It’s not often that I carry a grudge about football games, especially regular season matchups early in the season.  This game (I’m about to discuss) is especially frustrating.

Allow me to take you back to a simpler time.  September 2005.  The Dallas Cowboys host the Washington Redskins for a Monday Night clash.  Both teams are coached by legends (Parcells and Gibbs), and both teams appear to be rising from the dead.  At half time, Troy Aikman, Micheal Irvin and Emmith Smith will be inducted into the Dallas Cowboys famed Ring of Honor.

The Cowboys thoroughly dominate the game for three and one half quarters.  It’s not all roses and sunshine, however.

At half-time the induction ceremony occurs.  It’s a moving moment where Cowboys history and present share in a once in a lifetime opportunity.  And I’m watching a TELETHON!!!  Never have I cared less for the victims of huricane Katrina as I do when the NFL decides to beg for money on their behalf during the induction ceremony.  Ask me after the game!  Ask me before the game!  Ask me during the commercials!  Ask me in a scroll at the bottom of the screen, but don’t show the telethon while the only thing I want to watch are the triplets!  Damn you NFL!

To add salt to the wound, Santana Moss, goes nuts and catches two LONG td’s receptions.  Final score, Cowboys 13, Redskins 14.

To add a red hot poker to the wound, in week 17 the Cowboys play a Sunday night game against the lowly Rams.  They simply need one of several possible outcomes to come to fruition combined with a win against the Rams, and the Cowboys will be playoff bound.  Slowly throughout that Sunday hope withers on the vine.  The Cowboys are eliminated from the playoffs with one lone game left to play.  All the emotion in Texas Stadium is sucked clean.  The fans are crestfallen.  The players are flat.  Even Rowdy had a difficult time keeping a smile.

There might be one small consolation to being knocked out of the playoffs.  There are two young QB’s, Drew Henson and Tony Romo, on the Cowboys roster who haven’t received any playing time.  Maybe the fans will get an opportunity to see if the future has any hope.

The QB line for the game:

18 for 39, 242 yards, 1 TD, and 2 INT.  Not bad for a 2nd year QB in their first real action of the season.  Sure the Rams were a pathetic 5-10 at that point in time, but not a bad effort for young players.  An old player… who takes too much time in the pocket and throws with questionable accuracy.  Not so good.  Yes, that stat line is Drew Bledsoe’s. 

I’m emotional right now, so I’m going to lay all the blame at the feet of Santana Moss.  He single handedly beat the Cowboys, dropped them from playoff competition, and delayed the Romo era by 1/2 year (though I’m still thinking of exactly how Moss is to blame fo rthis one).  I also believe Moss’s body heat entering the Gulf of Mexico while on vacation helped cause huricane Katrina and caused me to miss the induction ceremony.

Damn you Santana Moss, damn you to hell!  Why do I bring up such pain?  It is reported that Moss has been provided performance enhancing drugs from Canadian doctor, Dr. Galea.  There’s no specific evidence that Moss used performance enhancers to win the September clash.  There’s no evidence that at half time he injected himself with equal parts HGH and spinich.  There’s no evidence that as the HGH/spinich combo rushed through his veins that he there were sinusoidal bulges running down his arm and then his legs.  There’s also no evidence that Moss has ever swam in the Gulf of Mexico.  Damn it, I don’t care. 

I can take solace in the following.  As the 2005 Cowboys season ended in misery, so will Moss’s career.