Football 101: The Talent Evaluation Process

[BrAinPaiNt]

ahem

Oh that looks good...but it needs some tomato on it.

 

[casmith07]

Oh that looks good...but it needs some tomato on it.

Entirely too much cheese for me.

Now the Double Decker Taco at Taco Bell? That's deliciousness on a tortilla.

 

[birdwells1]

ahem

I see what you did there.

 

[Hostile]

I see what you did there.

Everyone did. But you want to hear the funniest part? Some of his bestest buddies now on another forum whining were the best thread hijackers we ever had and he never once complained about them.

I bet you don't find that the least bit funny or hypocritical either because you feel the same way he does about me. Peas in a pod.

 

[junk]

How did this get to be about "sources" anyway? Didn't only one or two people out of everyone on this monstrous thread even mention that? I thought this thread was about Jerry's role as GM, and whether what he did was just like every other NFL team or not.

But on sources, am I the only one who doesn't care about this so-called inside information anyway? I don't know, it's never impressed me. If it's wrong half the time anyway -- even if sources really did say it -- why get all worked up about it? I'd rather talk about what the team is actually doing than something that we're *supposedly* doing.

But maybe it is just me because everyone seems to get really worked up about this whispered super-secret info.

Anyway, I notice you only got a tiny bit of that last post answered, Junk. And Lacewell was here for years after Ireland arrived.

Agreed on the sources. Frankly if I was in the know I'd leak bad info to the Internet anyway

Also agree on my post. The tough things ive asked have been repeatedly ignored. All is well I guess

 

[fanfromvirginia]

Let me be real honest with you. This forum has 2 reputations. One is that we are too strict. The other is that we are too lenient. Sounds like Charles Dickens "Tale of Two Cities" doesn't it?

We are considered too strict because we do not allow bikini pictures, foul language, or for disagreements to become too personal. In other words, we don't want Cowboys fans hating Cowboys fans when there are Commanders, Eagles, and Giants fans to hate.

We are considered too lenient because we give people a lot of leeway before we do ban them. One guy who fit the description BP was describing above had 35 infractions here before we finally said enough is enough. He had been suspended several times. He never learned. Each time he came back and was a good poster for a while, and then he'd revert to form.

Posters who are excessively rude drive other posters off a forum. And to be quite truthful we are probably more at fault than the rude posters because we allow it to go on longer than we should. I would like nothing more than to simply ban all of the constantly rude posters on this forum, but that has never been our goal here.

Despite what banned posters and their lingering cohorts claim about this site banning people for disagreeing with the team or a clique, they actually get banned for breaking the rules here, or for simply being someone so rude that we get fed up.

The saddest part of this for us is that none of us on the staff like banning people. I can't stand it personally. I hate even giving infractions. But do you know what I hate more than having to do those things? Seeing good posters run off, and make no mistake about it, it has happened here way too often.

One poster who does not post here any more or anywhere else for that matter is a real estate agent who is used by the Dallas Cowboys to find places to live for the players who are coming to Dallas. She was also dating a player at that time. Let me give you an example of how this information got to us here first. Dedric Ward was sent to her to find an apartment. She shared it with us. 2 days later Dedric Ward was signed by the Cowboys. We had known about it for 2 days.

Now, I don't know about you, but that kind of information is freaking awesome to me. Guess what jerks here focused on?

They didn't like the player she was dating and they took it out on her.

BP mentioned family members join. That is true. One in particular did post and his son was a lightning rod of controversy. But this poster took it and took it and took it. He shared with us the news that Bill Parcells brother had died. I actually had DFW media members PMing me asking if there was any news organization verifying that information. Know why? Because they can't go to their sport editor and say, "I read on this fan forum that Bill Parcells' brother died. I want to report it."

Well, no news service reported it for hours and hours, and in the interim that man got attacked as a liar, and his son was trashed even worse than he had been before.

Lo and behold, Parcells brother had died. Do you think any of those posters apologized to the man for calling him a liar? Think again. They continued to attack his son.

I know of 3 players who have accounts here, but they do not post. I approve accounts here so I see e-mail addresses and I know if someone has an e-mail address to the Cowboys that he is real. Guess what I do as soon as their accounts are approved?

I send an e-mail and/or PM to that player and I advise them NOT to post here. That's right. I pray they read here every day. But there is not a doubt in my mind that Internet tough guys who enjoy playing the jerks and doubters are going to run off a player.

That is the sad truth. So, just like BP said, sometimes I get info in a PM and 9 times out of 10 I do not share it. I used to. In fact, I sometimes share things with the staff here that never makes it to the forum, and sometimes I share stuff with posters like Verdict who just reported to you that I did indeed know all about the Drew Henson stuff days ahead of the media.

There is no way on this earth that I would have posted the info I had about Drew Henson. Know why? Because fans would have been huge jerks. Especially the at that time very jealous Hutch and Q fans. I had information that Kurt Warner wanted to sign here in 2004. I never shared it with the forum. Same reason as above and also because there were rumors Parcells wanted Vinny, and that is the route we took. I guarantee you I would have been called a liar for sharing what I knew. Ask Kurt Warner if in 2004 he was interested in coming to the Cowboys if you ever bump into him. Jerry wanted him. Jerry gave Parcells the guy he wanted instead. That is 100% true.

Take it with a grain of salt.

Okay, appreciate the response, Hos. You guys have a tough job and, as with pretty much anything, the difficulty is knowing when and where to draw the line.

I remember most of those events you discussed. It makes sense that players and others in the know wouldn't want to post in here. It's nice to know that some of that info at least is making its way in here. It's up to individuals to believe what and whom they want to believe. With this many posters I suppose there will always be knuckleheads.

 

[Hostile]

Okay, appreciate the response, Hos. You guys have a tough job and, as with pretty much anything, the difficulty is knowing when and where to draw the line.

I remember most of those events you discussed. It makes sense that players and others in the know wouldn't want to post in here. It's nice to know that some of that info at least is making its way in here. It's up to individuals to believe what and whom they want to believe. With this many posters I suppose there will always be knuckleheads.

Unfortunately there will be.

 

[birdwells1]

Everyone did. But you want to hear the funniest part? Some of his bestest buddies now on another forum whining were the best thread hijackers we ever had and he never once complained about them.

I bet you don't find that the least bit funny or hypocritical either because you feel the same way he does about me. Peas in a pod.

Naw, it was just a spot on response to someone complaining about hijacking threads. That taco bit that some do is one the most blatant and arrogant hijacking of threads that's done on this board.

Normally a thread will slowly drift into hijack mode and no matter from which side its usually unintentional but the taco bit, well that's a different story.

Sometimes when someone hits you with a good one you just got to tip your hat, I've done it a few times myself i.e. Were's the Nasty post, someone responded with "where's the spell check" pretty funny.

Just for your info, I don't know who you're referring to in your post, I'm kinda proud to say that I really don't keep up with other posters. I really just express my opinion and that's it.

 

[Verdict]

I try to read this website EVERY DAY that I am online and have 5 extra minutes. It is an awesome source of information on the Cowboys team that most of us love. Every person who has an account here is a potential portal to contribute information on the Cowboys.

I appreciate differing view points, as I think that is more conducive to "true" knowledge than everyone thinking the same way. I even respect heated arguments if both sides feel strongly about a particular issue. That is to be expected. QuintSy Carter comes to mind as an example of a topic that can be quite polarizing.

Some posters may make a hundred posts that don't make any sense, yet, every once in a while, they will hit on something that no one else may have thought about that actually has some validity, kinda like a blind hog finding an acorn. That is what makes this website great.

However, there are a few posters on this site that seem to make EVERYTHING personal, or they have such disdain for another poster that they just can't hide it. They bash literally anything and everything that poster says. I haven't ever felt like that personally, but it truthfully detracts from this forum in a way that I think the greater good of this forum would be served by banning them.

I am not taking about someone adamantly taking a position on something, or even getting out of line in a major way once or twice. There are also posters who go out of their way to be antagonizing on seemingly every post they make.

I think the chilling effect that the "jerk" posters bring to this website far outweighs any value that they bring to this website. I am all for freedom of speech, but I am sure many on this board wish they would be forced to exercise that freedom somewhere other than this forum.

Everyone makes mistakes, such as misunderstanding what a post actually said, but some seemingly do it just to antagonize the original poster. Those are the types of things that I think would be the hardest to police, but once a person receives an infraction, or two, maybe they should be shown the door.

 

[FuzzyLumpkins]

Just some ramblings from your friendly (mostly) neighborhood BP.

There ARE members here that are part of the Dallas Media. This is not in question. A funny story about one of the dallas media that is a member here. He made a challenge of sorts to one of the mods. Said if that mod could figure out who he was on this forum he would send the mod some tickets to a Rangers game. I found out what his username was and told the mod. Don't know if the mod ever took the journalist up on the offer or not. A few times I sent the journalist a PM (to his membership name here) to congratulate him on a recent book or article just to joke a bit with him.

Secondly. There have been relatives of players, agents of players and some players themselves who have contacted the board in one respect or another.

What some people on here don't seem to understand is that when they constantly belittle and attack some members with sources (whether that be a relative of a player, a media member with contacts, a person that has contacts in some way with the team or other nfl teams) they wind up driving said members away or discourage them from sharing any info they get with the board.

They need to remember that as cowboys fans they just want to share info they have received with the rest of the board. But by constantly attacking their info it only alienates those members and they either leave all together or they just don't feel that sharing that info is worth the hassle.

So in the end the nature of not believing these people to the extreme that they constantly belittle them and in some cases harass them, they only hurt the amount of info that comes into/onto the board.

We have had some members completely quit the board because of this and they had good info and actually would talk to some players on a regular basis. One member got called some pretty bad things that were uncalled for so that person just quit posting all together which is a shame because that member would give us some good info about some players that came in via FA or trades before that info was out to the general public. So by some members being extremely rude we lost a good source that provided some good info to all of the cowboys fans that come to this site. We lost out because some had to be jerks just no other nice way to say it but it is true.

Another thing to consider. Just because some info that is passed on does not pan out, it does not mean a member is making it up or that anything else they say should be automatically dismissed. Things do change, some things are also floated out there for misdirection from a source and not always told to the person that it is for misdirection.

I have seen some things on a college board that proves that point. Some insiders were letting some info out about some possible upcoming decisions. Next thing you know a few weird bits of info started to come out and many of them were in contradiction to other info released. Turns out a team was trying to find out who was leaking some real information by starting up a few fake rumors to see who would post what so they could find the leak.

There are other times when a team does indeed have something in mind but changes their mind later.

A good example of this is Jerry Jones and TO and how Jerry said TO would be on the team the next season and when they let him go TO got mad and called Jerry a liar or not a man of his word.

Problem with that is that at the time Jerry Jones said it he was being honest and not trying to deceive anyone. It was only later when some of the coaches and other people in the FO talked Jerry into letting TO go that Jerry agreed and let TO go. Things are fluid and can change.

There have also been times when the team is interested in a player in the draft and by all accounts would take him if he fell to their spot...only to see another player fall to them that they really did not think would fall so they take them instead because he is rated higher on their charts. So if any info prior to that came out that they really liked player A and someone shares that info...just because they took player B does not mean that the person sharing the info was lying or making it up...it was because things can change.

Some people will complain that some sharing info does not always say something like take it with a grain of salt, but even when some people do say something along those lines or make a disclaimer that says that if someone does not believe their info to put them on ignore or that things could change...people still complain about it.

Things can change, delays can happen, opinions from the team can change, a player could become available that they did not think would, trades could be offered in that last minute or close to it. It is going to be a rare thing for ANYONE to be 100% accurate with the info they share because that info can change at any time without notice.

Another example of this was on the college forum I was talking about. A member of that forum was telling fellow WVU fans WVU would be joining a specific conference (SEC). Then after some time they said that things changed and they would be joining another (big 12). They said it would happen before or on a specific date. That date was about to happen, things were about to be announced but all of a sudden another team jumped into the mix (louisville) and it pushed the date back a few days. Because this person changed Conferences in his info and because it was a few days later than the official announcement time he had heard...many people would not believe anything else he said and called him a bunch of crazy names. Sad thing was he was right about everything until something changed that nobody (even the team) seen coming (like louisville jumping into the fray to halt the official announcement).

So again, don't ruin it for all cowboys fans by being rude, calling names or just trying to be some kind of internet rebel who thinks it his or her mission in life to make sure everything is 100% accurate or nothing is accurate just to satisfy your own sense of worth or because you don't like someone because all that does is ruin it for all the others who are happy to get any info they can get about their favorite team. Because things can change and it is hard for ANYONE to be 100% accurate with info that a team does not always want out there. It is ok if you do not believe a person but try to keep in mind not to be a jerk about it. It ruins it for all the other cowboys fans that come to this site to get any info they can about their favorite team.

I don't care if you don't like a particular user who shares info, I don't care if you are somehow jealous of a user that shares some info, I don't care if you just want to show the world that you are an internet tough guy and will not believe anything....Just remember to disagree politely and move on instead of trying to hijack a thread in some quest to prove you are an internet tough guy and quit ruining it for other members here who would like to get some info. Because that is what you do more often than not.

Most members who share info here will not mind if you are a cautious person who does not believe all the info, most do not mind if you respectfully disagree however they also don't like to be called names, chased from thread to thread trying to belittle them, hijacking their threads for your own amusement or just generally being rude to them when it is uncalled for.

Thankfully I understand this. Even if I may not always agree with a poster or their line of thinking. And in return I get some info that is not shared with board because some don't want to be treated like a jerk over the info. They take the time and want to share the info but don't want to be treated poorly for doing so. So in some cases they just might share it via PMs to some members. Which is nice that I get that info from time to time but it makes me sad that the many good members on this forum are missing out on the info because a few people want to ruin it for everyone.

There...I said my piece or is it peace...oh well you get the point.

Bravo, sir!