Dallas Cowboys

Dez Bryant tweets directly at Skip Bayless over Cowboys comments, and Skip responds

Published Nov. 15, 2016 1:57 p.m. ET

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Andrew Lynch

By his own admission, Skip Bayless used to be the biggest Dez Bryant fan in the world. These days, however, the "Undisputed" host is more likely to express his disappointment in the Dallas Cowboys wide receiver — which has Bryant defending himself on Twitter.

The conversation started on Wednesday, when Skip made the point that these Cowboys are better without this uncommitted version of Bryant:

When a fan brought that opinion to Bryant's attention, he had some thoughts he wanted to share:

On Thursday, Skip responded to the response:

I have two big reactions, so you're just going to have to give me a moment to express myself. I believe what I said on yesterday's show stung Dez Bryant, maybe even hit a nerve. At least, I hope it hit a nerve. And it compelled him to lash back at me and make it personal, make it about me, instead of about Dez. That disappointed me. But I'm going to reiterate what I said yesterday: in 2014, you could not have found a bigger Dez Bryant fan than this guy sitting in this chair. ... But we all know that in the opener this year, he dropped a touchdown pass in a game that ended up 20-19 Giants in Jerry World.

Then came the ESPN report that Dez had missed up to 40 meetings in his career -- had missed them, or been late to them, or missed injury treatments, and obviously, he hurt his knee, he went AWOL for what, about three days? And they couldn't find him, didn't hear from him. And I was very disappointed in that because obviously Dez Bryant had been spoiled rotten and allowed to get away with this for years on end by his owner Jerry Jones.

So I thought it was the greatest thing that could have happened to Dez Bryant that the Cowboys went to San Francisco and won without him, came home and beat Cincinnati without him, and showed Dez Bryant, I hoped, that the new Cowboys don't have to revolve around the old Dez Bryant. The new Cowboys need a new Dez Bryant, one who's recommitted to showing up on-time to meetings, like Shannon Sharpe always showed up on time for. And recommitting to the whole process about being about team, instead of being about Dez. And I'm hoping Dez can sort of wise up, shape up, and grow up, and see what's been happening without him and want to be part of what can happen to an even greater extent with him.

Skip went on to address his Cowboys fandom -- which he noted was irrelevant to the conversation -- before Shannon Sharpe gave a player's perspective:

I just can't understand why whatever you say about him bothers him so much, because it appears to me that any rational, sane person that can react the way he does to whatever tweet you say about him, there has to be some truth or validity to it. ... Now I'm with Dez. If you can't play because of the knee, it's too painful, I'm with that. But you responding to Skip, I don't see the point. I don't see the purpose. 

Skip had an answer:

What Dez, to me, was saying in those tweets ... he's basically saying, "Hey, Skip. If you're really a Cowboys fan, you'd give me a pass! You'd look the other way! How could you criticize me? Are you a fan or not a fan?"  

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