Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me as many times as David Buehler has fooled the Cowboys and we don't even know where to start with assigning shame.
We might not have to worry about it for much longer. Getting a jump start on their New Year's resolution to stop providing safe haven to underperforming placekickers, the Cowboys signed veteran kicker Kris Brown on Thursday. Brown, the former Texan who kicked for the Chargers earlier this season, has a two-year deal.
That tells you that there is going to be a kicking competition in Dallas during the offseason, but the Cowboys aren't simply looking at this as a long-term play. The team plans to watch each of the kickers in practice on Friday and Saturday before deciding which of them will kick field goals and extra points during Sunday's game. Buehler will kick off either way, but his missed extra point against the Cardinals might have been his last scoring try.
It's a very good sign for the Cowboys. Jerry Jones has talked a lot about how upset he is about this season, but words with no action behind them are meaningless. While changing a kicker seems like a very small nod in the direction of change, Buehler isn't any ordinary kicker.
Buehler is built like a regular player and has athletic ability that puts him well above the average kicker, two reasons why Double J was supremely pleased with himself for grabbing him in the 2009 Draft. It didn't much matter that Buehler couldn't hit a field goal, because he could run fast and lift a lot of weight.
That's ridiculous, of course, but it has been life under Jones for most of his tenure as owner. If this is an isolated move, it's still smart but it would be a bit disappointing because this should just be the canary in the coalmine for an offseason of real change in Dallas.
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