This column originally ran in The Standard-Times on Dec. 15, 2005.

By Nick Tavares

In the fickle world of sports, it's easy to lose track of certain players in their travels. I imagine it will be harder to keep track of the recently departed Bill Mueller in the coming season in Los Angeles, just as it was hard to realize how good he was when he was manning the hot corner for the San Francisco Giants.

Players moving from big market to big market, like Shaq in L.A. and Miami, make themselves so available and are so visible that they never quite lose their luster.

But one player, surprisingly, has flown somewhat under the radar.

There's a quarterback having a heck of a season in Dallas right now, who last week threw for 332 yards and three touchdowns against the tough Kansas City Chiefs.

His name is Drew Bledsoe, and if you watch him from week to week, he looks like he's having the time of his life.

Big, lumbering, strong-armed Drew, at 33 years old, left for dead in favor of J.P. Losman by the Bills last season, has fit right in with Big D and former boss Bill Parcells this season, simultaneously solving their quarterback troubles and his spiraling career.

Bledsoe has always been taken for granted. In New England he was usually solid, sometimes great, but sometimes maddening. The crippling last-second interception became a bit too common by the end of his stay, but the late-quarter comebacks, especially in 1997, can't be forgotten, either.

Everyone knows why he isn't here anymore, and obviously the Patriots haven't looked back. But the Buffalo tenure, meant to revitalize his career, never felt right. Through his first half-season in Buffalo, he looked like an MVP candidate, connecting with Eric Moulds the way Peyton Manning has with Marvin Harrison for the past eight years.

But it didn't last. The second half of 2002 saw the Bills go 3-5, including two one-sided losses to New England. Bledsoe's production fell, and the next two years were the epitome of mediocrity. Records of 8-8, 6-10 and 9-7 meant first a new coach (Mike Mularky replacing Greg Williams) and next a new quarterback. Drew was back on the street.

The Cowboys were taking a huge gamble on Bledsoe. Popular sentiment was to give the ball to Drew Henson and see what he could do, but Parcells has always favored a veteran, and the pairing was set.

Fast-forward to week 14, and the Cowboys are facing a season-making game against the Chiefs, who've had a solid run themselves in the ultra-competitive AFC West.

The 'Boys mixed it up for Vermeil and the Chiefs, scoring their first touchdown on a fake-turned-deep route to Terry Glenn (remember him?) to get the ball rolling. The game went down to the wire, Chiefs kicker Lawrence Tynes missed a last-second field goal to tie it, and Bledsoe was seen screaming in joy on the sidelines, hugging teammate Keyshawn Johnson, another Dallas reclamation project.

Now the Cowboys are one game behind the division-leading New York Giants and very much alive in the tight NFC, where no team other than Seattle has really stood out.

I've never before in my life found myself actively rooting for Dallas, so saying this (or typing, as it were) feels a bit foreign, but here it is.

Here's hoping that, this season or next, Bledsoe has a great playoff moment. Not too great (my beloved Bears are still in this, you know), but great enough that he'll be remembered as he should -- as a great quarterback finally at peace with the football world.

Nick Tavares is a columnist for The Standard-Times. E-mail him at ntavares@s-t.com

This story appeared on Page C1 of The Standard-Times on December 16, 2005.