Photo by Joe Camporeale—USA TODAY Sports
Watching the NFL cannibalize itself gives you conflicting feelings. We're predisposed to picking good guys and bad guys in any narrative, but when you have Jerry Jones going toe-to-toe with Roger Goodell, the only satisfactory result would be them simultaneously devouring the other whole, like two snakes successfully eating the other's tail.ESPN's Outside the Lines just came out with an article about their escalating feud, depicting a fly-on-the-wall scene we all surely would have liked to witness between wincing eyelids: Jerry Jones on the phone with Goodell back in August, when Goodell told Jones about Ezekiel Elliott's six-game suspension.Apparently, after Goodell said his piece, there was a long silence, until Jones invoked his fellow owner Robert Kraft and his reaction to the Deflategate scandal.
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So on one hand we have Goodell, the death-and-concussion-ignoring NFL oligarch, exerting his undue supreme authority over the league to suspend Elliott for domestic violence claims. And on the other, we have a protest-busting oil baron who many owners consider to be the NFL's rainmaker. And both of them are struggling to hold on to their authority.Now set their feud to the backdrop of an NFL where people are blaming poor ratings and stadium attendance on whatever hot-button conservative political gripe is closest to hand. And voila! We've got a bunch of foot-stamping old white men, grappling for power on a sinking ship.Seems fitting, then, that this dick-measuring contest would feature Jones calling another owner a "pussy" while threatening Goodell. And now that Elliott has decided to accept his suspension and drop his court case, you can only imagine what threats and potty words Jones has been saving for Goodell. Stay tuned."I'm gonna come after you with everything I have," Jones said. Then he mentioned Deflategate. "If you think Bob Kraft came after you hard, Bob Kraft is a pussy compared to what I'm going to do."