Saturday Night Football: Dallas Cowboys v. New York Jets

I have one friend who is a Cowboys fan. I've known him since I was 13 years old. Every football season, we have the same "This is the year Dallas wins the Super Bowl" conversation. It doesn't matter how flaccid the defense is or how dumb Dave Campo is or how broken the offensive line is, every year brings the same optimism, and every year they finish below this outlandish mark.

This year was especially sad for him because they actually could have made the Super Bowl. They brought back the same team as last year, but better, that got knocked out of the playoffs because Dez Bryant reached for the pylon and the ball moved.

Yet, this was especially fun, fun, fun, for me. For the majority of my life, the Texans were really bad. Therefore, most of my football season after Week 6 was spent watching the Cowboys lose on FOX and warming my heart with hate.

This season was even better than most seasons because of how long Dallas fans held onto their hope while being a complete abomination. If the team was just terrible, they could ignore it and wait for the draft, but they couldn't because they were terrible and still in the playoff hunt.

They were 2-0 before Tony Romo broke his collarbone. Then they were forced to watch and root for Brandon Weeden and hope he could win two games until Romo got back. Weeden lost every one of his starts. Then they tried to put out a grease fire with water by bringing in Matt Cassel. He lost every one of his starts. With these two they lost seven games in a row, but they still had a chance because Romo was back.

On Thanksgiving night, they lost game number eight to the Carolina Panthers, and Tony Romo broke his collarbone again. It was like the 90th time this has happened. But they still had a chance to make the playoffs because of how bad the NFC East is. The next week, they beat the Redskins with Matt Cassel on Monday Night Football and moved a game back of first place. The circle of desperation became complete.

But now after losing to the the Packers behind Cassel's 99 passing yards, their season is officially over. Dallas is two games back of the rest of the NFC East. My friend can now move on and go back to watching Zach Efron movies with his girlfriend. This sadness will last until next summer when he'll utter "Super Bowl" randomly every chance he gets.

Anyways, the Dallas Cowboys (4-9) are playing the New York Jets (8-5) on Thursday Night Football on Saturday night.

Here's your open thread for it. Enjoy the game while you do whatever it is that you do.

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