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Dallas Cowboys

Football. Finally.

By Richie Whitt Mon., Jul. 25 2011 at 10:12 AM

Categories: Dallas Cowboys

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Day 132 of the NFL lockout is going to be the last.

When the NFL Players Association's 11-man executive committee formally agrees to accept the owners' labor proposal this morning -- around 10 a.m. -- it will effectively end a boring, maddening off-season. As the league's approximate 1,900 players show up to team facilities Tuesday-Wednesday they will vote to recertify the union.

Far as we can tell, trades can begin being discussed this afternoon and teams can also commence talking to free agents, though they can't be technically signed until later this week.

On Wednesday 10 teams will open training camp, another 10 Thursday and 10 more Friday. The Texans and Jets are scheduled to open on Sunday.

As for the Cowboys ...

Training camp will open (probably Wednesday, maybe Thursday) in San Antonio. The team's equipment trucks left Valley Ranch headed for The Alamodome this morning.

Then ... prepare for chaos. We're about to embark on five months of free agency to be crammed into five days.

The Cowboys, for example, have to sign their own free agents such as Doug Free and Stephen Bowen, carve out salary-cap room by perhaps cutting Marion Barber, sign a free-agent safety and fill out their camp rosters with a myriad of signings. Oh yeah, and don't forget about signing their draft picks. Under the new CBA which includes a rookie wage scale, first-round pick Tyron Smith will get a four-year contract. The new NFL? Last year top pick Sam Bradford received a six-year, $78 million deal from the Rams. This year the Panthers will only to be allowed to give top pick Cam Newton four years in the neighborhood of $22 million.

With the NFL attempting to get teams into camp two weeks before their pre-season openers, that would put the Cowboys at Thursday. But we're also hearing that the Cowboys are moving their scheduled Aug. 11 exhibition opener against the Denver Broncos at Cowboys Stadium in Arlington to the weekend of Aug. 13-14, preferably the night of the 14th.

A timeline released later today will begat a flurry of unprecedented personnel moves. Buckle up.

The good news: The NFL lockout is over.

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Tags:

football, Jason Garrett, San Antonio, Tony Romo, training camp

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It is all about the Benjamins. My futile hope that it would last at least one week longer to cut into part of that scam was shit-canned just as soon as the players figured out their take of the pile would be reduced too. The preseason is a joke of epic proportions. If I hear one more segment about Doug Free I think I am going back to the Cd spinner. Blah blah left tackle, blah blah blah. Plays both sides, blah blah. Spike to me head.
I ain't never been to Port Somnambulate. But once I bought me a mess of them shredded beef chimichangas at the Country Mart down there in Port Neches Groves.
Old habits die hard. From the student ticket perspective, the Texas is a given...
Shitty radio shows missed football, that's about it.
The purpose of 4 preseason games is to make money for the owners by requiring season ticket holders to shell out money for 10 games instead of 8. When the lockout was looking to threaten the preseason, it was estimated that the owners collectively make $800m in revenues from the preseason. The owners won't stand for the reduction in season ticket prices that would come with changing 10 game packages to 8 or 9. 16 game regular seasons already inflict enough of a toll on the players that expanding to 18 isn't going to happen. In order to do that, you'd probably have to expand the rosters by another 10-12 spaces. That would give you room for more backups who would play more regularly, plus let you have special teams units which are largely dedicated to playing special teams instead of making offensive and defensive players do double duty.
Finally??? No one missed any football... So it can't "finally" be back.
It's called Texas/OU weekend, sir.
Imagine that, a lukewarm iffy sports opinion from RW.
That was so awesome...saw it on the sportycenter yesterday morn..giggled.
I can't wait for September: FOOTBALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and the Sox winning. Rangers=Believe in Warsh. Yankee's-Suck. Cowboys-Come on, anything but 10-6 is unnacceptable Patriots-Window Closing? Please, just 1 more and I'll quit being a greedy former New Englander!
Agree completely. Nothing different from last season. Romo is incapable and this year will prove that once and for all. And again, the purpose of FOUR preseason games is what????
Back from a week long vacay and after going through last weeks posts...I didn't miss a damn thing from the Midget's reporting. There was some great commenting on whitt's end though. A lot of them had me laughing. This week should be great. Trades going on in the NFL, trades going on in MLB. I hope we see both Heath Bell and Nnamdi Asomugha ride into town soon. My DISQUS does not appear to be working.
RW, last weeks post had you ragging on the owner's, and now the player's are moments from signing off on the contract. How did this happen? Did the player's cave, negotiations continued this weekend, or did the player's think it was fare? Your post did have a 50/50 shot.
should of had a truck tag also
Yea football.........I guess. In other news NASCAR............(face palm)........................really????? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J74y88YuSJ8
Football. meh. The Rangers are leading the AL West with 60 games left.
Buckle up? For the biggest names being Free and Bowen? Don't think I'll need a seatbelt (let alone air bag) for this snoozefest. Wake me up when the first cool front rolls through and the Cowboys are 1-4 already.
Cam is probably pissed. He won't get a pay raise from what he was making at Auburn.
Meh. Is it OU weekend yet? If not, STFU about football.
Wake me in September. The free agency clusterfuck will be interesting, beyond that I'm all in on baseball trade talks and all things Rangers. Good points about Garrett and Romo...
Finally this is the holding book. The big agency weep is. Our nightmare culminate for use whose. Port somnambulate! All we declare. More football. Praiseworthy more our giant 41.