Attention Deficit Disorder

When Dez Bryant took off his helmet and argued with the referee during the Cowboys' 27-23 win over the Minnesota Vikings, Yours Truly simply couldn't believe his eyes.

Because taking off your helmet on the field of play would automatically result in a 15-yard unsportsmanlike penalty (or the so-called "Emmitt Smith" rule), and it did take the Cowboys out of the field goal range.

It reminds Yours Truly of fellow Cowboys Tyron Smith's holding penalty with just a minute left to play against the Detroit Lions, which stopped the clock and gave the timeout-less Lions the chance to mount an improbable 31-30 victory.

These incidents make Yours Truly wonder whether Cowboys' coach Jason Garrett preaches attention to detail in his practices.

These two penalties simply should have never happened, with the holding penalty on Smith particularly inexcusable. It happened on a third-down running play with just a minute to go. The Cowboys were trying to milk the clock and for some reason, Smith decided to hold a Detroit Lion on a play that ended up short of the first-down anyway. Instead of bleeding the clock down to 20 seconds or so, the clock stopped and the Lions, who were out of timeouts, were gifted a valuable extra 30 seconds and snatched victory from the Cowboys' firm grasp.

Did Garrett tell his players that if you want to milk the clock, no one should never ever commit any penalty? Or taking off your helmet will result in an unsportsmanlike penalty?

Yours Truly remembers an article about the meticulous Bill Belichick and his New England Patriots a while ago, on his situational practice sessions. He would bark to a player, "Offense, fumble on the sideline," and then the player will know that he should try to knock the ball out of bounds, thus maintaining possession for the offense. If Belichick yells, "Defense, fumble on the sideline," then that player will try to recover the ball while staying in bounds, that would result in a change of possession.

Not surprisingly, the Patriots rarely commit amateurish mistakes like the Cowboys do and have several Super Bowl rings to show for it.

Attention to details is a trait that will make sure that one will always do the right thing at the right time. Without that, the only thing that can be assured of is that one will hardly have any success whatsoever.