top to bottom.
Paul M. Banks owns, operates and sometimes writes The Sports Bank.net, which is partnered with FOX Sports Engage Network. The website is also featured on News Now.
Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, currently contributes to the Chicago Tribune RedEye. He also appears regularly on numerous television and radio talk shows all across the country. Catch him Tuesdays on KOZN 1620 The Zone.
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