PHILADELPHIA -- When we last saw the Dallas Cowboys leaving this very same Lincoln Financial Field late last December, they were a battered and humbled group, having put the final, galling touch on one of the worst chemistry experiments in the history of the NFL. It was one last hard knock for the once-celebrated boys of "Hard Knocks,'' and the failure was epic-sized.
My weekly look at key matchups and storylines to watch in one game at each time slot. (All times Eastern).
Breaking down Sunday's Dallas Cowboys at Philadelphia Eagles game (8:20 p.m., NBC)...
Football Insiders: Check out Stewart Mandel's College Football Overtime column.
GREEN Bay, Wis. -- Musings, observations and the occasional insight as a rather unconventional but fascinating homecoming weekend here in Titletown wrapped up with the Vikings' 38-26 win over the Packers ...
These were supposed to better days for the Cowboys, Browns and Raiders, with Tony Romo rising from undrafted free agent to Brett Favre clone sans Terrell Owens, Brady Quinn becoming the Robo-QB in Cleveland he was at Notre Dame and JaMarcus Russell showing improvement in Year 3.
At this very moment I am on my way to being happier, wealthier and more successful than I was at this time last week, and I have Jerry Jones to thank for it.
I awoke Monday morning in Dallas, where the sky was obviously falling after the 1-1 Cowboys humiliated themselves with the whole world watching by losing at the last second to the Giants in their new billion-dollar ballpark. Oh, and while we're at it, what's the story with Tony Romo (again)?
ARLINGTON, Texas -- There's so much ground to cover on this strange, almost surreal night here, deep in the heart of Jerry's World. So let's get right to it ...
Breaking down Sunday's New York Giants at Dallas Cowboys game (8:20 p.m., NBC).
PHILADELPHIA -- When we last saw the Dallas Cowboys leaving this very same Lincoln Financial Field late last December, they were a battered and humbled group, having put the final, galling touch on one of the worst chemistry experiments in the history of the NFL. It was one last hard knock for the once-celebrated boys of "Hard Knocks,'' and the failure was epic-sized.
My weekly look at key matchups and storylines to watch in one game at each time slot. (All times Eastern).
Breaking down Sunday's Dallas Cowboys at Philadelphia Eagles game (8:20 p.m., NBC)...
Football Insiders: Check out Stewart Mandel's College Football Overtime column.
GREEN Bay, Wis. -- Musings, observations and the occasional insight as a rather unconventional but fascinating homecoming weekend here in Titletown wrapped up with the Vikings' 38-26 win over the Packers ...
These were supposed to better days for the Cowboys, Browns and Raiders, with Tony Romo rising from undrafted free agent to Brett Favre clone sans Terrell Owens, Brady Quinn becoming the Robo-QB in Cleveland he was at Notre Dame and JaMarcus Russell showing improvement in Year 3.
At this very moment I am on my way to being happier, wealthier and more successful than I was at this time last week, and I have Jerry Jones to thank for it.
I awoke Monday morning in Dallas, where the sky was obviously falling after the 1-1 Cowboys humiliated themselves with the whole world watching by losing at the last second to the Giants in their new billion-dollar ballpark. Oh, and while we're at it, what's the story with Tony Romo (again)?
ARLINGTON, Texas -- There's so much ground to cover on this strange, almost surreal night here, deep in the heart of Jerry's World. So let's get right to it ...
Breaking down Sunday's New York Giants at Dallas Cowboys game (8:20 p.m., NBC).
If ever there was a monument to Texas' clichéd fondness for BIG, it's that planet-sized videoboard hovering 90 feet above the field in the Dallas Cowboys' $1.15 billion new digs. At 60 yards long and 72 feet high, the big ol' box has become an instant attraction for patrons' peepers as well as punters who've discovered they can hit it, thus enshrining the gaudy contraption in the pantheon of such play-disrupting fixtures as the speakers on the ceilings of the Minneapolis Metrodome and Houston Astrodome.
Don't get spoiled by the last two Mondays. I can't keep up the pace of 7,200- and 9,000-word columns in the preseason. But there's enough -- from Dallas, Denver and Minnesota, and a stunningly bad list of prospective free agents when teams will have real money to spend in 2010 -- to keep us all thinking this morning.
You guys are all fired up over the Dallas Cowboys videoboard, and we'll get to that. But first, Tim of Modesto, Calif., has a question about rookies:
SI.com has dispatched writers to report on the 32 NFL training camps across the country. Here's what John P. Lopez had to say about the Cowboys' camp in San Antonio. For an archive of all the camp postcards, click here.
Tony Romo recently was back in the news when Cowboys offensive coordinator Jason Garrett suggested the star quarterback was "bottom-heavy" and needed to report to training camp in better shape (which, predictably, Romo says the media blew out of proportion). Will that be the difference-maker for Romo and the Cowboys, who haven't won a playoff game this decade? If not, what is it going to take for Romo to lead the Cowboys to the next level? SI.com NFL writers Don Banks, Jim Trotter, John Mullin, Ross Tucker and Andrew Perloff discuss.
• Jessica Simpson and boyfriend Tony Romo, leaving Al Biernat's steakhouse in Dallas carrying a bottle of Macallan 21-year-old single-malt Scotch whiskey. Clearly, there was plenty of football talk over their meal: The pair dined with new Dallas Cowboys backup quarterback Jon Kitna and his wife Jennifer, as well as quarterbacks coach Wade Wilson and offensive coordinator Jason Garrett.
An air-supported roof over the Dallas Cowboys' practice field collapsed during a heavy thunderstorm Saturday afternoon, leaving 12 people injured, authorities said.
A Dallas Cowboys scouting assistant suffered a broken back and has been permanently paralyzed after the collapse of the team's practice canopy during a heavy thunderstorm, the Cowboys announced Sunday.
So far, public reaction to the tragic collapse of the Dallas Cowboys' indoor practice facility has understandably reflected sadness, shock and genuine empathy for the 12 injured persons, particularly scout Rich Behm, who was left permanently paralyzed from the waist down.
A federal agency is examining what caused the Dallas Cowboys' practice facility to collapse on Saturday, paralyzing a scout and injuring 11 others.
DANA POINT, Calif. -- Musings, observations and the occasional insight as we wrap up the NFL's annual meeting with a little table-hopping among the league's head coaching set, and more from the St. Regis Monarch Beach Resort...
If the adage about defense winning championships is true, the league should pencil the Jets in as title contenders. Building on the solid foundation former coach Eric Mangini left behind, new head coach Rex Ryan is assembling a unit that should be formidable in 2009.
Minutes after that galling 44-6 debacle of a loss at Philadelphia that both ended and summarized Dallas' lost season of 2008, I stood off Jerry Jones' right shoulder in the Cowboys locker room and listened as the man who presided over the train wreck preached the virtues of continuity and staying the course. As if it was the only obvious path to take at that moment of disappointment and defeat.
Terrell Owens, a former San Francisco 49er and a former Philadelphia Eagle, is now a former Dallas Cowboy. The Cowboys released Owens late Wednesday, according to published reports.
The 2009 NFL season officially begins Friday at 12:01 a.m. when free agency opens. What follows is a rundown of the game plans for every NFC team heading into free agency and the draft. For the AFC teams, click here.
The great debate in Dallas in these earliest days of the NFL offseason surrounds Terrell Owens' fate, and to some degree, I'm learning that reality depends on who you talk to.
PHILADELPHIA -- Venturing into the losing Dallas locker room early Sunday evening at Lincoln Financial Field, I expected to find a deep reservoir of disillusionment and disappointment and see the almost visceral pain of chronic underachievement etched on the faces of Cowboys players, coaches and officials. It was, after all, the worst Dallas defeat in 20 years I was wading into.
If you're in one of those strange fantasy leagues that plays Week 17, this is important. For the rest of you, well, I still say that the "partial season problem" is the biggest issue for fantasy football. There are plenty of injuries and even more playing time issues as teams that are already in -- or already out -- are resting and protecting players. For the surprising number of teams in meaningful games, there are as many issues to deal with as usual. Of course, teams aren't making it any easier on me, but let's get to it:
Hold off on the obituaries: The Cowboys are back in the mix as a title contender, and they have their vastly improved defense to thank for it.
Breaking down Sunday's New York Giants at Dallas Cowboys game (8:15 p.m., Eastern, NBC) ...
Musings, observations and the occasional insight while watching the strange doings of a Week 15 that from start to finish I just didn't understand ...
NEW YORK -- Did someone say Miracle of the Ketchup Bottle?
Talk about your self-inflicted wounds in the NFC East.
It's undeniable their seasons have been greatly impacted by a wave of injuries, but does anyone else find it curious that all three of the teams with head coaches in waiting are struggling mightily this year?
Musings, observations and the occasional insight as we watch a Week 8 unfold that looks like it's going to be very, very accommodating to home teams ...
Five weeks ago, when I first visited the topic of NFL coaches already on the hot seat, it seemed way too early in the season to be tackling such firing line issues. Turns out it wasn't. Oakland's Lane Kiffin and St. Louis's Scott Linehan were let go after Week 4, and San Francisco's Mike Nolan got added to the casualty list this week, when the 2-5 49ers decided they had seen enough and elevated Mike Singletary to the role of interim head coach.
"I am so grounded in the thinking that higher payrolls don't win Super Bowls. I've never experienced success throwing money at players. I never see myself [being a Steinbrenner].'' -- Dallas owner Jerry Jones, at the NFL Meetings in Palm Beach, Fla., last March.
Every Monday, SI.com's Ross Tucker will hand out letter grades to deserving NFL parties...
Musings, observations and the occasional insight as we take in Colts-Packers at Lambeau -- an old-school NFL matchup that could have just as easily occurred in 1958, '68, '78, '88 or '98 ...
He's 40 now, which is truly rarified air for any quarterback, but if you want to get the true measure of just how long Brad Johnson has survived in the NFL consider the following factual nuggets:
Can a team have too much talent? That's a thought floating around league circles after watching the Cowboys acquire former Pro Bowl receiver Roy Williams at the trade deadline. Williams, who earned a Pro Bowl berth in 2006, was sent to the Cowboys from the Lions in exchange for a first, third and sixth-round selection in the 2009 Draft. In addition, the Cowboys inked the star to a multi-year extension reportedly worth $45 million, including $20 million in guarantees.
Staring into my oblong-shaped crystal ball, here's what I foresee for the days, weeks and months ahead in this 2008 NFL season.....
Commissioner Roger Goodell's decision this afternoon to suspend Dallas cornerback Adam Jones for at least four games for violating the league's Personal Conduct Policy is the most predictable event of this most unpredictable season.
Dallas Cowboys cornerback Adam "Pacman" Jones was suspended indefinitely by the NFL on Tuesday for violating the league's personal conduct policy
Heading into the NFL's Week 7, we hold these truths to be self-evident:
Sometimes when you're parenting, you tell your kids, "Oh, everything's fine. Don't worry. Everything's fine.'' You don't really believe it, but you figure it's what you've got to say sometimes.
Will Trent Edwards become the league's next great quarterback? That's what some scouts are pondering after watching the rapid development of the former Stanford passer whom many of them whiffed on in the 2007 draft. The third-round selection has taken his game to another level, and the Bills' surprising 4-0 start can be largely attributed to his growth.
Every Monday, SI.com's Michael Lombardi will hand out five letter grades to deserving NFL parties...
Breaking down Sunday night's Dallas Cowboys at Green Bay Packers game (8:15 p.m., NBC) ...
Aaron Rodgers has memories of the Dallas Cowboys, and they're not all bad. He stepped into the middle of a rout last year and brought the game down to respectable proportions. The Cowboys were on their way to a blowout, scoring on their first five possessions, knocking Brett Favre out of the box with a dislocated elbow, after they had held him to 5 of 14, with two interceptions.
Breaking down Sunday's Pittsburgh Steelers at Cleveland Browns game (8:15 p.m., NBC)...
The glory of the AFC is slain upon thy high places. How are the mighty fallen? (Samuel II, almost).
I read an interesting comment the other day in Peter King's MMQB Mailbag . When King asked Phil Savage, the Browns GM, what he thought when Monday's debacle of a loss to the Giants was over, Savage responded, "I don't know. You never know. It's preseason.''
Jerry Jones is media-friendly. This much is apparent as the Dallas Cowboys owner stands in the center of SkyBar, the infamously exclusive poolside lounge tucked away in the Mondrian hotel overlooking Hollywood. Jones has rented out the area for the evening for a media party, waving in beat writers that have been brought down from the team's training camp site an hour north in Oxnard. While scantily clad women and Hollywood high-rollers attempt to sweet talk their way past the velvet ropes, Jones is making scribes from the Dallas Morning News and Fort Worth Star-Telegram feel like A-listers, at least for an evening.
SI.com has dispatched 10 writers to report on the 32 NFL training camps across the country. For the complete schedule of postcards, click here.
Back in the early 1990s, while working for the Cleveland Browns, I took a side trip with head coach Bill Belichick to spend an afternoon at Indiana with legendary basketball coach Bob Knight, before continuing on to the NFL Combine.
We all know the NFL headline machine never really gets unplugged, but the next two months unfold at the most leisurely pace of any on the league's calendar. While we wait for things to pick up, here's a sneak peek at 10 of the most intriguing topics I want to know more about once training camps start springing to life in late July.
Jon Bon Jovi should be living it up like the rock star that he is right now. He has a rare day off from touring and he's pacing around his plush digs in Miami with the vibrant Florida sun beaming through the windows around him. With South Beach at his fingertips, however, he opts to stay in and talk football. That's what happens when you're the owner of the Philadelphia Soul, one of only two undefeated teams left in the Arena Football League.
IRVING, Texas -- Musings, observations and the occasional insight as we put a wrap on the marquee day of the NFL's annual pick-fest, from our vantage point of deep in the heart of Texas....
Thanks to its wheeling and dealing ways, Cleveland essentially won't have a draft this year. San Diego's roster is so well stocked it doesn't really need one. But those are the exceptions, not the rule.
PALM BEACH, FLA. -- Musings, observations and the occasional insight on bug-out day at the NFL annual meeting, while I watch droves of league folk fleeing the posh surroundings of The Breakers hotel like a second fall of Saigon....
The healing began at a blackjack table, of all places, in a banquet room at Giants Stadium in the middle of baseball season. A June minicamp had come to an end, but New York Giants players and coaches were instructed to convene for one last meeting before going their separate ways. Seated at the table, carrying neither a whistle nor his familiar scowl, was coach Tom Coughlin, waiting for face cards. It was a team-only casino night, the first in Coughlin's four-year tenure and an uncharacteristic off-season overture from the coach to his players.
As they walked off the field Sunday night, the New York Giants had defensive linemen, linebackers and defensive backs dropping their chins and hanging their heads. It wasn't that they were ashamed or disappointed. It was they did not have enough strength left in their bodies to hold up their helmets anymore.
SI.com's Don Banks had a veteran NFC insider assess the Giants-Cowboys matchup.
• Chargers' LaDainian Tomlinson vs. Colts' Bob Sanders
Tony Romo's late-season slide wouldn't be so alarming if it hadn't happened last year, too.
I should know better, but I was surprised by the Brian Billick firing. I'm told that early in December, Baltimore owner Steve Bisciotti and Billick sat down and figured out how they'd change the staff for 2008, and how they'd handle the postseason announcement that Billick would return in 2008. When I started hearing rumors to the contrary, I called a Baltimore coach on Saturday. The staff had the same impression I did. In the assistant's words: "Brian's definitely back.''
For a league that has always prided itself first and foremost on knowing how to make the savvy public relations move, the NFL's decision to allow both NBC and CBS to simulcast the NFL Network's broadcast of the New England-New York game was a master stroke.
As a sports culture we like to throw our arms around the pursuit of history. Record chases bind us to an athletic heritage that lives on in yellowed paper volumes (along with Google searches and, blessedly, the occasional YouTube video) and connects to greatness in a language that we can understand and speak at picnics. How about those Celtics? And such. Whatever the milestone, we usually want to see it, touch it, remember it, celebrate it.
• Credit Dallas offensive coordinator Jason Garrett for incorporating more runs to Julius Jones and Marion Barber III in the opening stages against the Panthers. By running the tandem on an assortment of draws and quick-hitters, the Cowboys were able to exploit the deep drops of the Panthers' linebackers. Though Garrett didn't maintain balance in his play calling, the decision to use a balanced attack helped the Cowboys get off to a quick start. And with Terrell Owens out of the lineup due to injury, expect to see the Cowboys rely more on a balanced attack to move the ball effectively in the coming weeks.
I got a tremendous e-mail from Frank Reich, the former quarterback now living in Charlotte, about one event I neglected in the early editions of Monday's column --Philadelphia running back Brian Westbrook going down at the 1 so the Cowboys wouldn't get another chance to touch the ball in a 10-6 Eagles win -- and another event I neglected completely: Peyton Manning's headiness on the last play of the Colts' 21-14 win over the Raiders.
NEW YORK -- "And the legend grows,'' Eddie George said just after 4 p.m. Sunday afternoon at the NBC studios, staring up at the nine-television wall the crew members of NBC's Football Night in America fixate on every Sunday during the NFL season.
FOXBORO, Mass. -- Musings, observations and the occasional insight as I watch the Patriots make Steelers second-year safety Anthony "I guarantee it'' Smith eat his poorly chosen and hardly prophetic words ...
After counting myself among the privileged few permitted to watch the NFL's heavily restricted Hostage Bowl, shown to selected viewers, here are the things I'd worry about if I were a Packers fan:
With the big showdown over, the NFC standings this morning say the 11-1 Cowboys lead the 10-2 Packers in the race for homefield advantage throughout the playoffs by what amounts to two games with four remaining to play in the regular season.
Musings, observations and the occasional insight from the NFC's Game of the Year, won by the hometown Cowboys over those plucky Packers of Green Bay (who just might meet again in January) ...
Our top 10 reasons why Thursday night's titanic Green Bay at Dallas game rates as must-see TV (the key stipulation being, of course, that you have access to the NFL Network) ...
We have all due appreciation for the pursuit of excellence, and ample respect for the historical significance of what's unfolding in New England, but we interrupt our regularly scheduled NFL column to declare this space a Patriots-free zone for the time being, in order to bring you something other than more coverage of a certain team's methodical march to perfection.
As the New England Patriots methodically hand out beatings to the rest of the league, there's a tendency to overlook the Patriots' most significant drubbing thus far in 2007: what they've done to the barometer of public opinion called conventional wisdom.
This NFL season is something altogether different now. Sometime in the middle of Sunday evening it ceased to be the annual carefully constructed exercise in athletic socialism -- in which drafting, scheduling and free agency ensure that many teams, however flawed, can smell the Super Bowl in December -- and devolved into a widely televised and very lucrative game of king of the hill. One team stands at the top, and other perfectly serviceable challengers struggle upward, fruitlessly. Laughably.
With a diamond star pinned to the left lapel of his blue suit, Jerry Jones was waiting in the breezeway of Giants Stadium on Sunday afternoon when the door to the visitors' locker room swung open. In small clusters the Dallas Cowboys filed past him toward the field -- Terrell Owens, the mercurial receiver on his third NFL marriage; Wade Phillips, the quiet coach from the league's recycling bin; Tony Romo, the newly minted $67 million quarterback of obscure origin. When the team's new nosetackle, Tank Johnson, appeared in the door, Jones approached his latest reclamation project and offered some perspective on the set-to he was about to face. "Well, here we are," the owner told Johnson. "New York Giants, Dallas Cowboys. We're a little distance from four or five weeks ago." That's when the Cowboys were reeling from a painful loss to the Patriots and Johnson, who signed with Dallas on Sept. 18, had just begun practicing with the team.
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- The calendar says there's still another seven weeks to play. But we don't need that long to discover the pecking order in the NFC East.
• Ben Roethlisberger's athleticism is often underrated, but it has made him one of the tougher quarterbacks to defend when he flees the pocket. His running skills and ability to complete throws accurately on the move creates big play opportunity for the Steelers. His 30-yard touchdown run was one of the numerous plays he made with his feet to keep the offense rolling.
1. EAST: Cowboys (7-1) Tony Romo is making the right throws, has two strong backs in Marion Barber and Julius Jones, and continues to build on his chemistry with Terrell Owens and Jason Witten. On defense, the Cowboys are creating pressure and turnovers despite holes in the deep secondary. If the D can make as many big plays as the offense, Dallas will go to the Super Bowl. Scout's take: "As long as Romo rides high, the Cowboys will too. They do a good job stopping the run and rushing the passer."
Here we are almost halfway through the 2007 football season, and we still have no idea what the Cowboys' defense is all about.
Eli Manning's completion percentages in his four years as a part-timer, then full-time quarterback, for the Giants:
He knew precious little about the New England Patriots. There were those three Super Bowl rings. There was the coach in the gray sweatshirt who seemed so imperious and distant. "He never smiled," says Adalius Thomas, a Pro Bowl linebacker who spent seven seasons with the Baltimore Ravens before reaching the open market last winter as an unrestricted free agent. There were the players, enemies whom he scarcely knew.
Three nuggets from Dallas coach Wade Phillips lead my fantasy tips this week, and the moral of the story is: Don't shy away from Cowboys this weekend because they're playing the best team in football.
One day, in the 1968 offseason, I was in Dallas and I dropped in to the Cowboys' office to visit Tom Landry. It was a bad time for him. His team had lost two straight NFL Championship games to the Lombardi Packers, each game coming down to the final moments, the Ice Bowl being the latest. Already the rumors had started that he was the coach who "couldn't win the big one."
Musings, observations and the occasional insight on the latest Monday Night Miracle, that instant-classic that unfolded between the ridiculously charmed Cowboys and the snake-bit Bills 'round midnight in Buffalo's Ralph Wilson Stadium...
I don't know if you'll get 24 more exciting minutes in sports than the last 24 minutes of Monday night. It's a few minutes after midnight as I write this, and my heart is still pounding.
When you think of the Colts, you think of Peyton Manning dropping back, snap after snap, and firing to Marvin Harrison and Reggie Wayne waiting in the end zone. And when you think of the Cowboys, you think of Tony Romo ducking in and out of trouble before turning a broken play into an improbable touchdown pass to Terrell Owens or Jason Witten.
Thoughts on Week 2 in the NFL, now that we're finally clear of all camera-related controversies ...
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