Texas NFL Capsules: Obama to appear in PSA with 3 NFL players, including Cowboys' Ware
NEW YORK — Dallas Cowboys linebacker DeMarcus Ware has played in dozens of important games and hung out with some of the biggest stars in sports.
Still, he was nervous when he met President Barack Obama.
"It’s something like no other," Ware said Thursday. "Being able to meet the most important guy in the United States, the guy with the most power, it was unbelievable."
Ware and fellow NFL players Drew Brees and Troy Polamalu filmed a public service announcement with Obama that will air during the league’s Thanksgiving games.
The 90-second spot shows Obama and the NFL stars playing touch football with local children on the White House lawn. The PSA promotes the league’s Play 60 campaign, which encourages physical activity to combat childhood obesity, and the president’s community service initiative United We Serve.
"Thanksgiving is a time when families come together, and it is also a perfect time to focus on the importance of keeping kids healthy and active," New Orleans quarterback Brees said in a statement released by the league. "I was honored to spend time with the president on an issue that is clearly important to him. I was also impressed by his wide receiver skills."
Obama wears a Chicago Bears jacket as he plays football with Brees, Pittsburgh Steelers safety Polamalu and Ware. A shorter version of the spot will air throughout the season.
"I was like ‘Ohhhh my God,"’ when Obama came out in a Bears pullover, Ware said in a telephone interview. "It was me, Polamalu and Drew Brees there, so you know how we feel about the Chicago Bears. But he’s a big Chicago Bears fan. He greeted each one of us, and he knew everything about our teams."
Ware is Dallas’ representative for the Play 60 program, which began in 2007. The NFL estimates it has committed $200 million worth of programming, grants, and time for PSAs to the initiative.
"I think it’s really important," Ware said. "If the players are getting involved in it, Obama, a lot of important people getting involved in it, sometimes it encourages kids to get out and do those type of activities and show them just how important it is."
Highway bridge to reopen near new Cowboys Stadium
ARLINGTON — A major highway bridge reopens Monday near traffic-heavy Cowboys Stadium in Arlington.
The opening comes in time for the Dallas Cowboys to host their Thanksgiving matchup with Oakland.
The rebuilt Collins Street bridge over Interstate 30 has been closed for five months as part of a $166 freeway makeover, causing some detours for drivers heading to Cowboys games.
The Texas Transportation Department says the opening means drivers will no longer face a nearly half-mile circular detour. The agency says the area will remain a work zone as other improvements are made to roadways near the new $1.2 billion stadium.
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For a punter, Redskins' Smith having quite a year
ASHBURN, Va. — For a punter, Hunter Smith is getting a lot of attention.
First, his position coach claimed with a straight face during training camp that Smith might be the best holder in the history of the NFL. Then Smith showed up at practice one day wearing strange, seamless burgundy and gold shoes, a can't-miss moment for TV cameras.
In the Washington Redskins season opener he scored a touchdown, running 8 yards on a fake field goal.
Then he got hurt. Twice. The pulled groin in his kicking leg forced the Redskins to use three other punters over a five-game span. Smith was nearly placed on the season-ending injured reserve list.
Then came the biggest moment yet. On Sunday, during a wacky fake field goal sequence, Smith uncorked a 35-yard touchdown pass to Mike Sellers to turn the tide in a 27-17 win over Denver that snapped a four-game losing streak.
"Generally the only time we generate news is when we don't punt well, and the news is that we've lost our job," Smith said Thursday. "If you have to sit out and cause your team that sort of roster problems with an injury, you'd like to come back and be worth your weight."
Smith was chosen as the NFC special teams player of the week. He is the first specialist in NFL history to run and pass for a touchdown in the same season.
Seems he was worth all the trouble he caused.
"It makes it difficult to put a guy down, to release a guy, to bring a guy back, to have two punters on the roster at the same time, all of that logistical thing," coach Jim Zorn said. "But the thing that we came out with was very positive results, with the punters that we used and then Hunter being able to make it back. That couldn't have been a better story."
The fake field goal looked silly watching it live, but it was a stroke of well-designed genius from special teams coach Danny Smith. Even though the Redskins had advertised the fake and even sent a man in motion, the Broncos didn't notice Sellers slip out to the left while Smith and everyone else rolled right.
Smith was recruited as a quarterback by Notre Dame and was the emergency third-string quarterback for many of his 10 years with the Indianapolis Colts, so he was able to throw a downfield spiral with no problem.
"It's one of those you knew is going to be a touchdown or nothing," Smith said. "At that point in the game, we were willing to take that risk. I really wasn't nervous about it not working. I just had a feeling. Who thinks that I'm going to throw that pass? Who thinks that I'm going to roll out and actually throw it and not punt it or something? They certainly didn't."
Until this season, most of the noise from Hunter has come during the offseason, when he's making music with his Christian rock band Connersvine. He and a friend have been writing songs and performing during NFL offseasons for the better part of the decade and have recorded a CD. The band's name came about when a youth pastor brought some cherry tomatoes that his son had grown and asked the people at church: "Does anybody want these — they're straight off of Conner's vine."
Fronting the band makes Smith well versed in the challenges of balancing faith with the NFL lifestyle.
"I don't think professional athletes have it harder because of the temptations of being here than anybody else," Smith said. "It's hard to be a Christian, no matter what. If you are a professional football player, if you are an electrician, if you are a contractor, if you are a lawyer, if you are a plumber, it is hard to be a Christian."
Zorn needed to have some football faith in Smith to have the punter return after the second groin injury. It wasn't until Saturday that the latest fill-in was released and the coaching staff was convinced that Smith could indeed last the season.
Now he needs to keep the groin from flaring up again, and that means scaling back in practice.
"We're not going out there and kicking my leg off, but I'm trying to get better and get my skills sharp at the same time," Smith said. "It's a fine balance."
In 2001, the Redskins were 0-5 and losing to Carolina when LaVar Arrington ran back an interception for a touchdown, a play credited with igniting a five-game winning streak. Could Smith's trick TD play start a similar turnaround?
"I certainly would love it if that were the case," he said. "This is legitimately a very talented football team, and there are crazier things that happen. The year that we won the Super Bowl in Indianapolis, nobody remembers this — we were not very good. We had all kinds of problems, and nobody believed in us. But we did, and it worked."
-- Joseph White
Clinton Portis ruled out for Redskins vs Dallas
ASHBURN, Va. — Washington Redskins running back Clinton Portis will miss his second straight game as he recovers from a concussion.
Coach Jim Zorn on Thursday ruled Portis out for Sunday’s game at Dallas.
Portis has not been able to practice since he was injured in a helmet-to-helmet hit against Atlanta.
Ladell Betts is set to start for Portis for the second consecutive week.
Zorn says defensive tackle Albert Haynesworth remains a game-time decision with a sprained left ankle. The coach says Haynesworth is "coming along" and that the ankle’s swelling is starting to go down.
