Projo Sports Blog

There's never a shortage of unintelligent acts in any given week of the football season, and in this new Friday feature, we will try to provide a roundup of the dumbest behavior that we have seen or read about -- on and off the field. So without further ado, here is today's list, in order of dumb-ness.

1. DeSean Jackson, Eagles: The speedy rookie channeled Leon Lett on Monday night, sprinting out ahead of the Cowboys secondary and hauling in a Donovan McNabb pass, then tossing the ball in celebration before he actually reached the end zone. The dumb decision turned what should have been a 61-yard touchdown catch into just a simple 60-yard gain -- thanks to the fact that, in another dumb act, no Cowboys player thought to cover the ball. Fortunately for Jackson, his play didn't cost the Eagles, because Brian Westbrook scored on a 1-yard touchdown run on the next play, but it got fantasy football owners of McNabb and Jackson up in arms. Jackson does deserve extra points for stupidity since as a high school senior, playing in a California all-star game, he did a swan dive on a breakaway run, came up short of the end zone and was penalized for unsportsmanlike conduct:

2. Chris Cooley, Redskins: The veteran tight end posted a photo on his personal web site of himself studying a page from the team's playbook, then later said he was unaware that he was naked in the photo. The gaffe resulted in a dramatic increase in popularity for the Cooley Zone web site, at least until the photo was taken down and an apology posted. (Check out the video that's there now -- nice that Cooley is continuing to have a sense of humor about all of this.) Head coach Jim Zorn addressed the Cooley issue at a team meeting this week. Zorn -- football coach that he is -- was not concerned about the nudity, but instead about the possibility that Cooley might somehow be revealing secret team material.

3. Elbert Mack, Buccaneers: Two games into his NFL career, this rookie cornerback has already been suspended for twice violating the league's player safety rules. First Mack was fined $5,000 for unnecessary roughness in a preseason game against Texas. Then, last week against the Falcons, Mack launched himself into quarterback Matt Ryan and made helmet-to-helmet contact. The play resulted in NFL commissioner Roger Goodell taking time to emphasize that dangerous play by anyone will not be tolerated. Quite a way to make a mark in your second game as a pro.

4. Joey Porter, Dolphins: He said it shouldn't be too hard for a team that has lost 20 of its last 21 regular-season games (the Dolphins) to beat a team that has won its last 21 consecutive regular-season games, and on the road. This only ranks fourth because we're talking about Joey Porter, and it's pretty much in character.

5. Michael Clayton, Buccaneers: That's two for Tampa. Clayton's offense? With teammate Joey Galloway injured and unlikely to play this weekend in Chicago, Clayton pretty much declared himself the starter. You can imagine how Bill Belichick would respond to such an act, and Jon Gruden didn't take it much better, saying: "A couple players have already spoken that [Galloway is] not going [to play], but I'll make that decision, OK? I'll decide who starts, too. As long as I have the title here as head coach, I'll do that."

 Tags  Chris Cooley DeSean Jackson Elbert Mack Joey Porter Michael Clayton NFL stupidity

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