Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones stands on the sideline during the first half of an NFL football game against the Seattle Seahawks Sunday, Nov. 1, 2015, in Arlington, Texas. Jones participated in a Cowboys Ring of Honor ceremony where former player Darren Woodson was inducted. (AP Photo/Brandon Wade) NFL moves and questionable quote
The NFL owners voted on a slew of rule changes Tuesday.
The approved seven rule changes that ranged from the confusing (eliminating the multiple spots of enforcement on a double foul after a change of possession) to the obvious (it's not illegal to call a timeout when you don't have a time out) to the expected (making the new extra point permanent). Side note: There were 71 missed extra points by kickers last year. That's more than the previous seven years combined.
Two of the seven were expanding the safety concerns of players.
The chop block is now illegal everywhere. (Before you could chop on running plays under certain scenarios.) The league also expanded the definition of the horse collar to include the name n the back of the jersey as well as the collar.
Here's the seven rules that were changed.
Of course, on the topic of safety, Dallas owner Jerry Jones had a curious diatribe when asked about the connection between CTEs and football.
Jones said it's "absurd" to say there's a link between the head trauma and playing football.
He says he needs more research. OK, we could all use more research.
But to say there's no link after a) the most recent study showed more than 95 percent of brains of former NFL players studied had signs of CTE, and b) the NFL's senior vice president for health Jeff Miller said there's an association is quite simply absurd.
FILE - In this March 21, 2016 file photo, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks in Washington. Republican and Democratic presidential candidates clashed over the role of government, and its limitations, in enforcing U.S. national security Tuesday, March 21, 2016, following deadly attacks on the Brussels airport and metro system. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File) Political madness
The primary process continued to twist its way toward the summer conventions.
The frontrunners on each side extended their leads - Donald Trump winning Arizona and Ted Cruz winning Utah on the GOP side; Hillary Clinton winning a couple and Bernie Sanders scratching out Utah.
In truth, that Cruz was able to get more than 50 percent of the vote in Utah and claim all that state's delegates was a large win for him and almost neutralized Trump's gains by winning
Arizona. It also further complicated the math on whether The Donald can get to the 1,237 delegates - more than half - he would need to lock up the nomination before the convention.
Of, no GOP political story can really come and go without some form of mud-slinging and in old-fashioned political hubbub style, now the wives are becoming targets.
Trump's wife - his third and she obviously is attracted to either his hair or his wallet, and maybe both - Melania posed in her undies about 15 years ago and GQ reran the photos recently because of Trump's surprising political rise.
An anti-Trump Super PAC used the photos in ads bashing Trump. (And to be fair, we'd much rather see Melania in her skivvies than say, Martha Washington. But that's beside the point.)
Trump assumed Cruz was behind it and took to social media that he was going to expose Cruz's wife.
We've written it before but it deserves repeating: We are likely going to elect a president that is either a criminal (Hi, Hillary) or acts worse than my 8-year-old (Yes, that's you Donald.)
Staff file photo by Doug Strickland / Fans Judy Bonine, Kyle Adkins, and Jennifer Roche, from left, cheer before the Mocs' FCS playoff football game against Fordham at Finley Stadium on Nov. 28, 2015.Finley adds beer nest
TFP all-around sports ace David Paschall had the skinny from the very start on the news that Finley Stadium is adding beer to the west plaza for UTC football games.
We're in favor of this.
We're also in favor of the way Paul Smith and his folks are continuing to look for and find ways to make the Finley experience more enjoyable and attractive to potential fans.
Let's face it there is a strong core - that strength is in passion more than numbers - of UTC football fans that will show up if they played on Tuesday morning in 12 degree weather. That number likely is around 5,000.
For the Mocs, who have had better attendance in the recent championship run Russ Huesman and co. have authored, to go noticeably bigger, they have to attract the casual fan and the students.
We think more Thursday night games would be beneficial in appealing to those groups, but that's a layered decision involving the conference. (In truth, too, a lot of the core fans would not be super keen on a plethora of Thursday night kick-offs.)
Beer options will also help the appeal to those outside the core.
Also of note, most of the home kickoffs will be around 2 p.m., a time that either directly or inadvertently will slide between the noon kickoffs and the 3:30 kick of the biggest SEC game of the week.
So it goes, but score one for the home team with Tuesday's decision to add a beer option beyond the luxury boxes and the stadium club.
This and that
- Nice work here from TFP ace sports columnist Mark Wiedmer on the entire sport of tennis and the impact of its top men's stars.
- There are few high-powered football coaches of elite programs like Jim Harbaugh, who fired another Twitter blast, this time at THE Ohio State AD Gene Smith. Harbaugh is Spurrier in the social media age, and for that we say thank you.
-Final score of the baseball friendly was Tampa Bay Rays 4, Cuba National team 1. And somehow it feels like the big winner here was the Castro family.
Today's question
Do you have a mailbag question? Well, send it along.
If we need a Rushmore, well, let's go here: Ron Jaworski is 65 today. He is way more famous as an analyst than he was as a quarterback.
Who's on the Rushmore of former pro players who have become way more famous as analysts/broadcasters. (Think Bilas may be far left here.)
Go.