FanHouse Tom Cable

The best NFL news on Wednesday was that Brian Westbrook will not play this week. He may be your starting running back in your fantasy league, but the Philadelphia Eagles' all-time leader from scrimmage with 9,711 yards also is a man who is recuperating from two concussions in 20 days.

Right now, Westbrook is not just an NFL star. He is a medical patient.

Thankfully, everyone realizes it's time to focus on Westbrook's health and future well-being, and not how he can help move the chains for the Eagles' offense.

It's been a rough season for the Oakland Raiders. Not only is the team as bad as, well, usual, but head coach Tom Cable has found himself stuck in a controversy himself.

After he was cleared of any criminal charges after an assistant coach accused him of assault, an ex-wife and ex-girlfriend accused Cable of physical abuse. It appears Cable is going to catch another break on this latest issue.

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When an NFL player attacks an opponent with a dangerous, helmet-to-helmet hit, he is suspended immediately for a game or more. When Oakland Raiders coach Tom Cable acknowledges having struck his first wife -- this as two other romantic partners allege that he physically abused them, this after a Raiders assistant coach accused Cable of breaking his jaw and threatening to kill him during a training-camp confrontation -- well, I'm wondering where the NFL commissioner is right now.

Urgency has been the signature of Roger Goodell's tenure as it comes to violence and personal conduct. A violation occurs, he's on it at once, and next thing you know, Sheriff Roger is announcing another suspension. It has been the most important stance taken by a sports commissioner here in the new millennium, but just the same, Goodell must be as quick to act on a coach as he is a player. In the case of Cable, who at the least has serious anger issues and appears to have an ugly history of battering women and bullying men, it's hard for me to believe he'll be allowed to coach another week in America's most visible, successful league. The NFL says it is investigating Cable and his past, but Goodell already has the proof required for at least an indefinite suspension:

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As the NFL continues its investigation into Tom Cable's past and his incident with former Oakland assistant Randy Hanson, the situation in Oakland has become tenuous at best.

It might get messier still. Yahoo's Jason Cole, citing a source familiar with the case, reported that the Raiders plan to cooperate with the NFL's investigation of Cable because "Oakland owner Al Davis is hoping to gather enough information to fire Cable with cause at the end of the season so that Davis doesn't have to pay Cable."

Cable, who went 4-8 as Oakland's interim head coach last season, was officially named head coach in the offseason and given a two-year contract with two additional option years.

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Tom Cable has been, pun intended, cooling off this week. He shouldn't have been no matter this being his Raiders' bye week on the NFL schedule.

Instead, Cable should've been in New York at a particular building on Park Avenue sweating in the most magnificent office in the joint -- the NFL commissioner's suite. He should've been there explaining to NFL boss Roger Goodell exactly how his assistant Randy Hanson wound up with a broken jaw after a team meeting last August that a district attorney concluded was the result of "some type of physical contact that happened between Mr. Cable and Mr. Hanson when [Hanson] went down." And he should've been explaining how police wound up asking him about a woman who wound up being thrown out of his home last January.

In case you hadn't noticed, sports these days are all about Goliath. In 2009, the Steelers, Lakers, North Carolina Tar Heels and now the Yankees have all won titles in their respective sports. Cinderella is yesterday's news. The teams that win these days are the teams that always win, and if you think that's boring, well, tough. You can kiss one of Derek Jeter's five World Series rings.

So with that in mind, we need to be really careful about overlooking the Dallas Cowboys.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. All you ever hear about the Cowboys is what's wrong with them. Terrell Owens was a pain. Roy Williams is a loudmouth, too, and isn't good enough to replace T.O. Tony Romo's too concerned with his golf game and his high-wattage love life to ever attain his potential. The new stadium is ridiculous...

Running back Larry Johnson will not be in uniform Sunday at Jacksonville when the Kansas City Chiefs return from their bye and attempt to reverse the damage of a 1-6 start. That in itself is a small victory for a rebuilding Chiefs organization, which did its level best to severely punish a longtime problem player who crossed a line most agree constitutes conduct detrimental to the NFL.

And that disciplinary action -- a two-week suspension without pay imposed by Chiefs management, that was later arbitrated by the NFL Management Council, the NFL Players Association, Johnson and the Chiefs to return a week's salary to Johnson -- was neither endorsed nor encouraged by the league office, multiple NFL sources said.

Rather, the NFL told the Chiefs they should avoid issuing a suspension (and encountering the subsequent hearing, NFLPA involvement, settlement, etc.), and simply fine Johnson $10,000.

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An ex-wife and an ex-girlfriend of Oakland Raiders coach Tom Cable have claimed that he physically abused them during their relationships, an ESPN Outside the Lines report detailed Sunday.

The ESPN report features both Cable's first wife and his recent ex-girlfriend saying Cable exhibited a pattern of abusive behavior, including punching them.

ESPN also reports that Cable's second wife, Glenda Cable, said in their divorce proceedings that he was physically abusive. Glenda, however, declined to be interviewed by ESPN and recanted her claims of physical abuse in a statement issued through her attorney.

NFL Coaches Fight Club: the Tournament. Because we have nothing better to do than predict what might happen if head coaches started punching each other in the face.

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NFL Coaches Fight Club: the Tournament. Because we have nothing better to do than predict what might happen if head coaches started punching each other in the face.

As Round 1 of our single-elimination fight tournament involving NFL coaches nears its end, let us recap the action we've seen so far. To view the entire bracket or learn what we're talking about, kindly click on the links below.

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