Six hours before kickoff, nobody in Arlington knew the game’s defining figure would be made of plastic.
At 1:15 p.m., Cowboys cornerback Joey Porter Jr., acquired from the Steelers just a week earlier, was ruled out of the biggest game of his new career with a sudden illness. He never took a snap in his home opener.
At approximately 6:40 p.m., television cameras caught him leaving the stadium alongside a team staffer. The staffer was carrying a trash can. The trash can did not need to be carried. The trash can, on the evidence of the broadcast, was full.
By 7:02 p.m., the clip had its own warm-up act. The internet, which reviews all performances, gave the trash can a standing ovation it has not extended to the actual football team in some time.
The illness was real, the team said, and the speculation that it was contract-related invited itself anyway, because football fans experience stomachs the way economists experience inflation: as a number someone else is managing. A man who turns down money and then gets sick on a Thursday has not gotten sick. He has negotiated.
“I’ve had the flu eleven times and never once did it arrive two hours before a home opener,” said Marvin Okafor, 44, a season-ticket holder who watched the walk-off from section 118. “That flu had an agent. That flu had leverage. Respect.”
The medical staff’s account is that Porter was vomiting before the game, which is the kind of detail the NFL usually keeps between the trainer’s room and the sky. This time it went to 22 million households, and something strange happened: everyone loved it. A football injury is a tragedy. A football illness with a trash can is a founding myth.
The Buccaneers won the game, which history will record as a footnote, because the Buccaneers always win games and nobody remembers which ones. What survives is the image: a new Cowboy, a staffer, and a can, walking into Texas night, three parties completing a transaction no one can name.
The can was last seen near the visitors’ locker room. It has not been photographed since.