Terrell Owens does not think he's Jerry Rice

Back in 2006, Terrell Owens set the sports world on fire by daring to compare himself to a few sports legends with the following quote:

"I'm not Superman. I'm human. Michael Jordan doesn't make every shot. Jerry [Rice] hasn't caught every pass. Tiger [Woods] doesn't make every putt. I understand the expectations of me. People want me to catch every ball. The likelihood of that happening is not going to be great. I understand that."

Now, because America's sportswriters are always looking to find fault with Terrell Owens, they were up in arms about that statement. "How dare he compare himself to Jerry Rice, Tiger Woods, and Michael Jordan! He can't even put himself in the same sentence as those guys!"

Fast forward to April 9, 2009, when Terrell Owens said the following quote:

"Other than that, I’m fine. I’ve been called selfish pretty much throughout my career. I think I’m in good company, Jerry Rice has been called selfish before, as well as a number of other guys."

I wrote about this in 2006 and I'm going to write about it again, mostly because I hate sportswriters. I'm not going to pretend that Terrell Owens is an angel or a model teammate, but once again, they're really reaching with this. You'll see that what I said in 2006 is pretty much going to be identical to what I say today:

"But for those of us who don’t think with our anuses, he didn’t compare himself to them at all. For those of us, who aren’t constantly trying to find fault with a guy who can buy and sell, say…sportswriters with the change in his ashtray, he merely said that those guys, who are great, didn’t come through every time and he isn’t going to, either. It’s just not realistic to expect him to. I think that sounds pretty humble, and the sportswriters would think so too if they weren’t busy being all-around assholes."

Actually, I don't think I need to add to that at all.

Whether or not Jerry Rice was actually called "selfish" is beside the point. Nowhere in either of those quotes is T.O. saying that he's comparable to Jerry Rice. It's like when people say "People talked bad about Jesus, too." Unless they can also walk on water, they're not comparing themselves to Jesus. But when you make it your life's mission to hate a guy, then you'll find the negatives wherever you want to. In fact, the article where I got that quote was titled, "Terrell Owens: Criticism of him has been unfair."

It's T.O.'s fault that Dallas didn't make the playoffs because he divided the entire locker room, because the Cowboys are not grown men or anything, who can make their own decisions. T.O. was the serpent who coerced them to play like garbage. T.O. was wrong for choosing not to attend a voluntary workout with his new team, the Buffalo Bills, because even though it's voluntary, T.O. needs to spend time with his new teammates. Mandatory workouts and training camp simply aren't enough time. You'd think sportswriters wouldn't want him there, since it's his destiny to divide the locker room. Since he changed his mind and decided to go, that's just going to give him a headstart or wrecking their season.

Yeah, I'd say the criticism has been a bit much. After all, like the man himself pointed out, "What I find so unfair is that I'm not the only guy out of 32 teams that didn't show up to voluntary and optional weight sessions." No, just the only guy that the sports media wants to bring down. Right, Skip Bayless?

After all, it's not like anything he does will ever have a humble or positive spin put on it. Maybe I should show them the way. The quote I'm going to use is the sentence directly before the quote that caused all of this controversy.

Terrell Owens Actually Does Have Humble Moments

Terrell Owens showed deference to retired Cowboys quarterback Troy Aikman when he responded to Aikman's comments about "addition by subtraction" earlier this week. Owens said, "I think he has three Super Bowl rings, so he has the authority to say that."

Man, what an jerk.

T.O. in Buffalo? Didn't see that coming

Wow. Buffalo. And don't be fooled by that fake smile over there, because he does not look happy about it. Might as well have exiled T.O. to Siberia. Or Kansas City. On the bright side, no one's going to see him screw up anything out there. No one saw that coming, mostly because no one even remembered that Buffalo had an NFL team.

So, yeah, Terrell Owens signed a one-year, $6.5 million deal with the Bills. The deal validates the wild claims that agent Drew Rosenhaus made when he said that T.O. would have a deal within the week, although, judging from the look on T.O.'s face during his press conference, I don't think either one of them would consider this a "win." Personally, I believed that Owens would be out of work for a few more months, at which point, teams would no longer be influenced by ESPN's "T.O. Hater Brigade", and realize that at least 15 of them had nothing to lose by signing Owens.

After all, Terrell Owens, love him or hate him, is still one of the NFL's best receivers. The people who dispute that are generally haters, like Bob Ryan or Skip Bayless. In 2008, Owens was 13th in yards (1.052), tied for 28th in receptions (69, with Randy Moss), and tied for 5th in touchdowns (10, with Tony Gonzales and Lance Moore). And that's with Tony Romo-Simpson as quarterback.

Conversely, the Bills had 14 passing TDs total.

But Terrell Owens isn't considered an "elite" receiver anymore. His critics claim that he has "lost a step," but Stephen A. Smith said it best this morning when he said that Owens "has lost a step for him," but he's still as good as everyone else. I really don't see how you can afford not to look at a guy like that, especially when your team had trouble scoring points like, say...the Rams or the Bengals. Because if your team is scoring less than the Lions did (27 TDs in 2008), you can't really be that choosy about who you have on your roster. If you were that particular, you'd probably have better players.

And as far as who's going to get the ball more, Lee Evans or Terrell Owens, let me say this: That's a problem most teams wish that they had. It's not the same thing as saying, who's going to get the ball more, Lee Evans or Josh Reed? If you don't know the answer to that quesiton, you're also too slow to realize that teams now have to change the way they defend this team. Yeah, the Bills are so stupid for signing T.O.

It's nice to know that your favorite team is taking a moral stand against hated NFL players, but most of those teams will be doing it in an empty stadium. That's one thing Buffalo won't have in 2009.

Terrell Owens: Cut by the Cowboys

At 12:05 AM, ESPN reporter Michael Smith broke the news that the Dallas Cowboys were releasing Terrell Owens.

Terrell Owens has been the NFL's most polarizing figure not named Michael Vick in a long, long, time. His talent can't be denied, but it doesn't stop people from begging for him to stop acting like a little girl who's not getting the prettiest dress for Easter services.

So where does he go from here? Popular wisdom would probably say the Oakland Raiders, because they take everybody that no one else wants. Truthfully, it's too rough of an economy to have a reputation like he does and to be jobless at the same time. The news just broke a half hour ago, so it's really too soon to predict where he'll wind up, if anywhere.

The man can still play, though. Word is that he's faster now than he's ever been. And he still racked up 1,052 yards and 10 TDs in 2008 at age 35. Like Shaquille O'Neal did for two days this week, the man is defying Father Time. Still, he's been a headache over the years.

Not being able to find a taker wouldn't surprise me, but at the same time, some half-wit GM taking a chance on him wouldn't shock me, either.

My prediction, though? The first team that he's telling Drew Rosenhaus to call: The Washington Redskins. Baltimore wouldn't be outside the realm of possibility, either. Either way, I'm sure Cris Carter is dancing in the streets right now.

Of course it was T.O.'s fault

Watching the sad performance being put out by the Dallas Cowboys against their hated rivals, the Philadelphia Eagles, there's only one thing that needs to be said: This is all Terrell Owens' fault.

It really isn't, but I just wanted to be the first one to say it, because I just know it's coming. Haven't you heard? T.O. is the what caused the financial crisis.

This game is still in the third quarter as I write this, with a score of 44-3. It's a division game between two teams that have so much history, with the flashpoint always being Eagles (and 49ers) castaway Terrell Owens, who joined the Cowboys in 2005. It's the last game of the season and, in case this game wasn't big enough, whoever wins goes to the playoffs. You'd think that both teams would be ready to run through walls and catch bullets with their bare hands.

Buuuuut…since the score is 44-3 (so far), you should be able to guess that it's not turning out that way.

Assuming that the Cowboys aren't going to go on a 42-0 run in the fourth quarter, I'm just waiting to see how this is going to be put in T.O.'s lap Monday morning. It's invariably going to be his fault. It's always his fault, because if he wasn't out there trying to make everyone look at him, the Cowboys would have scored 7,000 points and made the NFL cancel the Super Bowl, because the other teams would have been too afraid to play.

Terrell Owens is the most selfish teammate since Lucifer decided that he wasn't getting enough attention. Or at least, that's how everyone likes to spin it. The truth is, that's just not reality.

The Cowboys team I saw today was a team that just didn't come to play football. Maybe they came for a baseball game or a spirited contest of lawn bowling, but it certainly wasn't to play this Eagles team. Since when was T.O. a member of the coaching staff? Because last time I looked, preparing this team to play was their job.

I'm watching a Cowboys offense that can't hold onto the football. They're fumbling the ball left and right, practically handing the thing to the Eagles. "Pardon me, old boy. I do believe this ball belongs to you. Toodle-pip, what?" Why, T.O. wasn't on his job, because everyone knows that it was his responsibility to make sure that the ball stays in his teammates hands. He should have been right there with the stick-em. These grown men can't do everything on their own.

The offensive line did about as good a job as the Secret Service did as keeping Bush safe from shoe throwers. At least their excuse can be, "We just didn't see that one coming. Who throws a shoe? Honestly." The offensive line's only job is to protect the quarterback. There are no curveballs coming at them. There aren't going to be sudden surprises, like sneak attacks from behind or secret mole men burrowing out of the ground.

There's nothing to say about the Cowboys' defense that the Eagles' 44 points didn't already say. I know, I know, all of those points weren't scored on the defense, but that part's not going on the scoreboard, plus they still give up 27 points on their own. In fairness, the defense has kept Philadelphia from getting to 50. Thank goodness for moral victories, I guess.

This is a team that has underachieved all season long, when they were picked by many (myself included) to go to the Super Bowl. They were beaten by teams that they should have beaten and they have underperformed in big game situations (like this one). And that's not T.O.'s fault. He played a part, I'm sure, because he's a part of the team, but so is Tony Romo. So is Jason Witten. So are DeMarcus Ware or Bradie James and on up the ladder to offensive coordinator Jason Garrett, head coach Wade Phillips and owner Jerry Jones.

They all could have done more than what they did, but to try to place blame on T.O. for what's been a mess whether he was around or not is really just grasping at straws. He's not throwing the ball to himself out there. He's not on the defense or special teams. He didn't even drop a mess of passes like he's prone to do. Everyone needs to be held accountable for what happened out there today, because I know that had to be embarrassing. I just hope that the sportswriters get a new refrain this time, because blaming T.O. for everything since the Holocaust just isn't working.

And no, I don't mean blame Pacman Jones, either.

Final note: The Cowboys went on that scoring run and closed the deficit to 38 points. Final score: Philadelphia 44, Dallas 6.