Other Than TO, This Is A Likable Team

[ZeroClub]

By Cowboys ÜberFan
http://mvn.com/nfl-cowboys/2007/06/01/other-than-to-this-is-a-likable-team/print/

With the majority of the media focusing on “The Player”, it’s easy to overlook how likable this team is. Our stars are all pretty humble, and our young stars seem to have their priorities straight.

Our young nucleus is made up of Jason Witten, Marion Barber, Julius Jones, Tony Romo, Patrick Crayton, Andre Gurode, Leonard Davis, Marco Colombo, Marcus Spears, Chris Canty, Jason Hatcher, DeMarcus Ware, Bobby Carpenter, Bradie James, Anthony Spencer, Terence Newman and Roy Williams. Not a bad apple in there, and most of those guys would rather play than talk. If anything, we could use a yapper just to keep it exciting.

That’s what makes TO such a contrast. In some strange way, I don’t want TO to raise the Lombardi Trophy in triumph, regardless of the team. He’s such a shining example of what we as a society will tolerate in exchange for physical prowess.

I can see why some fans are completely turned off by big money sports and would prefer to watch high school or college football. I’m not one of them, watching the best of the best outweighs any conflicting feelings I have about the personalities involved.

That’s what makes this team a bit difficult. On one hand you have stars like DeMarcus Ware and Terence Newman, who work hard, stay out of trouble, and from all the anecdotes I hear, are generally nice guys. On the other hand you might have the most self-promoting, selfish player in all of sports. So the sooner we can replace TO’s production the happier I’ll be.
What do you guys think?
__________________
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With all due respect, get over it and grow a pair.

If you are going to let a mindless media drama get in the way of your enjoyment of the likes of Ware, Newman, Romo, and others, then it is on you, not Owens.

 

[BouncingCheese]

Even TO has his moments that I like him;he is just a confused and lonely dude...

This is a likeable team but then again, what does it even matter if we are winning?

 

[stealth]

this place is like a gladiator arena in the off season

 

[Alexander]

Can someone who is more knowledgeable about the history of the NFL recall a championship team that didn't have at least ONE player with questionable character? Or for that matter, it doesn't have to be a championship team, any team will do.

The question should be, is it realistic to expect all 53 guys to be squicky clean? or it doesn't matter if there is a player with character issue as long as he is not a big part of the team?

Romantics believe that our great teams of the 1960s/1970s were all paragons of virtue and we had 50 plus squeaky clean Christians (Staubach) and salts of the earth (Lilly) playing for a similar minded head coach.

Turns out we had our own share of thugs (Thomas Henderson), partiers (Meredith) and arrogant jerks (Duane Thomas). For the most part, that was a different era and teams took great lengths to keep that sort of behavior out of a public forum.

Revisionist history is a wonderful thing. It is amazing what being separated from reality by years of history will do.

Read a little bit about the old Cowboys. Read Walt Garrison. Thomas Henderson. Pete Gent. Then try to sell this type of sentimental amphigory.

 

[Bob Sacamano]

didn't we win a championship w/ a rapist? Raphael Stephion or whatever

 

[stealth]

and arrogant jerks (Duane Thomas).

I get where you are coming from on that one but duane was getting screwed by management if I recall. He just wanted to be paid what he was worth. Being aware of your value to a team and expecting to be paid accordingly isn't arrogance in my mind. Especially in that era of racial inequalities.

 

[Alexander]

I get where you are coming from on that one but duane was getting screwed by management if I recall. He just wanted to be paid what he was worth. Being aware of your value to a team and expecting to be paid accordingly isn't arrogance in my mind. Especially in that era of racial inequalities.

No, he was Owens in overdrive and paved the way for the arrogant jerk athlete. It was not the act of a showman or a response to racial inequality.

He was T.O. without the glitz and pay that goes along with it. You could say he was a trailblazer.

He got trades voided, mouthed off to coaches and badmouthed them in the media (something Owens has never done to his degree) and held out for money.

Watch the interviews with him on America's Game. He is mentally unbalanced.

 

[Angus]

I completely agree with the article. I would rather lose without Owens than win with him, but I guess that's just me.

It is only you.

 

[Alexander]

It is only you.

He and nathanlt can start a club with a secret handshake that includes pantomimes of dabbing your eyes with a hankerchief and adjusting a pacifer.

 

[stealth]

No, he was Owens in overdrive and paved the way for the arrogant jerk athlete. It was not the act of a showman or a response to racial inequality.

He was T.O. without the glitz and pay that goes along with it. You could say he was a trailblazer.

He got trades voided, mouthed off to coaches and badmouthed them in the media (something Owens has never done to his degree) and held out for money.

Watch the interviews with him on America's Game. He is mentally unbalanced.

I disagree with your opinion on the man. It seems to me a ton of people mistake confidence for being extremely arrogant. The guy had every right to be pissed off about the situation I am not gonna dislike him for it.

 

[FuzzyLumpkins]

I get where you are coming from on that one but duane was getting screwed by management if I recall. He just wanted to be paid what he was worth. Being aware of your value to a team and expecting to be paid accordingly isn't arrogance in my mind. Especially in that era of racial inequalities.

he got traded and then was traded back and yes he was pissed at amanagement but he wouldnt talk to any of his teammates the entire 1972 season.

 

[Alexander]

I disagree with your opinion on the man. It seems to me a ton of people mistake confidence for being extremely arrogant. The guy had every right to be pissed off about the situation I am not gonna dislike him for it.

In that respect he is very much like Owens, except he attacked coaches, not teammates. And I don't really judge fault him for what he did either. He was himself.

This is a great story of what I mean from former Patriots general manager Upton Bell-

My plan involved Duane Thomas, the previous season’s rookie of the year, thought by some to be the greatest running back since the incomparable Jim Brown. Thomas played for Dallas, and for whatever reason he had become hugely disgruntled with the Cowboys’ coach, Tom Landry. Our own running back, Carl Garrett, was also disgruntled, so I put out feelers to the Cowboys about a trade: our problem guy for their problem guy.

Cowboys GM Tex Schramm was a notoriously tough negotiator. But Schramm proved receptive, and our discussions extended right up to the preinduction banquet at the Pro Football Hall of Fame, where I was one of the presenters. The moment the ceremony was over, I raced to my hotel room to get Schramm back on the phone. This was a complex situation, not just because of the deal itself — several players were involved in addition to Thomas and Garrett — but because of the unpredictables. Rumors of drug use swirled around Thomas. He was known as a strange guy — somebody once called him the biggest head case in the NFL (quite a distinction). Garrett wasn’t the easiest guy in the world to handle, either. The Thomas rumors had me worried but not enough to quell my enthusiasm. It was the ‘70s, and drugs were getting to be a problem for every team. If Thomas was having trouble, we’d handle it.

That Saturday, Schramm and I reached an agreement. Thomas flew in and arrived at our Amherst training camp. When I arrived I found a very unhappy John Mazur. I knew he had never been in favor of this deal, but he hadn’t opposed it, either. Now he was upset. Carl Garrett might have been troublesome, but Mazur at least thought he could handle him. Thomas was a different story. Mazur didn’t want him.

The next day I met with Thomas. The conversation had barely started when he said, “You know, I’d feel more comfortable if we talked outside.” We went out to the middle of the practice field and sat cross-legged. The strangeness of this scene impressed others as much as it did me, including Don Gillis, the dean of Boston sportscasters, who started inching toward us with his camera crew as if he were a wildlife photographer.

Thomas got to his feet and froze Gillis in his tracks with the scariest, most demonic stare I’ve ever seen one human being give another. “Get out,” Thomas said. His voice was a low rasp. Gillis stopped dead when the stare hit him. When he heard that “Get out,” he and the camera guy scuttled way back.

With Gillis at a comfortable distance, Thomas sat back down, and we resumed negotiating. “Duane,” I said, “we’ll restructure the contract to your satisfaction, but you should really be out on the practice field today. Why don’t you get dressed and get out there with the team.” He agreed, and I went back to work, thinking, Well, we’ve gotten this far. We’ll face the rest tomorrow.

The moment I got back to my desk I was on the phone. We had already brought in more than 50 players and were looking for others to try out. This was a team in need of a complete overhaul. Half an hour later I was deep in discussions when Bucko came in.

“Bad news,” he said.

I looked up. “What?”

“Mazur threw Thomas out of practice.”

I listened in disbelief as Kilroy described the confrontation. Mazur had told Thomas to assume his stance. Thomas said he was in his stance already, that in Dallas running backs line straight up with their hands on their thigh pads. Mazur resolved the question by kicking Thomas off the field, which was a message to me as much as to Thomas. “I just do not want this guy,” Mazur told me afterwards.

I won’t rehash the excruciating details of how I managed to reverse the deal with Tex Schramm, except to say that it involved the league’s commissioner, Pete Rozelle, and the fact that Thomas hadn’t passed his physical. The result was that we started the season with our original running back, Garrett, who was good, though not great. And the Cowboys played with Thomas, who, of course, led them to the Super Bowl.

 

[Bob Sacamano]

He and nathanlt can start a club with a secret handshake that includes pantomimes of dabbing your eyes with a hankerchief and adjusting a pacifer.

they actually signed off on leaving the forum

 

[Bob Sacamano]

another example is Danny White sucker-punching Roger Staubach, we could find many examples of Cowboy players behaving just as bad, or worse, than TO

 

[Alexander]

another example is Danny White sucker-punching Roger Staubach, we could find many examples of Cowboy players behaving just as bad, or worse, than TO

:laugh2:

Danny didn't punch Roger.

That was Clint Longley.

Paint chips are very bad for you.

 

[Bob Sacamano]

:laugh2:

Danny didn't punch Roger.

That was Clint Longley.

Paint chips are very bad for you.

you suck

 

[nathanlt]

Thank you for saying it so well. Can I use that for my sig?

It's not that I ever want my team to win but I want to win with people I can admire and like.

I don't hate the Commanders simply because they are a bitter rival but because of people like George Preston Marshall and George Allen. I hate the Eagles because of their fans and the dirty players they have had over the years (Wes Hopkins comes to mind as does Bill Bergy). The Giants are a rival yet I have never thought of them in the same way as the Commanders of Eagles.

I like who I like and root for the players and teams I like. I also have the right to dislike anyone I choose. I fell in love with the Cowboys because of Bob Lilly and Tom Landry and have stayed a fan for nearly 45 years because of guys like Mel Renfro, Bob Hayes, Staubach, Randy White, Aikman & Emmitt.

I disliked Duane Thomas, Hollywood Henderson, Michael Irvin, and Deion Sanders and would have been quite happy had none of them ever put on a Cowboys uniform.

The thing most people don't get is that teams with good character players win! We won a lot of games under Landry with mostly high character guys but I loved the team even in the early 60s before we started winning.

Guys with good character aren't suspended for doing stupid things, they play hard all the time even when the play isn't called for them, they do whatever it takes to make their TEAM better. Look at what Rivera is doing now with the young OLs even though he is likely to be out. That's character and we will win because of guys like that, not because of selfish, me-first players like Owens regardless of how talented they are.

Thanks, you're posts are right on. And hey, remember, this is the Goodell era, where it seems knuckleheadedness is no longer tolerated. Owens will get slammed if he gets out of line.

 

[Alexander]

Thanks, you're posts are right on. And hey, remember, this is the Goodell era, where it seems knuckleheadedness is no longer tolerated. Owens will get slammed if he gets out of line.

To my knowledge, Terrell Owens has never broken a law, lied about an off the field transgression, nor accumulated a rap sheet. He just happens to offend your ridiculous sensibilities, which border on the delusional.

If you equate anything Terrell Owens has ever done to anything Adam Jones, Chris Henry, Tank Johnson or Jared Allen has ever done that you are completely clueless. Which of course, most of us already know that.

 

[ZeroClub]

In that respect he is very much like Owens, except he attacked coaches, not teammates. And I don't really judge fault him for what he did either. He was himself.

Thanks for the story. One of the funniest parts of the reversed trade was that Garrett said some things about his former Patriot teammates - only to rejoin them and the team a day or two later.

Yeah, and I totally agree that one ought not judge or fault Thomas. Glad to hear you say it.

It wasn't easy for an intense, introspective, and proud black man to grow up in Dallas during the 50's and 60's, and losing both of his parents early. Dallas was a very white town back then and race was a much bigger deal.

Keep in mind that Thomas was drafted by the Cowboys less than two years after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. ... only 15 months after Tommie Smith and John Carlos shocked many with their Black Power salutes at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics.

And so Thomas was thrust into the spotlight of a rather strange and uncomfortable world. Tex Schramm was an equal opportunity scammer. Thomas might have dealt better with his circumstances. On the other hand, his circumstances could have been much better -- far less hostile.

Thomas did climb to the top of the football world for a brief period of time. Not bad, all in all.

 

[nathanlt]

To my knowledge, Terrell Owens has never broken a law, lied about an off the field transgression, nor accumulated a rap sheet. He just happens to offend your ridiculous sensibilities, which border on the delusional.

If you equate anything Terrell Owens has ever done to anything Adam Jones, Chris Henry, Tank Johnson or Jared Allen has ever done that you are completely clueless. Which of course, most of us already know that.

All of those individuals committed criminal acts, they are being dealt with, some have been suspended, and some will be.

Owens should have paid a much heavier price than he did for standing on the star. It doesn't offend you, probably because you're big into fantasy football, and "who gets which stat from I-don't-care-which-team."

The star of the Cowboys means something to me, I'm a fanatic. The Cowboys aren't just my only NFL team, they're my only sports team, period.

I did not want Owens to play in the NFL, period, after the star incident. His decade in the league has not matured him. He is selfish to his own detriment.

It doesn't make sense to you... fine. Stop calling us crybabies for wanting knuckleheads off the team. It makes perfect sense to a few Cowboys fanatics.