Sunday was a meaningful day for a number of NFL franchises, as the playoff hopes of 11 teams were to be decided. Among those were three squads in the NFC East, as the Cowboys, Giants, and Football Team all entered the day with, somehow, the division still up for grabs despite all having losing records.
The first game of the day in the division was Cowboys-Giants, with the winner keeping hope alive, needing an Eagles win to make the playoffs, and the loser seeing themselves fall to the top 10 of the NFL Draft order — which, to be honest, wasn’t the worst outcome in the world. The way that game ended was an abject disaster that was fitting of the way the division has played this season. Andy Dalton threw a horrific interception in the end zone to end a Cowboys comeback bid, but the Giants almost handed the ball back to them with an untouched fumble from Wayne Gallman that, somehow, was ruled to be retained by New York after the back sat on the ball and was deemed to have possession.
Once the game ended there were some celebrations from Giants fans — and some Cowboys fans who recognized it was much more important to add talent to this team than make the playoffs and likely lose — but no one reveled in the misery of the portion of the Dallas faithful still holding out hope for their playoff dreams more than Stephen A. Smith. ESPN’s top provocateur has always loved prodding Cowboys fans and took to Twitter donning his cowboy hat with cigar in hand to take a victory lap.
Well, well, well. I reckon those COWBOYS have just been eliminated from the playoffs
pic.twitter.com/vRw3NdiuCF
— Stephen A Smith (@stephenasmith) January 3, 2021
Smith is the finest performance artist in the sports media for a reason, and his commitment to the bit is tremendous — although, gotta clean it up with Washington’s nickname here, Stephen A. For those Dallas fans who are happier getting a top pick so they can hopefully bounce back next year with some more talent around Dak Prescott (or on the defensive end), this won’t get to them, but there will be plenty who get riled up over Smith’s latest prodding at America’s Team, something that truly seems to bring him immense joy.