Thursday, September 28, 2006

T.O. : Suicide or Searching for Sympathy?


The soap opera called “The Life and Times of Terrell Owens” is on again. This time, T.O. claims to have attempted suicide. No wait, check that, he claimed to have over dosed on pain killers. Nope, hold the presses, it was an allergic reaction.

Terrell Owens has proven a few things over his NFL career. First, there is no question he’s an amazing receiver. Second, he loves one person and one person alone: Terrell Owens. Third, and perhaps foremost, he loves only one thing more than Terrell Owens: that is the attention that the media provides the star-studded receiver.

Owens came to Philly with some demand, as he is an extremely talented receiver. Still, many teams shied away from him because of his off-the-field antics that served as a distraction for his first team, the San Francisco 49ers. He brought both the talent and the controversy to Philly, with his talent elevating the level of play to Super Bowl caliber but then dividing and destroying a team that was on the cusp of greatness for years.

T.O found much less demand this year, after Philly refused to work with him any longer. Only two teams would even consider taking the ultra-talented receiver, and he wound up going to Bill Parcels-led Dallas, where there was certainly the talent around him to show off his incredible skills. One problem, though: Bill Parcels is all about team, and will never let an individual’s antics overshadow the team.

During the off-season, Owens was a distraction with his phantom hamstring injury that remarkably healed when Parcels moved from public criticism to docking his paycheck. During the first game, T.O. played really well, and looked like a serious asset for Dallas. The only problem was that the media hardly focused on Owens. So we knew there would be problems.

Week 2, Owens breaks a finger during the game, but stays in the game, dropping a ton of passes and looking not-so-good. You can see the shock on his face in the press conferences when the questions are asked about his perhaps selfishness in playing as opposed to his courage in playing through the injury. He focuses on his remarkable healing skills, and how he’ll be back ahead of schedule.

During the bye week, it must have been ultimate frustration to Owens to have Parcels deflect questions about the receiver, just indicating that he is healing nicely, and going no farther. I can imagine him now trying to figure out how to drag the spotlight back over to camp Owens. Well, he found a way.

It’s no surprise that Owens was depressed, since no one was talking about him. He probably thought that the suicide angle would give him lots of publicity, until he realized that NFL rules would prohibit him from playing until he had a complete psychological analysis and was cleared by a shrink. Then it’s an OD, but oh no, drug policies prohibit that. So it’s an allergic reaction.

You bet it’s an allergic reaction: T.O. is allergic to being out of the spotlight. Any time the attention isn’t focused on him, he does whatever he has to do to pull the spotlight back in his direction, and later lets the people who work for him pick up the pieces. So to everyone who has followed this story, you’ve just been played by Camp Owens. Me too. Maybe sooner or later I’ll wise up, and realize you can’t trust anything he says.

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Posted by Scottage at 10:38 AM / | |