You know, I worked with RJ for a couple of years, and we didn’t always agree (which is fine), but I think this is just shameless. In the discussion that followed the tweet on his timeline, even Mike Fisher got into it:
And RJ’s response to that - and every other reply - was backtracking his original statement, saying DAL wasn’t wrong for doing it, just selfish.
This was brought up at the time, before and during the game, not just after Cooper was hurt in the game, and it’s the same thing it was then. It’s not selfish to play a player. He was healthy and ready to go. It’s like asking a chef to cook, or a truck driver to drive, it’s just their job. No more, no less. Cooper was paid amply for his time in that game, and wasn’t asked to do anything he wasn’t asked to do the week before.
Was it a meaningless game? That depends. There was no hope of playoffs or Super Bowl contention as a result of that game, but it was a football game nonetheless. The NFL is about playing football, Super Bowls are just a formality (they make less money for each player and for the team, and only happen once per year).
This notion that teams somehow owe their players is ludicrous. It’s a business. Their product is games and players play them. Simple as that. Setting aside the extremely click-bait bullshit RJ threw out there, he’s just wrong in calling it selfish. It was normal, standard, typical, usual. To single that out as “selfish” is to say something other than the routine was followed.