Terrell Owens came back to his roots to get his Hall of Fame

SANTA CLARA Womens Patrick Willis Jersey , Calif. (AP) — ring.Owens was presented with the ring during a halftime ceremony during Thursday night’s game between the San Francisco 49ers and the Oakland Raiders.Owens spent the first eight seasons with the 49ers, establishing himself as one of the best players in the game during his tenure in San Francisco.“This is awesome,” Owens said before the game, while wearing his gold Hall of Fame jacket. “This is an opportunity to give something to the fans. Ever since I left in 2003 and went on and did some great things, but this is where it started my first eight years of my career.”Owens was voted into the Hall of Fame earlier this year but skipped the induction ceremony in Canton, Ohio, to hold his own celebration at his college in Chattanooga, Tennessee.Owens said he was upset at the voters who made him wait three years for the honor, saying he believed they brought in off-field issues into their deliberations instead of focusing solely on what Owens did as a player.“No regrets at all,” Owens said about his decision to skip the ceremony. “If anybody knows who Terrell Owens is outside the media portrayal of me throughout the course of my career. They know what I did. I stand by what I did. … When they tried to bring other things outside my body of work and my accomplishments, that was an issue for me. My stats spoke loudly. They spoke for themselves.”Owens had a mostly sensational 15-year career playing for San Francisco, Philadelphia, Dallas, Buffalo and Cincinnati. He played eight years with the 49ers before bouncing around the league as he frequently wore out his welcome at all of his stops along the way.But he always produced, ranking second all-time to Jerry Rice in yards receiving (15,934) and third to Rice and Randy Moss with 153 touchdown catches. He was a five-time All-Pro, a six-time Pro Bowl pick and one of the most entertaining players of his generation.“I can’t look back and say I would have done anything differently,” he said. “I wanted to be a 49er for the rest of my career if that could happen, But not many people start and finish where they started. Look at Jerry (Rice), look at Joe Montana.”Owens was part of eight playoff teams but only reached the Super Bowl once after joining the Eagles in 2004. He gave a heroic performance in Philadelphia’s 24-21 loss to New England, catching nine passes for 122 yards after defying doctor’s orders and returning to play on his surgically repaired ankle 6½ weeks after an operation.Owens had many memorable moments in his career Womens Malcolm Smith Jersey , but the one that stands out most for him from his time with the 49ers came in a playoff game Jan. 3, 1999, against Green Bay.After dropping several passes early in the game, Owens caught the game-winning 25-yard touchdown in the final seconds in a play dubbed “The Catch 2,” as the sequel to Dwight Clark’s game-winner in the 1981 NFC title game against Dallas.Owens then was selected an All-Pro for the first time the following season.“That was a big catalyst for my career,” he said. “For me to come up with a big play at that particular time was monumental, very key for the development of me. It helped my confidence.” One of the benefits of a Friday afternoon NFL bad-news dump is that maybe not as many people will notice. The other benefit is that maybe people won’t ask the NFL tough questions about it.Plenty of tough questions could be asked about the NFL’s decision to fine but not to suspend Washington linebacker Reuben Foster after the incident that got him fired by the 49ers — and that resulted in the NFL placing Foster on the Commissioner Exempt list after Washington claimed Foster on waivers last November.So how does the NFL, with a Personal Conduct Policy that vows decisive action against alleged domestic abusers and potential repeat offenders (Foster is both), only fine Foster two game checks and not suspend him? (Foster has twice been accused of domestic abuse. On both occasions, his accuser recanted her allegations. He was suspended two games last year after a substance-abuse policy violation and a no-contest plea to a weapons charge that arose from his 2018 domestic-violence arrest.)Here’s why Foster wasn’t suspended, based on information leaked by the league to one of its in-house reporters: The NFL viewed video provided by the hotel where the latest incident happened, and it decided that no violation of the Personal Conduct Policy occurred, and multiple attempts to contact the accuser “were unsuccessful.”So why was Foster fined? Again, here’s what the NFL leaked to its in-house reporter: It “is related to other behavior over the past year and failing to live up to obligations the NFL set forth as part of Foster’s 2-game suspension last year for drug and weapons charges.”So what does that mean? Apparently, we’ll find out if/when the NFL leaks more details about what Foster did to deserve a two-game fine to one of its in-house reporters.Or maybe it won’t. Maybe that’s all we’ll ever know about a process that continues to be more about P.R. than justice, where the league seemingly picks a desired outcome based on how it will fly in the public eye and then works backward.Even though the league concluded that Foster didn’t violate the Personal Conduct Policy, the league knew that it couldn’t give him a pass. So the league fined him for something he surely wouldn’t have been fined for if he’d never landed on the league’s radar screen for a potential violation of the Personal Conduct Policy that the league ultimately concluded wasn’t a violation at all.Still, don’t feel bad for Foster. He got paid last year for five games in which he didn’t play. This year, he’ll play in two games without getting paid.The end result? Washington now has the full benefit of a first-round pick on whom the 49ers have given up. Unless and until Foster does something else that gets him suspended, not fined.