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Opinions split on Roy's suspension
4:28 PM Tue, Dec 18, 2007 | Permalink
Tim MacMahon E-mail News tips
How controversial is Roy Williams' suspension? You can't even get a consensus opinion on it inside the Cowboys' locker room.
Keith Davis, who will replace Williams at strong safety, said he understood Sheriff Goodell's thinking in this case.
"This is the third time it happened," Davis said, referring to the number of Roy Williams Rule violations for Williams this season, "so this penalty is more than deserving, I guess."
WR Patrick Crayton said he's glad the league banned horse-collar tackles, a dangerous technique. And he said Williams shouldn't be surprised by the suspension, which the NFL warned him could be coming after he horse-collared Marshawn Lynch.
"He's been given so many warnings, plus the rule was put in place for him," Crayton said. "I don't know, that'd be a red light flashing in my head."
Follow the jump for guys saying Williams got a raw deal.
LBs Akin Ayodele and Greg Ellis stuck up for their teammate, saying that they thought his one-game suspension for horse-collar tackling was unjust.
"What's a guy supposed to do when there's no other option to make the tackle?" Ayodele asked. "He's going to look bad if he lets the guy run by him. It kind of puts the man in a bind."
Added Ellis: "It wasn't a cheap shot. It wasn't like he was deliberately trying to hurt somebody. Usually when a guy is suspended, it's for something he meant to do."
Are the rules offensive?
5:57 PM Tue, Dec 18, 2007 | Permalink
Albert Breer E-mail News tips
Whether it's something as significant as a suspension, or as small as an illegal contact penalty, you can usually break players into two camps on rules like the horse-collar ones that will keep Roy Williams out of Charlotte on Saturday night:
1. Offense
2. Defense
The idea that defensive players look at some rule changes as a bed of nails on the road to doing their jobs is nothing new. Simply, it's long been perceived that the NFL tweaks and adjusts its regulations to promote scoring, in turn making things more difficult on the guys trying keep points from going up.
“You look at all the passing rules, it’s to help create more explosive plays for the offense, it gets you more crowds, gets you more fans enjoying the game," linebacker Akin Ayodele said. "(The horse-collar rule) puts you in a predicament. Should I get this runner down? Or should I stop and let him run by me and then look bad? Because you’re gonna look bad on film. The reporters are going to say, ‘Well, Roy Williams had a chance to bring him down, but he just stopped.’”
“This is how I feel, and you guys can take a consensus in seeing how the other defensive players feel – If I was put in the same situation, I’d rather take the fine than let my teammates down.”
Ayodele said that defensive coaches will accept certain penalties easier than others, so their players will maintain a certain level of aggression needed to play on that side of the ball. The idea's that you don't think too much about something before you do it.
Because anyone who's played football can tell you: There's just about nothing worse than being hesitant.
"Learning not to get a dead-ball penalty is being conscious enough to know, 'OK, once the whistle blows, stop,'" Ayodele said. "But once the ball’s snapped, within that timeframe, I’m allowed to go full-speed and do my job. A lot of things happen within that time before the whistle’s blown.
"Wade (Phillips) said, ‘I don’t care. As long as you do your job and you’re trying to get to ball defensively, or offensively blocking it, and you’re being aggressive, and you get a penalty, I don’t care about that. You’re being aggressive, (as long as) you’re not being stupid, you’re not trying to hurt somebody.’"
And when offensive players do things similar?
“It’s their actions with the chop block, and pulling you down, they’ll grab underneath your arm and try to lock to where if you run and try and pull out, you’ll hyperextend your elbow," Ayodele said. "Stuff like that goes on all the time. It’s legal because it’s within the box. But those actions are actually trying to get you hurt.”
Pretty simple, it seems. And it shouldn't be a news flash either: the league is looking to protect its offensive players in general, and its stars in particular.
That, Ayodele thinks, is the reason for the rule in the first place and that it's no coincidence that it was the injury to Terrell Owens that put the wheels in motion.
"If you’d have had a guy on the practice squad, and Roy did that to him, before T.O., I’ll bet the rule wouldn’t be there," Ayodele said. "We wouldn’t be talking about this right now. It was because it was a star player, T.O., that got hurt."
Wade's temperature rises
4:14 PM Tue, Dec 18, 2007 | Permalink
Albert Breer E-mail News tips
Cowboys coach Wade Phillips steered through his press conference today, and steadily got more and more passionate in his defense of S Roy Williams. By the end or the ordeal, you'd have thought he was on 31's legal team.
"Roy’s been in on 105 tackles now, and three of them have been on that variety," Phillips said. "I mean, a guy that does it one out of 15 plays, is he worse than Roy? Percentage-wise, certainly he is. Roy’s involved so much in all this, and it’s not a horse-collar tackle if you’re tackling in the line of scrimmage. But if it’s outside, it is.
"So where you are … there's a lot of factors involved in my opinion. But that’s why they have the process. That’s why we have the appeal. We’ll see what happens."
Phillips said he isn't involved with the appeal process, but he does know that this situation hasn't helped Roy as a player.
In fact, the coach says that this whole issue has affected Williams as a player.
"I think just holding it over him the whole season hasn't helped him," Phillips said. "They said if you do this again, you might be suspsended. Well, it's hard to play defensive football that way without being your aggressive self. But it's soemthing he knew about, and we understood the process."
4:28 PM Tue, Dec 18, 2007 | Permalink
Tim MacMahon E-mail News tips
How controversial is Roy Williams' suspension? You can't even get a consensus opinion on it inside the Cowboys' locker room.
Keith Davis, who will replace Williams at strong safety, said he understood Sheriff Goodell's thinking in this case.
"This is the third time it happened," Davis said, referring to the number of Roy Williams Rule violations for Williams this season, "so this penalty is more than deserving, I guess."
WR Patrick Crayton said he's glad the league banned horse-collar tackles, a dangerous technique. And he said Williams shouldn't be surprised by the suspension, which the NFL warned him could be coming after he horse-collared Marshawn Lynch.
"He's been given so many warnings, plus the rule was put in place for him," Crayton said. "I don't know, that'd be a red light flashing in my head."
Follow the jump for guys saying Williams got a raw deal.
LBs Akin Ayodele and Greg Ellis stuck up for their teammate, saying that they thought his one-game suspension for horse-collar tackling was unjust.
"What's a guy supposed to do when there's no other option to make the tackle?" Ayodele asked. "He's going to look bad if he lets the guy run by him. It kind of puts the man in a bind."
Added Ellis: "It wasn't a cheap shot. It wasn't like he was deliberately trying to hurt somebody. Usually when a guy is suspended, it's for something he meant to do."
Are the rules offensive?
5:57 PM Tue, Dec 18, 2007 | Permalink
Albert Breer E-mail News tips
Whether it's something as significant as a suspension, or as small as an illegal contact penalty, you can usually break players into two camps on rules like the horse-collar ones that will keep Roy Williams out of Charlotte on Saturday night:
1. Offense
2. Defense
The idea that defensive players look at some rule changes as a bed of nails on the road to doing their jobs is nothing new. Simply, it's long been perceived that the NFL tweaks and adjusts its regulations to promote scoring, in turn making things more difficult on the guys trying keep points from going up.
“You look at all the passing rules, it’s to help create more explosive plays for the offense, it gets you more crowds, gets you more fans enjoying the game," linebacker Akin Ayodele said. "(The horse-collar rule) puts you in a predicament. Should I get this runner down? Or should I stop and let him run by me and then look bad? Because you’re gonna look bad on film. The reporters are going to say, ‘Well, Roy Williams had a chance to bring him down, but he just stopped.’”
“This is how I feel, and you guys can take a consensus in seeing how the other defensive players feel – If I was put in the same situation, I’d rather take the fine than let my teammates down.”
Ayodele said that defensive coaches will accept certain penalties easier than others, so their players will maintain a certain level of aggression needed to play on that side of the ball. The idea's that you don't think too much about something before you do it.
Because anyone who's played football can tell you: There's just about nothing worse than being hesitant.
"Learning not to get a dead-ball penalty is being conscious enough to know, 'OK, once the whistle blows, stop,'" Ayodele said. "But once the ball’s snapped, within that timeframe, I’m allowed to go full-speed and do my job. A lot of things happen within that time before the whistle’s blown.
"Wade (Phillips) said, ‘I don’t care. As long as you do your job and you’re trying to get to ball defensively, or offensively blocking it, and you’re being aggressive, and you get a penalty, I don’t care about that. You’re being aggressive, (as long as) you’re not being stupid, you’re not trying to hurt somebody.’"
And when offensive players do things similar?
“It’s their actions with the chop block, and pulling you down, they’ll grab underneath your arm and try to lock to where if you run and try and pull out, you’ll hyperextend your elbow," Ayodele said. "Stuff like that goes on all the time. It’s legal because it’s within the box. But those actions are actually trying to get you hurt.”
Pretty simple, it seems. And it shouldn't be a news flash either: the league is looking to protect its offensive players in general, and its stars in particular.
That, Ayodele thinks, is the reason for the rule in the first place and that it's no coincidence that it was the injury to Terrell Owens that put the wheels in motion.
"If you’d have had a guy on the practice squad, and Roy did that to him, before T.O., I’ll bet the rule wouldn’t be there," Ayodele said. "We wouldn’t be talking about this right now. It was because it was a star player, T.O., that got hurt."
Wade's temperature rises
4:14 PM Tue, Dec 18, 2007 | Permalink
Albert Breer E-mail News tips
Cowboys coach Wade Phillips steered through his press conference today, and steadily got more and more passionate in his defense of S Roy Williams. By the end or the ordeal, you'd have thought he was on 31's legal team.
"Roy’s been in on 105 tackles now, and three of them have been on that variety," Phillips said. "I mean, a guy that does it one out of 15 plays, is he worse than Roy? Percentage-wise, certainly he is. Roy’s involved so much in all this, and it’s not a horse-collar tackle if you’re tackling in the line of scrimmage. But if it’s outside, it is.
"So where you are … there's a lot of factors involved in my opinion. But that’s why they have the process. That’s why we have the appeal. We’ll see what happens."
Phillips said he isn't involved with the appeal process, but he does know that this situation hasn't helped Roy as a player.
In fact, the coach says that this whole issue has affected Williams as a player.
"I think just holding it over him the whole season hasn't helped him," Phillips said. "They said if you do this again, you might be suspsended. Well, it's hard to play defensive football that way without being your aggressive self. But it's soemthing he knew about, and we understood the process."
