NFL Films released some audio on Monday that shows Dez Bryant was being positive at one point when he erupted on the sidelines in the third quarter of the Dallas Cowboys’ 31-30 loss to the Detroit Lions on Sunday.
I characterized Bryant’s sideline behavior when he got in the face of Tony Romo and his coaches as a “meltdown” and said he was “flipping out on everyone on the Dallas Cowboys sideline.”
Dez defended himself after the game saying he was just showing his passion and that he wasn’t going to change. His teammates and coaches backed him up.
The video from the NFL, which you can see here, seems to be edited and shows that Bryant was getting really animated over what kind of routes to run and how to best attack the Lions defense. It also shows Bryant was being positive to Romo at one point.
“We good on that, Tony!” Bryant yelled to Romo. “We the best in the NFL on that. We the best in the NFL!”
It was wrong to assume based on the visual that Bryant flipped out on everyone when he might not have. But the video shows he did have an emotional meltdown when he obviously spiked his helmet in anger/frustration and appeared to give Romo a look of disgust at first.
Unfortunately, this video is edited and doesn’t appear to show everything. It still looks to me like Dez was pissed off at Romo at first.
I also want to hear audio from the sidelines of what Dez did after the Lions scored that led to Jason Witten getting in his face. I don’t think NFL Films has that, but it sounds like Dez threw a fit over his team giving up the lead, and Witten was just trying to get him to focus on the rest of the game. It was Dez’s behavior at the end of the game that led to me calling him an “I guy.” My point was EVERYONE on the team was upset about them blowing the lead but he was the one who seemed to act out the most. I didn’t call him an “I guy” for his thing with Romo because at that point we didn’t know what he was ranting about.
This also brings up another point. Just like it’s wrong of me and others to make assumptions based on a video, it’s wrong of TV networks to show footage of sideline behavior without the accompanying audio. As we have learned, the power of visuals is very strong and can influence the perception of many. The millions of viewers watching the games only know as much as what we’re shown. If that isn’t shown on TV, nobody knows that anything even went on and we don’t have a chance to jump to poor conclusions.
