On Terry Glenn, Tony Romo and other Cowboys stories

You schedule a mini-camp at Valley Ranch and you’re going to get news and lots of it. You gotta love that about the Dallas Cowboys, whatever they do produces storylines for the media. No wonder Hard Knocks wanted back in with the ‘Boys.

Everybody is weighing-in on the Terry Glenn kafuffle. Jerry Jones is indicating that Terry Glenn and his former agent, who he recently fired, had agreed to the split-contract but now Glenn is going back on that arrangement. From Glenn’s point of view that never happened and he’s always told the Cowboys that there would be no change to his deal. 

"I wanted to play with the guys that I knew, at least the core guys," Glenn said. "But when I saw the [split salary], I felt like I was no longer going to be a Cowboy. ... I wish I wasn't in this situation, and I don't like the attention."

Yesterday I posted that I didn’t think Glenn had much chance of getting decent compensation from another team but I do admit I didn’t completely entertain the motivations of the Tuna. It’s true that Glenn is a Parcells Guy and that the team in South Florida just might be a viable destination for him. But I still say that it would be at a minimum contract for a veteran and there’s still the very real problem of his knee. At this moment it’s not a sure thing that he could pass a physical for another team. Still, the Tuna could take a look at getting him signed if the Cowboys follow through on their threat to release Glenn. But if Jerry Jones is going to hold on to Glenn until at least the end of August, that makes things very tough for his future.

I also posited yesterday that Glenn has no leverage in this situation. Today, JFE disagrees and says all the leverage is in Glenn’s court. This only makes me more confident that I am right. Her reasoning is that the Cowboys didn’t address the WR situation in the offseason and that they are one T.O. injury away from being neutered on offense. I could pull the "one injury away" argument with a lot of players on the team. Plus, she seems to forget that Terry Glenn is one injury away from not playing and that injury appears to have a high likelihood of happening.

NFL.com has an article with the theme that the Cowboys are all about "the finish" this year. Finishing plays, finishing games, and most importantly, finishing the season. I like this train of thought. The Cowboys have the personnel in place to do serious damage in the regular season and the playoffs, but they haven’t shown the mentality to make the kill in the postseason yet.

QB coach Wade Wilson is setting the stage for Tony Romo to think along the same lines. 

Not long after the Dallas Cowboys’ season ended, quarterbacks coach Wade Wilson laid it out for Tony Romo in a language he speaks as well as he does football — golf.

"You’re Phil Mickelson before he won his first major," Wilson said. "He’s accomplished as a great golfer like Romo has done everything as a quarterback in the regular season; Pro Bowls, things like that. But he needs to win a major — so win a playoff game or a Super Bowl. He’s certainly capable of doing that, it’s just a matter of him doing that."

I know some of you don’t like to hear it but for Romo to ascend to that next echelon of QB’s he’s got to get it done in the postseason. Sure he’s still young in terms of seasons played and there is plenty of time to left in his career, but with the team he has around him the expectations are to win now. So far, the end of the year has been a rough time for our superstar QB.

Here comes the but: When December begins through the playoffs, Romo is 4-7, is slightly less than a 60 percent passer and has 11 touchdowns against 14 interceptions.

You can lay out reasons for that record and production but excuses are not what we want to hear. I think the world of Romo and believe that he will lead us to the mountaintop but until it happens, questions will linger. You can say that Peyton Manning took a while to get it done but you can also counter that Tom Brady got it done right away. I’m really not interested in making comparisons to other QB’s and playing the stats game, or the experience game, or any other contextual parameter you want to put on it; I just want Romo to get it done. I believe he will.

So Pacman Jones no longer wants to be known as Pacman Jones. I smell some PrimeTime influence here. I have always thought the idea that changing his name will somehow make him a new person and wash away the past is just silly. I mean, did anybody actually call Prince "symbol", or "the artist formerly known as…" in anything but mocking terms when he tried the whole name change thing? If Pacman doesn’t want to be called Pacman, I guess I can honor that. But Adam Jones just sounds so boring for such a dynamic player on the field. So I put together a poll looking for a new nickname on the right-hand bar. I included his regular name, but that’s no fun!

NFL.com video report from yesterday.

T.O.’s absence is reportedly because of a death in the family.