Not So Fast On Adrian Peterson To Dallas

Over the past couple of weeks in the Adrian Peterson saga, one of the things that has been rumored more than once is Peterson wanting to play for a team in his home state of Texas. . .and, more specifically, for the Dallas Cowboys. Whether those rumors are true or not has been the source of a great deal of speculation.

However, recent events may have rendered them completely moot.

The past few days have brought about rumors of a video tape of Cowboys' wide receiver Dez Bryant in an incident that is. . .and this is the direct quote. . ."five times worse" than the video of former Baltimore Ravens' running back Ray Rice. Rice, if you'll recall, punched his then-fiancee in the face so hard that it rendered her unconscious, and he had to literally drag her from the elevator in the hotel the incident took place in.

I'm sort of scared to find out what's "five times worse" than that.

ESPN NFL Insider Adam Schefter confirmed the existence of said video in an interview with a Dallas radio station on Wednesday morning, and said he's been working on this story "since September." Now, this leads me to a few questions.

First of all, if this has been a known issue "since September," how in the sweet blue hell was Dez Bryant allowed to play for the Cowboys all season long without so much as a hiccup? Seriously, if Adam Schefter knew about the existence of this video, I'd be willing to bet one crisp internet dollar that someone in the league office knew about it, too.

Second of all, if this whole thing with Dez Bryant does in fact turn out to be much worse than the Ray Rice incident. . .are the Dallas Cowboys really in a position to bring in Adrian Peterson, who is coming off a season where he missed fifteen of sixteen games because of an incident of violence? I mean, I know that the Cowboys are still owned by Jerry Jones, and that Jones (and a few other owners) appear to operate under a different set of rules than the majority of NFL owners do, but really. . .come on.

Of course, if this turns out to be true, pending the outcome of Adrian Peterson's appeal, the Cowboys might not even wait that long. The Cowboys were rumored to be interested in using the franchise player tag on Bryant, but if that's no longer an option, they could turn around and use it on the NFL's leading rusher from this past season, DeMarco Murray. In that case, there's no chance the Cowboys would be interested in Peterson's service.

In any event, the Dez Bryant incident could wind up being very bad news for Peterson. . .if, in fact, he wants to make his way to Dallas somehow. And in any case, it appears that the Peterson camp may have lost a pretty significant bit of leverage in his ongoing saga with the Minnesota Vikings.