Super Bowl XLIV: Not the Cowboys vs. Not the Cowboys

Dallas is a woman who will walk on you when you're down
But when you are up she's the kind you want to take around
And Dallas ain't a woman who will help you get your feet on the ground

--"Dallas," Jimmie Dale Gilmore

As I sit down to savor yet another renewal of what was once imaginatively called the “AFL-NFL World Championship Game,” I reflect on those remarkable events that signify the years passing. The New Orleans Saints are in the Super Bowl. The New Orleans Saints! Think about that. The team that once was the NFL’s elephant graveyard is playing for the ring. You’ve got to like the fact that John Mecom’s little tax write-off, which the NFL awarded him solely to keep the AFL out of New Orleans, has managed to second line its way to the big game. A franchise that points to such immortals of the game like Drunk Billy Kilmer wearing a one-bar helmet and no chin strap, Danny Abramowicz, John Gilliam, Doug Atkins, Half-footed kicker Tom Dempsey, Hokie Gajan, Edd Hargett, or Ol’ Arch as its all-time stars really doesn’t even belong in the NFL, much less at the Super Bowl. You know, the Aints. But who dat say dey gonna beat dem Saints? This is the greatest thing to happen to New Orleans since Comus began parading (or syphilis was cured, one or the other).

The sad thing is they’re not playing the Super Bowl in New Orleans like they should be. Can you imagine the party, win or lose? Oh, and it should be at Tulane Stadium where all Super Bowls belong, under threat of a spring shower (in late January). All Super Bowls should be played in one of three places: the Orange Bowl (site of Joe Namath’s “guarantee” game), Tulane Stadium, or the LA Coliseum. The fact that two of those places don’t exist and there hasn’t been an NFL game in the third since 1975 is really beside the point. No more rotation. Super Bowls in places like Detroit or Atlanta are preposterous. And Up With People should have the halftime gig. Sorry to say but they’re at least as cutting edge as the Who these days. The Rolling Stones in a walker slurping Metamucil think the Who may be past their prime.

But another thing that you just can’t help notice. Yet again, for the 14th year in a row, the league’s premier game won’t feature the league’s “premier team.” That’s right, America’s Team won’t be playing in America’s Game. That’s funny isn’t it? What with the hyper-attention the nation’s media pays to every Valley Ranch twist and turn. For a team with one playoff victory to its name in the past 13 years, which by the way is exactly one more than the expansion Houston Texans in the same period, you have to wonder what all the fuss is about.

Ah, the Good Old Dallas Cowboys. The mere name has to bring up special thoughts and memories for everyone. The fans’ cult-like obsession. Acceptance of moral depravity that would embarrass a sewer rat in the pursuit of victory. The smugness of achievement of a team that once had it all but refuses to recognize its true self now, like the head cheerleader that can’t see the extra 40 pounds and 30 years. Ousting the annual Texas vs. Texas A&M Thanksgiving game from the television schedule. Playing ball in a public-funded football equivalent of Versailles that charges prices so high that most of the people who paid taxes to fund it cannot afford a ticket to get in (without missing that month’s mortgage payment). Insisting on other teams in the league following different rules than apply to them. Yes sir, those are the ‘Boys.

In case you haven’t figured it out, I have a bit of a problem with the Dallas Cowboys. Like other Houstonians (and all other right-thinking people of course), I’ve never been able to support the Cowboys. In the Jerry Jones era, I’ve actively despised them, notwithstanding that some of their players have been magnificent, both as players and people. But I’ve always hated them, particularly as I grew up an Oilers fan. It was one thing that people everywhere else in Texas followed the Cowboys over the Oilers, but it was particularly galling how many Houston fans supported the Cowboys and not the Oilers. What the hell?

Obviously, this all begins with Dallas itself. Let me be perfectly clear, and use simple terms so that no one mistakes my meaning.

Dallas Sucks.

Got it?

Everything about Dallas, everything Dallas is, everything its been, everything it stands for, sucks. Houstonians, and by that I mean all real Houstonians, hate Dallas. Perhaps sealing the deal for us is that Dallas basically could care less about Houston, either as a city or a team. Dallas is simply the denial of all things Texan. Dallas has no real culture, personality, or product of its own, it acquires it elsewhere and tries to pass it off as its own. Hell, the fact that the Dallas team hasn’t actually played a game in the city of Dallas since Craig Morton was quarterback pretty much says it all. Dallas is embarrassed to be in Texas and does all it can to deny being of Texas. Its about material possessions, appearances, style, social climbing, pretension, McMansions, and all things white. No one sweats in Dallas (like ladies, they perspire). Everyone sweats in Houston, a lot, starting when we back the car out of the driveway in the morning and all day long in summers that could steam the glue off of fat guys’ toupees. Or boil lobster thermodor. The whole wide world is in Houston: pipe fitters, joint welders, ship captains, shit kickers, rice farmers, lawyers, doctors, rocket scientists, chemists, engineers, rock and rollers, artists, cooks, hustlers, pimps, winos, holy rollers, Vietnamese refugees, Africans, Haitians, Cubans, Indians, Pakistanis, Euro trash, Moslems, jews, Christians, hindus, gurus, and East Texans (come in from the farm like John Travolta in Urban Cowboy to get work and meet himself a real lady like Pam; I sure liked Pam a lot better than that irritating harpy Debra Winger). Dallas has an affected style, the class of plastic and pretension, and the air of social rank. Houston has got no style, and its got no class. Houston makes money. Houston gets things done. Houston is real people. Houstonians may have to flee hurricanes, but Houstonians don’t riot or set fires or wail about helplessly at the first sign of trouble. Houstonians help each other out. Notice how Travolta didn’t go to Dallas? If the cities were the Bush twins, Dallas would be Barbara: cool, polished, stoic, collected, secretly committing transgressions for which she’ll never face punishment because she can use connections to have it hushed up and made to disappear. Houston is Jenna. The Fun One. Getting absolutely ripped and wearing a tube top to the Poison concert and flashing Bret Michaels while sitting on her boyfriend’s shoulders. Singing “Talk Dirty to Me!” at the top of her lungs between Jaeger bombs, then leading the crew over to Whataburger after for snacks. Then classes up on Sunday to go to church and meet Grandma.

Historically, the teams reflected that schism. The Tom Landry Cowboys were methodical, cool, robotic, operating with machine-like precision based on calculation and meticulous planning. And they were stars. The media fawned over Staubach, Pearson, Dorsett, Hill, Rentzel, White, Lilly, Hayes, and in later years the triplets, Deion, Novacek, Newton, and even that idiot Leon Lett. Anyone with a personality got shipped off: Don Meredith, Hollywood Henderson, Duane Thomas, Clint Longley. The Oilers of old were never stars. They were lunchpail guys. Most of the early teams were comprised of castoffs, except for Billy Cannon, who never really fulfilled his pro potential. But they were colorful. Pastorini married a Playboy Playmate of the Year. Carl Mauck wrote the team song. Guido Merkins got a tryout while driving a truck for a living. There were of course outstanding athletes-Bethea, Munchak, Childress, Moore, Matthews, Moon, Burroughs, Kenny Houston-but none of them ever got as much glory as Cowboys also-rans. But those guys were always more real and genuine, and had more personality and heart, it seemed, than the stoic Cowboys. I was happier in defeat when Bum promised to kick the door in than I imagine any Cowboys fan could be at any Jerry Jones Super Bowl victory (sponsored by Pepsi, and with promotional consideration provided by Rolex).

Under Tex Schramm and Tom Landry, I could at least appreciate the Cowboys’ success and their innovations. Though antiseptic and stoic, they at least had class and dignity. Jerry Jones’ purchase of the team and subsequent operation has long since swept away even that attribute. Jerry Jones is the Ross Perot of professional sports. Success in one field convinced him he can succeed in any field. Like Captain Ahab obsessively pursuing the White Whale, Jones’s win at all cost philosophy, which works in business, doesn’t necessarily translates to the field in the salary cap era (where the Cowboys can’t just buy championships) and his utter hubris prevents him from seeing he is the primary obstacle preventing the Cowboys from achieving Super Bowl victories.

Jones and ego. Its like bacon and eggs. Or Shake and Bake (now “El Diablo” and “the Magic Man”). Those two are buddies from WAY back. The Cowboys win two Super Bowls, but Jerry fires Jimmy Johnson because the latter gets all the credit. Which he deserved because Jimmy put together the team and coached it. Jerry spent the money and got to roam the sidelines like the jock sniffer he is. He brings in a procession of stiffs whom he can roll over, til things get so bad he has no choice but to hire a real coach. To placate his ego, he decides he needs to have the best coach, Bill Parcells, and even agrees to let Parcells run the show while Jerry backs off. Just when Parcells gets the team turned around, Jerry can’t help himself and adds more star power (or at least “stars”) in the form of such all-time good guys as Tank Johnson, Pacman Jones and Terrell Owens. Jerry roams the sidelines like he’s the coach. He runs the team as general manager, though he had absolutely no experience, still has no real qualifications for evaluating talent, and is constantly torn away from football to attend to his other businesses. He’s the only owner in football with his own TV show. The only one who does commercials. Aside from Mike Brown and Al Davis, the only one who actually runs his team (which puts him in pretty poor company). Not satisified with playing in a standard NFL stadium, Jones held up those idiots in Arlington to build the Jones Mahal, a Xanadu-like monument to excess, charging more in parking fees than most tickets to Astros games. He gets plastic surgery to get that fine corpse-like waxy sheen that must impress the ladies, and caps to let his chompers take a serious bite at the media. He sued the NFL to get out of sharing concessions, merchandising, and sponsorship revenue, as if though the Cowboys don’t actually have to play another team every Sunday. News flash, those aren’t scrimmages you’re watching, they’re actually the Cowboys playing another NFL team. Jones spearheaded the NFL Network/TimeWarner Cable fiasco, thereby preventing a substantial number of die-hard Texas Cowboys fans from watching their beloved team play Thursday night games (that he pressures the league into awarding to his team).

Ego is one thing; I’m sure there’s 31 other NFL owners whose heads can barely fit inside their luxury suites. Classlessness, however, is quite another. We first learned about Jerry from the appalling and disgusting way he cut loose Tom Landry (on a golf course in Austin, after having already told media members Landry was out). Then, after making Tex Schramm’s life a living hell for a few weeks, he unceremoniously dumped him as well. These two men were more than just innovative. They made the NFL what it is today. Without these two men, the NFL would be radically different than the game we love today. Yet after 25 years of building the Cowboys into the league’s marquee team, and arguably the most important sports franchise in the world, they got no more thanks than the back of Jerry’s hand on the way out the door. When Jones decides to cut corners and build a cheap, uninspected indoor practice facility that collapses and paralyzes one assistant coach and breaks the neck of another, Jones issues no public statements of sympathy or otherwise. Jerry brings on any common street thug with a swift 40 time or bench press number when he thinks it may help him sell jerseys or win games. His tolerance of rampant criminality during the 1990s was shocking. At times you couldn’t tell if that was a pro football team or a Led Zeppelin tour (or the 1986 Mets). Remember all those fun times? Cocaine, strippers, hookers, booze, pills. Michael Irvin stabbing Everett McIver in the neck for not getting out of the barber chair when Michael wanted to go first. Nate Newton getting busted for driving a truckload of pot (that’s 175 pounds to you and me) down I-10 just as casually as if he were moving his stuff to Lafayette for a new job. Barry Switzer, the Bootlegger’s Boy, and former coach of that bastion of the “student-athlete” Oklahoma (think Charles Thompson selling coke, Buster Rhymes firing machine guns, and several rape allegations) going through pre-9/11 airport security with a loaded .45. Pacman Jones (rap sheet: 13 police reports, 6 arrests). Tank Johnson (violated probation by weapons possession). Just recently Deion Anderson gets arrested for pulling a gun on a guy outside a restaurant. Duane Goodrich plowing into some good Samaritans doing 110 Mph and fleeing the scene. Many teams have bad guys, but Jones seems indifferent. He’s the poster child for the “win at all costs” mentality.

Yet, ironically, through the towering ego and pursuit of glitz and glamour and star power, there’s a shocking tolerance of on-field mediocrity. “Win” at all costs apparently means “become famous and make lots of money at all costs.” Actually winning championships doesn’t seem quite as important. He may say so, but on the principle that actions speak louder than words, look at what he’s done to “win.” Fired Jimmy Johnson, ran off Bill Parcells, hired coaching immortals such as Dave Campo, Chan Gailey and Little Bum Phillips. Who moved up in the draft to pick Quincy Carter in the first round? Who brought in Chad Hutchinson, Steve Walsh, Anthony Wright, 80-year-old Vinnie Testaverde, 90-year-old Drew Bledsoe, and Ryan Leaf. Ryan Leaf? Two-glove wonder David Carr wants to know why he didn’t get a shot. Jones cares more about bringing in past-their-prime stars with name value than up and coming players that can achieve. Roy Williams? There’s $11 million more in dead money. Terrell Owens. Pacman Jones. Is there any doubt who’s drafting Tim Tebow?

But aside from Jerry Jones, there’s yet another reason to hate and despise the Cowboys. The zombie-like cadre of brainwashed lemming masses that swallow any product they’re sold with a blue star stamped on it. You know, Cowboys fan. Year in, year out, Cowboys fan watches the team flail in mediocrity and under-achievement but somehow manages to see a Super Bowl championship every season. To them, the Cowboys win the Super Bowl every year. They are the Iraqi information minister of sports fans. “Yes, yes, we have definitely won the Super Bowl. The Colts-Saints game is for third place!” Cowboys fan myopia borders on Raider myopia, possibly passing it as more and more Raiders fans sicken of Al Davis’ Mafioso-style senility. And they just take it, hook, line and sinker. $75 to park? No problem. $40 just to come inside the stadium and stand in one end zone? Sign them up. $59 for the cheapest seat in the house. $2000 for the cheapest PSL. They buy the hats, the shirts, the cups, the pizza (which cost $60 in one of the suites), the Pepsi (because Jerry has a special endorsement deal with Pepsi while the rest of the NFL is with Coke). They accept 9-7 records year after year, hoping next year will bring another round of the Michael/Emmitt/Troy glory days. They are the legions of the America’s Team worshippers. They are Raiders fan without criminal records. Until they demand that Jerry backs off from his GM duties and provide an actual winner, they merely buy the jacked up, good but not that good, product that Jerry dishes out. In the end, they’re just cheering for the shirts. And the stars.

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