ARLINGTON https://www.theredskinslockerroom.com/authentic-terry-mclaurin-jersey , Texas (AP) — Colt McCoy silenced his phone knowing he was coming back to his home state for his first NFL start in four years, in the stadium where he helped lead the Texas Longhorns to a shot at a national title as their star quarterback and where he last won a game as a pro.The longtime Washington backup also knows what's most important as he takes over following Alex Smith's season-ending leg injury . The Redskins (6-4) can control the NFC East by beating the rival Dallas Cowboys (5-5) in the most traditional of Thanksgiving games Thursday."I'm thankful for the opportunity, but I think it's even more than that," McCoy said. "It's time to just go play and put everything else aside. We have a huge game this week. It's a huge game." McCoy is 2-0 at AT&T Stadium, beating Nebraska for the 2009 Big 12 championship and a spot in the BCS championship game, which Texas lost to Alabama when McCoy got hurt early. The small-town Texas kid beat the Cowboys five years later, completing 25 of 30 passes for 299 yards in a 20-17 overtime win for the Redskins.He's 32 now, and hasn't started since the last of three straight defeats late in the 2014 season, a little more than a month removed from that win over the Cowboys. McCoy, a third-round pick by Cleveland in 2010 after that title-game loss to the Crimson Tide, has a career record of 7-18.McCoy is in his fifth year as Washington's backup and has played just four games over four seasons, including when he replaced Smith in the third quarter of Sunday's 23-21 loss to Houston. A potential winning drive stalled near midfield, and Dustin Hopkins‘ 63-yard field goal try fell short with 3 seconds left."It's been a while since he's played in a significant game. That'll be the challenge," coach Jay Gruden said."I know he's excited as heck, man. He hated to get the opportunity the way he got it with Alex getting hurt. I understand that. But deep down inside, he's been waiting for this."Dallas running back Ezekiel Elliott has been waiting for another Thanksgiving game since he had to miss last year on his six-game suspension over domestic violence allegations. In his Thanksgiving debut against the Redskins two years ago as a rookie, he jumped into the giant Salvation Army red kettle after a touchdown in a 31-26 Dallas win.The Cowboys have a chance to tie the Redskins for the division lead thanks to their first winning streak of the season, a pair of victories on the road after they were winless in their first four away from home."We said this a couple weeks ago, though; we knew that the division was still in front of us," quarterback Dak Prescott said. "Our backs are still against the wall. We know what this game means. We know how important this game is."BIG RETURNSWashington could get a major boost if any combination of left tackle Trent Williams, running back Chris Thompson, wide receiver Jamison Crowder and cornerback Quinton Dunbar can return from lengthy injury absences.Williams just needs to feel comfortable blocking after surgery for a dislocated right thumb, and Thompson said his injured ribs feel markedly better this week. Dunbar, who's dealing with nerve damage as part of a shin injury, feels "pretty close" but isn't sure if he'll make the problem worse.ELLIOTT'S WORKLOADIt just so happens that Elliott's season high in touches — 30 in a 22-19 win over Atlanta — came on the Cowboys' annual short week. In road wins over the NFC's past two Super Bowl participants in Philadelphia and Atlanta, Elliott had 55 touches (42 carries, 13 catches) for 388 yards from scrimmage and three touchdowns."If that's what it has to be then that's what it's going to be," said Elliott, who needs 91 yards rushing to overtake idle NFL rushing leader and MVP contender Todd Gurley. "I'm definitely not afraid of that."BALANCING ACTPart of the Redskins' challenge in helping McCoy succeed is getting Adrian Peterson going on the ground. Peterson had just 16 carries for 51 yards in the loss to Houston, but ran for two touchdowns and is looking forward to playing back in his home state of Texas.The pressure's on Peterson and the rest of Washington's running backs to produce in the running and passing games. The former Oklahoma standout had 99 yards in the earlier win over the Cowboys.GALLUP BACKDallas rookie receiver Michael Gallup is expected to play after rejoining the team Wednesday. He stayed behind with his family after getting the news following the win over the Falcons that his brother died by suicide."The situation's unique, the individual's unique, the circumstances," coach Jason Garrett said. "I do think for all of us as we go through challenging things, I do think getting back to routine and structure typically can help us."STARTS WITH DEFENSEThe Redskins, who haven't allowed a 100-yard rusher, held Elliott to 33 yards in a 20-17 win in the first meeting. It's the second-lowest total of his career. Both teams are in the top five in scoring defense and in the top six in rushing defense. She took little bites and she chewed very slow, Just like a good girl should..." for Bud LiteThis series is called Salary Cap Nuggets because ‘nuggets’ is such an interesting word in English.It calls to mind chicken nuggets - tasty, bite sized and easy to eat.But it also calls to mind gold nuggets - small, but valuable.The salary cap is a product of the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA), which is a 301-page contract between the NFL Owners and the NFL Players Association.In these articles, I try to explore just one or two small parts of the NFL salary cap defined in the massive CBA.Hence, Salary Cap Nuggets - small, bite-sized, easy to digest, yet valuable information for NFL fans.The goal is to Montez Sweat Jersey , one bite at a time, get a clear understanding of the salary cap.Click this link for handy access to all the Salary Cap NuggetsThere’s a question that has bothered me for years, and to which I’ve never known the answer.How do playoff teams handle the salary cap? What I mean is, they have to keep playing after the regular season ends.Do they get a salary cap credit?Is there some other mechanism... some special dispensation that is used to allow them to keep paying their players?Well, while reading the book Crunching Numbers this past week, I found information that answered that question.Teams pay a lot of costs that relate to players (called, interestingly enough, “Player Costs), but, as it turns out — and this is something I just learned this week from the book — there are only two “buckets” for player-related costs:Salary Cap Charges; andPlayer Benefit ChargesBasically, anything that is not a salary cap charge is a “Player Benefit Charge” because the CBA just isn’t any more granular than that, which leads to some odd items landing in the “benefit” bucket.The authors of Crunching Numbers had this to say:What you’ll see is that some of the items that end up in the ‘benefit’ bucket look like they should end up somewhere else, but — because ‘Player Benefit Charges’ are defined simply as any player cost that is not salary cap charge —the benefit bucket has to hold an odd assortment of costs that don’t seem to fit together neatly.The one that seems, to me, the most unlikely to be found in “Player Benefit Charges” is first item on the right side of the chart below, which appears on page 20 of the Crunching Numbers book; that is, “Postseason Salary”.Here’s the logic:The league, via the CBA and its salary cap provisions, is aiming to create a “level playing field” for all 32 teams to promote parity and competitiveness.The basic test of the usefulness of the salary cap is whether it puts all 32 teams into the same circumstances - whether each franchise faces the same limitations fairly.One obvious difference between teams is that twelve of them play in the post-season, and some teams keep playing — as many as three or four postseason games — until the Super Bowl winner is decided.This raises a question about finding a fair method of administering the salary cap that allows for playoffs without either unfairly punishing or rewarding playoff teams in the salary cap calculations.I expected to find some complex system of credits or adjustments in place, but what I’m learning more and more is that the CBA avoids complex formulas and adjustments.It is, by design, primarily a pragmatic document.The owners and players created a system that doesn’t require salary cap adjustments for playoff teams because postseason player costs are not charged to the salary cap. This seems a bit counter-intuitive; how can the money paid to players for playing football during the playoffs not be counted towards the salary cap?The logic lies in the idea that charging postseason playoff costs to salary cap would (i) create ‘unequal’ treatment between teams, meaning that the ‘level playing field’ would no longer exist; and (ii) a complex arrangement would need to be put into the system to re-level the field, and any such system would be flawed.The pragmatic CBA avoids these issues entirely by simply saying that postseason player costs are not part of salary cap charges. Since we only have two buckets for player costs, postseason player costs are classified as “Player Benefit Charges”, remembering that the definition of this category is any player costs that are not part of salary cap charges.It makes a bit more sense, perhaps, since individual teams don’t foot the bill for the playoff costs,Instead, playoff money comes from a league pool — so, a benefit.In the most recent playoffs, these are the amounts that were paid to players:Wild Card Round:Division Winner: $29,000Wild Card Team: $27,000Divisional Round: $29,000Conference Championship: $54,000Super Bowl Winner: $118,000Super Bowl Loser: $59,000Perhaps it would have been clearer (less confusing) to have given a different name to the second group of costs; perhaps instead of “”, the category should have been “Other Player Charges”, but that isn’t what happened.The CBA defines the two buckets as shown in the chart above, and those are the labels used throughout the agreement.This handy chart helps us casual fans identify what gets charged to salary cap and what doesn’t.Just remember that the “Player Benefit Charges” is a ‘catch all’ bucket for any player cost that isn’t charged to the salary cap.Now, at least, I can stop losing sleep over the question of how playoff teams handle the salary paid to players in the post season.