Isn’t that what the CFL is for?
They don’t seem to be well-versed in the history
Ummm… there were 5 teams in the NFC Central (they must be forgetting the poor Creamsicle Bucs). This was before the 2002 realignment to 4 divisions per conference, with 4 teams each.
In the decades prior to that, each conference had two 5-team divisions and one 4-team division (AFC Central, and NFC West). That changed when the Panthers & Jags joined the league in '95, giving each division 5 teams (Ah, remember when the NFC West had ATLANTA, CAROLINA, and NAWLINS…for goodness sakes???). Then the Baltimore Cleveland Browns “expansion” team in '99 came in and mucked it all up for a few years, giving the AFC Central now 6 teams (yikes!). It all got fixed when the Texans joined in '02, giving a nice, easily divisible number of teams at 32.
Yeah…Ive noticed, especially lately, that sports writers aren’t very good historians.
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I have TB BAL on 3 channels, one with some sort of weird commentary from the Mannings and Belichek
don’t believe i have LA AZ at all
I think the game is on ESPN+.
A true blessing!
- he is ridiculously wealthy (or should be) from that contract and the min salary deal he’d be offered isn’t even a good month of investment gain of what he should have
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...cont...
For the "cut Deshaun after 2025" crowd:
2026 Dead Cap: $72,935,000 ($46M cash)
2027 Dead Cap: $26,900,000
*note, these are current figures that assume no additional salary cap conversions
...end
For comparison, Denver had to eat only 85M when they cut Russel Wilson. I heard someone on the radio say they expect Deshaun Watson to be the most expensive backup QB in history.
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the only viable alternative is to trade him to some cap rich team. and by trade I mean give them some very valuable draft picks and watson so he can eat their salary cap instead of the browns cap.
it’s like the osweiller trade to the browns, but on mega steroids.
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One day, the NFL will figure out how valuable QBs are not.
Wondering about the insurance on this. The smart teams’ owners pay out of their wallets for insurance.
Seems CLE owner is semi-smart, though I don’t understand the tight-lippedness of discussing the policy. .
Huh, fans can tour “The Star” while the players are there.
Fun fact: Players don’t like being exhibits in a zoo:
Too much C&P, so hid the deets.
Summary
. But several former Cowboys told ESPN that the tours are one of the biggest distractions of working in Jerry’s world and contradictory to Jones’ stated goal of ending the 29-year Super Bowl drought.
Former Cowboys tight end Dalton Schultz created an entire news cycle last March when he told Pat McAfee the Cowboys’ facility was “like a zoo,” because fans tapped on the glass walls of the weight room to get the players’ attention while they were inside working out.
Cowboys defensive end KJ Henry arrived in Dallas the first week of October this season, and he’d already been prepped by his Bengals teammate Justin Rogers, a former Cowboy.
“He talked about the tours all the time, just saying that’s the difference,” Henry says. “Like, people are always touring, always walking through the facility, so just be ready to see random people.”
Jerry Jones being delusional about this being a good thing (well, for his pocketbook, mainly).
Jones will often talk with tour groups when he runs into them at The Star, so he knows fans such as Gainous are growing increasingly impatient after three straight 12-win regular seasons have ended in early and embarrassing playoff exits. He values transparency with the fan base, and he built The Star in 2016 with fans in mind as much as players and staff. But within that transparency lives a contradiction.
“We have 24/7 access to the facility, and it should be a place of solitude,” said a recent former player who requested anonymity to discuss the topic freely. “I come in for extra work at night, to use the hot and cold tub, and there’s fans walking through, poking out at you.”
“You’re walking by the tour guide, and they’re pulling [the fans] to the side, and you hear them say, ‘Oh that’s CeeDee Lamb, that’s CeeDee!’” says former Dallas safety Jayron Kearse, starter on the three straight 12-win teams. “Like Dalton said, it’s kind of like you’re in a zoo and kids are going to see a lion. That’s not a reason why we didn’t get over that hump. But I just don’t think that really equates to winning. That has nothing to do with us winning the game.”
Jones says he has never heard any complaints about the tours from a staff member or a player. “Not one time,” he says, “but the most important thing is it wouldn’t make any difference. Period. Because overall, they’re swimming against the stream.”
Parsons doesn’t acknowledge the fans, nor does he look bothered by the attention. But the recent former player who requested anonymity says the tours can be exhausting because the players always have to be on, even on a Saturday afternoon when their work before the game is done.
“We want to have our own space where we can talk, but it’s either media or fans all day,” the former player says. “You never get a break. It’d be one thing if they did the tours like one day a week, but it’s every day.”
Most NFL clubs work to limit distractions for players and staff. Paranoia motivates owners to keep the public and media out of the minutiae of football business. But Jones is built differently. “I have always thought that the way to promote the Cowboys and to add interest into what we were doing was to involve in every corner that’s possible, fan interest,” Jones says.
He says he thinks the fan presence inside the facility inspires his players and staff, while also growing the interest in the team by fostering a closeness with fans. Jones sees the tours as a part of his legacy as owner, along with being the first team to have live cameras in the draft room starting in 1992, and pushing for increased broadcast access and more lucrative broadcast deals.
“We’ve drafted well over the years,” Jones says, “But more important, that initiated a lot of interest in a part of football, and now, the draft is more of a programming hit than the World Series, as far as people watching. So all along the way, all I’ve ever had is a complete ratification and endorsement of the more that I can involve fans, such as tours, the better it is.”
OK, as long as you know something, JJ: players leave DAL as soon as they can, because of this. It is like playing for the team with the worst facilities, like the Clippers in the old LA Sports Arena (RIP).
Players who do move on often arrive at a similar realization.
“I’m smiling … when I walk in the building here, I just know, like, I just have work,” said six-year Cowboys defensive end Dorance Armstrong of his new team, the Washington Commanders.
“This is more about football, just X’s and O’s,” running back Tony Pollard, who spent five seasons with the Cowboys, says about his new team, the Tennessee Titans. “I’m in a better place mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually, just all around.”
“Over here [in Kansas City] … the point is the football and winning championships,” says cornerback Kelvin Joseph, who was with the Cowboys for two seasons before moving to the Chiefs this offseason (He is now a member of the Colts). “There [in Dallas], it was a lot of football and like, other stuff.”
“You got real facilities here,” says defensive end Dante Fowler Jr., who spent two years in Dallas and now plays for the Commanders. “You might not see tourists coming around, but it keeps the main thing the main thing.”
When asked what is different about Dallas’ team culture, Fowler, along with Kearse, were two of three Cowboys players from the 2023 roster who independently cited the tours as a defining feature.
“You’re on your way to eat lunch and you’re running into tours,” Kearse says. “You’re on your way to meetings, you’re running into tours. We’re here for football, it’s our job to come in and be able to focus whether we’re in the weight room, or our coach is teaching us something in the meeting room, where you have 30 to 35 people walking by, looking through the glass while you’re in meetings.”
Another recent former player who requested anonymity says his position group would shut the door to their room specifically to avoid tours. And the first recent former player who requested anonymity says he never felt as if he could speak freely, even in the locker room, because with the open entrance, fans could easily hear them in the hallway.
“I don’t know if that worked for Jerry in the '90s, back when they were winning Super Bowls, but times have changed,” says the first anonymous former player. “You have these elite athletes and if you want their complete focus, you shouldn’t have tours. It is an added distraction.”
Kearse played for the Lions and Vikings before the Cowboys. He says Dallas is a great organization that changed his life for the better, but a normal work day there is unlike any he experienced elsewhere.
“We get all the top-of-the-line things throughout the day, the hot tub and the training room,” Kearse says. “But it’s just a whole bunch of other things that come along with it. It’s all about the brand, that star, which I think supersedes trying to win at the highest level.”
Joseph says he didn’t get distracted by the tours, because he was able to “block out the noise.”
“Jerry is gonna try to make his money all around the world,” Joseph says. But in the next sentence he reconsiders. “It can be a distraction because they do have people sitting there watching you working out, tapping on the glass and just looking at you standing.”
A source close to the Cowboys says Dallas’ player leadership council, a group of veteran players, has discussed the disturbance of the tours, but believed there was nothing they could do.
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I say, keep the tours. 29 years is not long enough.
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And Troy Aikman is perhaps the most overrated QB in league history
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I did one of those Cowboys tours in the offseason several years ago and it was awesome. They let you go out on the field, and you can even throw passes / kick field goals if you buy a ball. I didn’t know they did the tours during the season when players were there.
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For several years, I’ve played with my friends in a no money picks contest. We pick every NFL game each week against the spread. In this contest, CBS tweaks the spreads so they all end in a 1/2 point so there are no ties.
In general we do pretty well in aggregate ATS vs “experts”.
I don’t have any skill in picking ATS despite watching many games. I have won the season, but to me it was random chance. Last week I decided to stop picking and to develop a lines model.
Perhaps my model sucks, but I’m going with math rather than judgment for the rest of the year. It was at least educational for me, and did give me better insight on line size.
Note no money is involved here. It’s just pride/ smack talk, although one of the group does make frequent NFL wagers.
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I was the only person in my group to take the Rams last night.
And hopes that were high in the heat of September
Can wilt and die in the chill of November
November can be cold, and gray
November can be surly
With bitter rain upon the world
And winter coming early
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New York Jets: 13 14 consecutive seasons of missing the playoffs.
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as a new england fan, on one hand it sucks bc the season was already in the toilet and I am OK with the draft assets that come from losing. on the other, stiffing the jets and rodgers is delicious
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We’ve finally found something even A.A.Ron can’t do!
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