Cowboys won't discipline 'Pacman' for scuffle

[October 10, 2008]  IRVING, Texas (AP) -- Troubled cornerback Adam "Pacman" Jones won't be disciplined by the Dallas Cowboys for a scuffle with his bodyguard that team owner Jerry Jones said resulted from joking banter that got out of hand and was quickly settled.

"They were literally kidding each other," Jerry Jones said Thursday. "They were jiving around ... and all of a sudden one of them starting saying some things, and here you go."

Dallas police were called to an upscale downtown hotel because of the disturbance late Tuesday night. No charges were filed.

While not planning any discipline for Adam Jones, Jerry Jones acknowledged that he was "very disappointed in that we're having to deal with this."

It remained unclear if the NFL planned any discipline.

Adam Jones was fully reinstated by commissioner Roger Goodell just before the season opener after being suspended for 17 months and missing the entire 2007 season because of numerous off-field problems. He has started all five games with the Cowboys.

Goodell said in a radio interview Thursday that the league was investigating the matter. He said he didn't speak with Adam Jones individually during a previously scheduled meeting with the entire Cowboys team following their practice Wednesday.

"I'm disappointed that we're even discussing this at this point in time," Goodell said on ESPN Radio. "But we'll have to wait for the facts."

Jerry Jones said he already had all the facts, but that the NFL as part of its own investigation was talking to Adam Jones and Tommy Jones, the bodyguard who is part of a security detail provided by the team to be with the player at all times.

"With the availability of the information that I have right now, we don't have club discipline in mind here," Jerry Jones said.

Adam Jones was arrested six times and involved in 12 incidents requiring police intervention from the time the Tennessee Titans drafted him in the first round in 2005 and sent him to Dallas in April to complete a long-discussed trade.

"Before he joined the Cowboys, he built up a reservoir of doubt," Jerry Jones said. "He had created with his actions no benefit of the doubt."

Because of that, Jerry Jones knew when Adam Jones came to Dallas that something "could possibly happen." The owner never anticipated a scuffle with one of his own security people.

"I did not dream that we would get in a situation where we had all the structure in place and literally have an incident that casts lightly with him publicly or with the league that would involve the very people that you're doing the structure with," Jerry Jones said.

Jerry Jones said the incident took part at a hotel where the player was attending a private party. There was alcohol served at the party, but Jones was told that the player's "conduct should not be interpreted as over drinking."

The owner called the incident an "aberration."

Coach Wade Phillips said Jones would play Sunday against the Arizona Cardinals. The coach talked to his players about the incident before they practiced Thursday.

"What I'm trying to do is get this team to focus on this game and the team that we are playing," Phillips said. "We're moving on in that direction."

Adam Jones wasn't in the locker room Thursday when it was open to reporters.

Nose tackle Tank Johnson, who brought his own checkered past to Dallas, said the incident was overblown and that it wouldn't distract the team.

"This is not that big of a deal," Johnson said. "Nobody's in jail, nobody's in trouble, nobody's hurt. We're all here ready to practice, ready to work."

An empty locker separates the cubicles of Jones and Johnson, who missed the first eight games last season while serving an NFL suspension for a series of off-field problems. Johnson doesn't think Goodell will take any punitive action against the cornerback.

Dallas police said officers responded to a disturbance about 11 p.m. Tuesday. Officers said the incident was over by the time they arrived and that some hotel employees reported overhearing a scuffle in the men's restroom in the lobby.

Jones and his bodyguard said everything was OK, and both were driven from the hotel by an acquaintance, police said. The bodyguard told police he didn't want to press charges.

Tennessee got a fourth-round pick in the April draft, and a sixth-rounder next year for Jones. The Cowboys could get back a fifth-rounder in 2009 if Jones is punished again.

"That doesn't affect us," Titans coach Jeff Fisher said Thursday. "We've moved on and that's their issue."

Jones was among the Titans' best defensive players for two years until Goodell suspended him before the 2007 season. The Titans distanced themselves from Jones and eventually traded him.

The highest-profile incident involving Jones was a shooting at a Las Vegas strip club that left one club employee paralyzed. Jones denied involvement in the shooting.

Jones has started two games in place of injured Pro Bowl cornerback Terence Newman, and the others when the team opened games with five defensive backs. Jones has 22 tackles with no interceptions.

Newman missed all the preseason and the season opener with groin injury, then returned for three games before missing Sunday against Cincinnati because of an abdominal strain. Newman is expected to miss Sunday's game at Arizona, and could miss more depending on the severity of the injury.

Pro Bowl safety Roy Williams, who missed the last three games with a fractured right forearm, was back at practice Wednesday but is not expected to play this week.

[Associated Press; By STEPHEN HAWKINS]

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