Arizona's stadium was loaded with both Dallas and Cardinals fans. It was a bizarre pro environment. Every play that went against the "home" team was greeted with loud applause. The Cardinals almost proved once again why they are the Cardinals at the end of the game. Dallas lined up for a long field goal attempt, and Arizona appeared to block it. But wait! The Cardinals coach pulled one of those last second timeouts that Bill Cowher popularized. And it totally blew up in his face. The kick went off, and his team managed to block it. But the officials had awarded the timeout, so the play was nullified. Dallas came back out again after the timeout and hit the field goal, forcing overtime. Luckily for Arizona, the Dallas special teams were inept all around. They were able to block a Dallas punt and recover the ball on about the one-yard line, then run it in for a touchdown, ending overtime. I don't think today's loss had as much to do with a slump as it did the Cowboys falling prey to a big game environment. They're still one of the top teams in the league, but everyone is gunning for them. Especially teams like Arizona. It's too bad Cincinnati and Detroit can't play on the last game of the season for all the marbles. How classic would a 0-15 vs. 0-15 tilt be? If Jon Kitna, the former Bengals backup quarterback, could take the snaps for Detroit, the game would have even more of a mystique. I honestly believe at this stage that the Bengals are going to pull off the unthinkable and go 0-16. What happened to Oakland's highly touted running attack? They combined for a measly eighty-five yards on the ground, with no back recording more than thirty-five. Atlanta is an interesting story. I don't believe they'd have a 4-2 record had Bobby Petrino stayed. No one believes they can win, but they have shown the ability to move the ball and play tough. They may just win their division. The NFC East isn't looking as invincible this week as it did last week. With Dallas and Washington both losing in humbling fashion, and the Eagles having to pull off a mammoth fourth-quarter rally to stave off the lowly 49'ers, I'm starting to wonder if the NFC East is equal to the hype. The Hoodie is the genius, and Norv is the dunderhead, right? Can we blame Tom Brady's absence for the defense giving up thirty points today?

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"We're not leaving until Oklahoma is declared the rightful winner!" I saw things in that Oklahoma-Texas game that I've never seen before. The ball hit a receiver's hands, bounced straight up in the air, and he still caught it for a touchdown. The ground clearly caused a fumble of an easy INT in the endzone for Oklahoma, and the officials and replay officials totally missed it. And the worst acting job ever that was rewarded to a kicker. A player ran into the Oklahoma kicker, he started to get up as normal, and then he thought better of it and fell back down, clearly faking an injury. Such a performance is worthy of a yellow card in soccer for acting. Is it NCAA or WWE? All of these crazy plays didn't amount to much, as Texas won by 10 points, ending Oklahoma's dreams of the National Championship. Oklahoma State dashed the big ratings hopes of television by beating Missouri today. The Cowboys spoiled next week's Texas-Missouri game. Can LSU overcome their spanking in the Swamp? They survived losing to Kentucky last year, this can't be much worse. Has a team defeated by thirty every won a MNC? Penn State is this year's Ohio State. Wait and see. Everyone assumes the two grinder conferences, the SEC and Big 12, will spit out a pair of champions for the BCS Championship Bowl. But Penn State is going to roll into one of those slots with a tidy list of mediocre victories. And they will get destroyed just like OSU did the past two years. It looked like Nebraska was going to win. They blocked Texas Tech's extra point in overtime. All they had to do was score a TD and kick their own PAT. Instead, Ganz threw a pick and the game was over. The former mighty empire is now 3-3, and 0-2 in Big 12 play. All the talk of 4-1 Notre Dame being heinously under-ranked is over. The Irish went out on the road and lost a close game to North Carolina. Notre Dame is better than last year, but not enough to enter into any kinds of discussions about relevancy. Ball State is 7-0. That's a real story. Michigan lost at home to Toledo? Even if you don't hate the Wolverines, it's amusing to see the snobbish elite of Div. I go down in flames. Ditto for 2-4 Tennessee. I know Vandy is ranked #13, and that they're 5-1 with three wins already in the SEC. Why is it that I still wonder if they'll get to that magic number of six wins and Bowl eligibility?

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Viva La ACC. ESPN pays a big price for its Duke-Carolina basketball lovefest. That price is having to air football games like Wake-Clemson. It really is an unholy alliance. I tried to watch this game. I really did. But I just couldn't get into it. How can you get into the game when Clemson had something like -14 yards of total offense with seven minutes to go in the first half? The Verdict is in... The Cowboys have chosen not to punish Pacman for brawling with his bodyguard. Does this surpise anyone? The great thing about it for those who enjoy watching a good implosion, the Cowboys enabling will only encourage Pacman to have even more anti-social behavior. Why not? There was no punishment this time. The message sent: Brawling with your bodygard is A-OK with Jerry Jones and the Dallas Cowboys. So why not do more of it?

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Johnson, Navin R has this to say:	Oct 11, 2008 at 1:41 PM
Pacman, TO, and Tank Johnson. They're just holding up a long Cowboy tradition.

We've waited for this moment. Patiently. We knew it was coming. The moment Adam "Don't call me Pacman" Jones signed with Dallas, this was inevitable. The story is, he got into a scuffle with a bodyguard and damaged the bathroom in a hotel room. Way to go! The good news for wiley Jerry Jones is he found a way to insulate Pacman by keeping him basically under house arrest with bodyguards. The bad news is, Pacman may have gotten drunk and brawled with the bodyguards. The only thing more comical than the actual situation itself, that Pacman can't even control himself while under 24-hour surveillance, is the quotes that came with the ESPN article on the story. First, the Police: (All quotes from ESPN.com article) "Someone from the business called police," Dallas police spokesman Cpl. Jerry Monreal told The Associated Press. "Police arrived and spoke to the parties after they had a verbal argument. Both parties agreed to leave, and they left." Then, from Pacman's lawyer: "I'm not satisfied anything has happened," Robinson said. "I perform due diligence on rumors anytime there is an allegation made against a player I represent, and at this point I can tell you that I'm not satisfied that anything occurred." Let's set aside the obvious, hilarious disparities between these two reports for a moment and just move on. From ESPN: "NFL spokesman Greg Aiello had no comment. The Dallas Cowboys said they had no information about the incident and also had no comment. A source told ESPN that NFL Security has been notified and is investigating." The NFL, Cowboys, and everyone in management has no comment? You don't say? The only comment we're likely to hear from the NFL over this is "Pacman is suspended." But that is unlikely as long as Jerry Jones pulls the strings like Vito Corleone. The article gets even funnier when it mentions that NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell happened to be in Dallas when all this was happening. What great fortune! Before the story broke, Goodell had this to say, on Pacman avoiding the problems of his old life: "I am supportive of him and am hopeful that he will be able to do that for the rest of his life. I am hoping he will not only be a great NFL player but he will continue to do the right things so he can lead a productive life off the field as well." Pacman just humiliated the commissioner. Look out. I don't think anyone really had any high hopes that Pacman could stay clean for the rest of his life. Everyone involved on the money side had their fingers crossed that a guy locked down as hard as any prisoner in Cuba would be able to keep clean for a few years, during the prime of his NFL career so they could at least capitalize. But it's just not happening. Finally, this quote was supplied from Pacman, that he delivered during his re-instatement process several months ago: "I know my responsibilities to the NFL and I'm going to hold my own and do what I need to do to make sure I stay where I am right now, which is reinstated. I work hard every day to make sure I don't make the same mistakes. Can I say I would never ever make the same mistakes? No, I can't say that. I'll make sure I put myself in way better situations than I have put myself in the past." He's certainly put himself in better situations, but it doesn't seem to matter. The names and faces change, but the results are still the same. Incidentally, Deion Sanders is still performing as Pacman's mentor. I wonder what Deion will have to say about all this? Don't kid yourselves, Cowboys haters. This will ultimately get swept under the rug and it will be as if it never happened. But for now, on this day, we can bask in the hypocrisy and hilarity of the moment, as we eagerly await the Dallas Public Relations Department's scripted apology that Pacman will read in a few days.

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