Butt fumble 2.0? Trayveon Williams coughs up the ball, Aldon Smith scoops, scores from 78 yards
By Keith Farner
Published:
Plenty of sports fans remember Mark Sanchez’ famous Butt Fumble on Thanksgiving, but Traveon Williams, the former Texas A&M running back turned Cincinnati Bengal, has joined the club.
Williams ran into a wall of offensive linemen and coughed up the ball. Former Missouri pass rusher Aldon Smith of the Dallas Cowboys swooped in to scoop up the ball and then returned it 78 yards for a touchdown.
Fumbles by Williams and teammate Giovani Bernard helped the Cowboys build an early 10-0 lead. The Bengals then turned to Samaje Perine to get some production out of the backfield.
For Smith, that was a game-changing play in a season that has been a remarkable return for him. He’s been out of the NFL for for four full seasons in a row because of NFL suspensions. The Cowboys gave him another shot and he is making the most of it, and he has to be enjoying Sunday’s game.
When he was reinstated in the offseason, Smith shared his perspective with the Cowboys’ team site.
Since he was drafted into the NFL back in 2011, Smith has been arrested numerous times – several of which were for driving under the influence of alcohol. With the legal trouble came multiple NFL suspensions, including the one he was serving up until his official reinstatement this week.
Eventually, Smith said, he reached his breaking point.
“For me, like with most people, I think if anybody really wants to change, it comes from within,” he said. “And so I got to a point where I was fed up with how I was living my life, and I knew I needed to change if I wanted to be something and get back ahold of my life.”
#ButtFumble2020pic.twitter.com/lUeAepGrSy
— Dov Kleiman (@NFL_DovKleiman) December 13, 2020
A reminder that Aldon Smith didn’t play in the NFL for 5 years prior to this season.pic.twitter.com/W3MwAUvbRW
— Dov Kleiman (@NFL_DovKleiman) December 13, 2020
A former newspaper veteran, Keith Farner is a news manager for Saturday Down South.
