Why the Cowboys beating the Saints means that Wade Philips should get fired...

If you were to interview all of the sports journalists in the United States on Friday morning, I promise that 97 out of 100 would have picked the Saints to beat the Cowboys. The 3 that wouldn't have picked them were the 3 that had been drinking Hennesy since they woke up...The Saints went into the game with a sweet record of 13-0. They were going for history in a city that could use some good history. The Cowboys on the other hand were going in the complete opposite direction. For the 12th consecutive year they were heading towards a losing December. This team has been called "soft" among many other more profanity laced things. They had already lost their first 2 games in December, and were realistically looking at going 1-4 to finish the year. Everything spelled d-o-o-m for the Cowboys and their serial under-achieving coach. then came Saturday night...

The Cowboys went into the Superdome in Louisianna and shocked the unbeaten Saints. They outplayed the Saints in every area except 24yd field goals (Folk signed his own pink slip on that one...) Tony Romo was outstanding and Drew Brees was pedestrian. Romo guided the cowboys to 24 points and a shocking zero turnovers. He had a 104 quarterback rating for the game. Then there was Brees. The New Orleans offense had averaged over 30 points per game coming into this contest. They were held to only 17. They had 3 turnovers, and looked outmanned by a Cowboys defense that has overall played pretty well this year.

The talk this week is that the Cowboys will probably finish the year 1-1 (beating the Redskins and losing to the Eagles), and they will make the playoffs. The ESPN pundits have said that if they Cowboys DO make the playoffs, and then somehow manage to win a playoff game then Wade Philips will probably keep his job. In my humble opinion that is ludicrous. This New Orleans game just proves everything that has been wrong with the Cowboys since the Jimmy Johnson years.

First, lets imagine if the Cowboys had of played that way the entire year long! They would easily be 11-3 instead of a measly 9-5. There is a HUGE difference in 11-3 and 9-5. The Vikings look like they may be coming unravelled, and that 11-3 record could have easily turned into 13-3 and that might just have been good enough to have gotten the Cowboys a first round bye and a playoff game in the megachurch known as "Jerry's World". The problem is that they haven't played that way the entire year. There have been many quarters and even games where the Cowboys look downright un-inspired. You can't have that in the NFL and win. The Cowboys underachieving however isnt the only reason that I believe that Philips should lose his job, because I believe that some of that responsibility must be put on the players. However, that is not the real reason that I believe that he should be looking for a job...

I heard on a radio broadcast after the game that the Cowboys coaching staff showed the team Tony Dungy's comments about the Cowboys not having any chance to win the game. Some of the players said that made them want to play that much harder. Seriously?!? It took a sports analyst to get you motivated to knock off an un-beaten team in their home field? Your head coach couldn't do that during the week? Then it all hit me like DeMarcus Ware...That has been the Cowboys problem all year! Many times they looked un-motivated. They looked like they lacked a fire and an intensity. This is the NFL, you shouldn't need bulletin board material to get excited about knocking off an unbeaten team or a division opponent, and yet that is what it took for the Cowboys to play with a fire.

That is why Wade Philips should be fired. He personally lacks a fire for winning. Did you hear his interview a couple of games ago? He got into an argument with a reporter about calling the Cowboys "Winners"...IF only he got that excited DURING the football games. He can't motivate the players to play hard, because frankly he doesn't care enough. I want to see him get excited. I want to see him throw his headset. I don't want to see my uncle out there pouting when a field goal is missed that could have put the game out of reach. I want him to run over to Folk, grab his facemask and tell him that if he doesn't make every dadgum kick then he will let Roy Williams start kicking (seriously, shouldn't we be getting something out of him...) Yet, we didn't see that. We saw him make his little pouty face and move on. Sure, Bobby Knight crossed the line and did some stupid things in his college coaching career, but you always knew that he wanted to win, he HAD to win, and his players played their butts off every single game. Probably because they feared for their lives if they didn't. I am not saying that Philips needs to grab a player by the neck, but show a little fire out there. Lets not make some television commentator get your players fired up, you should have had them fired up the whole week leading up to the game.

My Heisman Ballot

My Heisman Ballot: 1) Ingram, 2) Gerhart, 3) Suh, 4) Tebow, 5) McCoy I know that all of you Texas lovers are going to freak out, so give me a chance to explain my picks. I picked Ingram #1 for a variety of reasons. 1) He plays in the toughest conference in college football, and he still rushed for 6.2 yards per carry. That number alone is ridiculous. 2) In the biggest game of the year, and the biggest of his career, he was awesome. Not to mention that game was against the #1 defense in the country, with a ton of soon to be NFL players, and that didn't stop him from dominating. 3) Without him Alabama is not in the title game. 4) The Heisman is supposed to be for the most outstanding player, to me, that was Ingram. I picked Gerhart #2. He was amazing all year long.The problem for Gerhart is that Stanford plays in the Pac-10, which is generally not looked on as favorably as the SEC or the Big 12. He had 26 rushing touchdowns, and he only had 2 games were he was held under 100 yards, and one of those games he had 96. He is the only reason that Stanford was any good this year, and in the big games he dominated. I picked Suh #3. The argument could be made that he deserves to be #1, and I feel like when it mattered he was awesome, many times throughout the year he was incredible. However, he still only ended up with 12 sacks in 13 games. 4.5 of those sacks came in the Big 12 championship game though, and they came against one of the best offensive lines in the country. Without that Big 12 Championship game he doesn't even get invited. I picked Tebow #4 and McCoy #5. Now before all of you crazy people start threatening my life and mocking my sanity let me explain. I believe that Tebow and McCoy both had mediocre years. You can't just make it about the numbers either, because McCoy is a passing qb and Tebow is a hybrid between a giant fullback and and a qb. That being said, Tebow had a better quarterback rating than McCoy (106-100). McCoy has more passing yards and touchdowns, but he also threw the ball a lot more, he had more attempts and interceptions than Tebow. Neither McCoy's nor Tebow's numbers are anywhere close to where they were last year, and they didn't win the award last year with MUCH better numbers. Neither of them deserves the award, and I don't think that either should have been invited. Neither of them were good in the biggest games of the year, the Big 12 Championship game and the SEC Championship game, but Tebow was better. That is saying something, because he didn't look very good at all, and Alabama's D dominated the game. BUT, McCoy was terrible in the Championship. Granted, he did spend most of the game on his butt, but when he had time he still had a very hard time hitting the open man. AND if it weren't for the gracious Big 12 referees at the end of the game, he could have single handedly lost the game by his poor decision. In my opinion they were both invited to the Heisman ceremony because they have each had fantastic careers. McCoy has more wins that any starting qb in Division 1 history, and Tebow is considered by many to be one of the greatest college football players of all time. So, they are both incredible players who had mediocre years. They were both invited to the Heisman ceremony, and therefore the only thing I can think is that they both lead great teams this year and they have both had incredible careers, and their careers is the reason they were invited. Tebow (National Championship and a Heisman) has had a better career than McCoy, and that is why I ranked him 4th and McCoy 5th.