Welcome to the first official guest post in the history of BountyBowl! We’ve been flying solo here for a few months, but extreme circumstances merit extreme measures (insasmuch as a guest post is extreme). A good buddy had the opportunity to be the guest of the Dallas Cowboys at the Linc this past Sunday night. For professional reasons, he kept his Eagles-related feelings in check, but it sure sounds like he had a pretty killer time. And although we may have uncharitable things to say about the Cowboys on the field, he insisted that the folks he met from the organization were absolute class up and down — a view I can certainly second after meeting the guys on Monday. Let’s call it a friendly rivalry and leave it at that!

Definitely some good stuff in the notes after the jump, especially the story about the “blind dates” that showed up their section. Ahem! The details:

• Police escort caravan for team buses from hotel to the Linc.
• Tailgating fans giving the finger as the buses roll into the parking lot (Cowboys folks seemed to expect this).
• Press pass - met the Dallas radio team of Brad Sham and Babe Laufenberg, and Victor Villalba who does the Spanish-language radio broadcast for Los Vaqueros de Dallas.
• In the press cafeteria saw John Madden, Dat Nguyen (Cowboys assistant coach), David Aldridge and Howard Eskin.
• Pregame field pass, got to stand in the endzone as players are coming out and warming up. T.O. has shiny shoes.
  Introduced to Jerry Jones. Converse about NFL Network and the cable companies, ad:tech, how he thinks Marcus Spears would be so much better minus 15 pounds (as he walks by), and how Roy Williams is freakin awesome (as he jogs by).
• Introduced to Jerry Jones Jr and sister Charlotte Jones.
• Beautiful night for football!
• As full teams come out for final stretches and warmups, stand in Cowboys bench area. Meet and have a conversation with Calvin Hill (Former Cowboys star, Grant Hill’s dad).
• Make our way to Lower-level seats on 40-yard line.
• First play from scrimmage not so good for Donovan, game does not go well for Eagles but my Cowboys hosts are pretty fired up
• Halftime - back to press cafeteria… on the way up meet two Louisiana hotties who are guests of Ryan Moats. They sit down and eat with Moats in the cafeteria
• 3rd quarter hang out in the Dallas radio booths (English then Spanish). It’s amazing how manual everything is… the Spotter points to a team lineup card on every play, the statistician constantly erasing and updating a whiteboard with MatchTracker-type stats. Spanish booth is a lot more energetic (of course). Meet the QB for Georgetown who’s guest color commentator for the Spanish broadcast.
• 5 minutes left in the 3rd quarter and the Linc is emptying out in a hurry.
• Leave at the beginning of the 4th quarter. Ride the elevator down with Darren Daulton.
• What struck me most was the professionalism and confident, winning attitude of the entire Cowboys organization. First-class all the way. And it didn’t even come close to bordering on arrogance.

Unusual side-story: Father & son sitting directly to my left during the game. Son is probably about 20-21 years old. Midway through the first quarter they are joined by two 22-year old girls. 4 people for two seats (though we were standing for the whole first half). Usher tells them to sort it out. Father convinces usher to let “his son’s girlfriend” stay. She’s pretty talkative to me and one of the Cowboys guys - though she can’t remember our names (asks us 5+ times). Almost like she’s on some drugs. I ask her and the son where they’re from. He’s from Oreland. She’s from the Poconos. “You’re from the Poconos?” the son asks. “Well my parents are. I live in Manayunk,” she answers. OK kinda weird that the guy doesn’t know where his girlfriend lives. She is all banged up and they are crowding 4 people into two seats (with a young Asian girl hanging with his dad). Conferring with my Cowboys host at halftime, yup, we’re pretty sure they are escorts.

Only in Philly.