Typical Cowboys Fan:  “What the fucking fuck just happened!?”

Rational Cowboys Fan:  “Our star running back has just been suspended for the first six games of the season.”

TCF:  “FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!!!!!  WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!???

RCF:  The official reason is that he violated the NFL’s Personal Conduct Policy.

TCF:  What the fuck does that even fucking mean!?”

RCF:  The short answer seems to be that it means whatever Roger Goodell wants it to mean.

TCF: “BUT THAT’S NOT FAIRRRRRRRRR!!!  HOW COULD ANYONE KNOW WHAT NOT TO DO!!????

RCF:  While there have certainly been many fair criticisms of Goodell’s use of his suspension powers under the PCP…”

TCF:  “Wait, you have PCP?  Can I have some?  This whole thing has me on edge and I could use something to smooth things out.”

RCF:  Personal Conduct Policy.  Although reading that thing will take the edge off, and in fact will put your ass to sleep.

TCF:  “FUCK!!!!  I REALLY NEED SOMETHING!!!  I’M LITERALLY DYING HERE!!!”

RCF:  You live in Oklahoma; there should be a meth lab somewhere within spitting distance.

TCF:  “Well, there was…

RCF:  Jesus.

TCF:  Yeah.

BUT GET BACK TO MY COWBOYS!!!!  WHY WAS ZEKE SUSPENDED!!!!  HE WASN’T EVEN CHARGED WITH A CRIME!!!!

RCF:  True.  If you would read the Conduct Policy instead of trying to smoke it, you would see that it specifically says:  “It is not enough simply to avoid being found guilty of a crime. Instead, as an employee of the NFL or a member club, you are held to a higher standard and expected to conduct yourself in a way that is responsible, promotes the values upon which the League is based, and is lawful.”

TCF: (suddenly much calmer after dipping into a tin of pills marked ‘Hippo’s‘)  “Wait a minute.  How is that fair.  Doesn’t that put a player in a position where anyone can be suspended just on the say-so of a pissed of ex?  Or a pissed off fan of another team?  Or just someone who wants to fuck with their opponents fantasy line-up?”

RCF:  Theoretically yes, and the NFL does itself no favors by conducting these investigations in secret, more-than-occasionally fucking them up, and then backpedaling quicker than Chris Conte…

TCF:  “That’s not saying much.”

RCF:  Please don’t interrupt.  While this is true the player does have the right of appeal, which Zeke is doing and which I suspect will reduce his penalty to 4 games….

TCF:  FOUR GAMES!!!!???? OHMYGOD EVERYTHING SUCKS AND I WANT TO KILL MYSELF!!!!!!!!

RCF:  Here, have another chewable Hippo “vitamin”.

TCF:  (eyes dilate to the size of pins)  “Thanks.”

RCF:  Sure.  Anyway, the player can appeal the suspension and potentially have it reduced or eliminated.

TCF: (drooling)  “Well that seems like good news.  Who does he appeal to?  If it’s a Texas Court we should be in bidness!”

RCF:  Yes, a Texas Court would probably eliminate the suspension, hang the accusers and suspend Goodell by this thumbs over a pit of alligators but that’s not how this works.  The appeal is heard by the Commissioner.

TCF:  (snapping wide awake)  “WHAT????  BUT HE’S THE GUY WHO SUSPENDED HIM IN THE FIRST PLACE!!!!  HOW IS THAT FAIR!!!????”

RCF:  Oh it most definitely isn’t fair.

TCF:  WHAT FUCKING IDIOT AGREED TO THAT!!!!????

RCF:  Meet the NFL Player’s Association, probably the least powerful union this side of Wisconsin.

TCF:  “Did the players at least get something out of this agreement, like more money, or better health coverage, or, or, anything really?”

RCF:  No.  They agreed to this in 1968.  They got the right to play football and that’s pretty much it.

TCF:  “Wow.  The NFLPA is just the worst.”

RCF:  Well, they’re certainly not good, but keep in mind that, unlike in other sports, baseball most especially, the NFL players can’t really go on strike because Americans have proved that they will watch literally any group of “players” dressed in the uniforms  of their teams and flinging a football all over the place.  As long as the audience is there the owners have no incentive to give in to any kind of demands, as they make most of their money off of TV.  And Americans looooooooove football on TV.

TCF:  “Hey, whatever happened to Brooke Langton?  She was HOT!!!”

RCF:  How do you know her name?  That’s creepy.

TCF:  “I looked on iMDB.  You don’t have a monopoly on rational thought y’know.”

RCF:  Touche’.  Well, suffice it to say that Time has never lost a game but it looks like Ms. Langton

is going to at least take her game into overtime.  Good on her.

TCF:  “OK, so not that I’m not enjoying all these digressions and off-brand “medications”, what exactly did Zeke do to warrant a six game suspension?”

RCF:  Elliott has been under investigation for allegations of physical violence against his then-girlfriend dating back to 2016.  Based on the language of the NFL this appears to be the primary basis for the suspension.

TCF:  “BUT THAT’S BULLSHIT!!!  THE COLUMBUS PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE DECLINED TO PURSUE THOSE CHARGES!!!!  WHY DOES THE NFL GET TO PUNISH HIM WHEN HE WASN’T EVEN CHARGED!!!”

RCF:  There are two responses to that.  First, under the PCP, (no, you’ve had quite enough of those pills), a player doesn’t have to be convicted, or even charged, for the NFL to take action.  It states specifically that “Persons who fail to live up to this standard of conduct are guilty of conduct detrimental and subject to discipline, even where the conduct itself does not result in conviction of a crime.”

TCF:  “WHAT STANDARD OF CONDUCT!?!?!?  THE NFL BUILDS STATUES TO RAY LEWIS AND JIM BROWN!!!!”

RCF:  Buddy, if you’re bothered by hypocrisy and double-standards the NFL is not for you.  Anyway, the second response, and surprisingly I’ll side with the NFL’s suspension on this on, is that just because the Columbus prosecutors decide not to pursue charges against a star football player from THE Ohio State University it doesn’t necessarily mean he didn’t do it.  That’d be like the NFL not taking any action against Jameis Winston just because he wasn’t charged with rape by the Tallahassee prosecutor…

TCF:  “Um, the NFL didn’t do anything to Winston…”

RCF:  WHAT!!???  THAT IS FUCKING BULLSHIT!!! 

TCF:  I KNOW RIGHT!?!?  WE SHOULD UNITE WITH PATRIOTS FANS AND TAKE OUT GOODELL!!!!

RCF: (injecting Hippo’s “insulin” right into his eyeball) Whew!  That was close.  No, no, we can’t do that.  CERN’s accelerator  has proved conclusively that if the Cowboy and Patriot fanbases were to unite for any reason the resulting Douche Singularity would be so powerful that the galaxy would collapse in on itself, leaving nothing but a faint smell of Axe cologne and tobacco juice lingering from here to the Kuiper belt.

TCF:  “Is that bad?”

RCF:  It means you’d never get to watch football again.

TCF:  “Well, fuck that then.  Let’s get to what’s important.  What does this mean for the Cowboys season?”

RCF:  Certainly nothing good.  But they still have that offensive line and McFadden and Morris are better-than-average backs, especially for 6 games.  The early schedule is tough and without Elliott they probably lose a game to Denver that they should have won.  They could open as poorly as 2-4 but more likely go 3-3.  The season is probably more trending towards 9-7 than it is towards 11-5.  This could very well mean no play-offs.

TCF:  “Well shit.  What the fuck am I supposed to learn from this?”

RCF:  My main takeaway would be maybe don’t hit women, and that when you’re being investigated for hitting a woman maybe don’t yank another’s shirt down in public and maybe don’t be involved in some bar incident where another guy went to the hospital.

Also I will draft Elliott in the third round of any fantasy draft I’m on, because I did the same thing last year with Brady and Bell and won my league.  And when you’re in my situation you need as many tiny lockers as you can get.