Many of you are simply not going to want to hear this. You’ll cover your ears with your hands. You’ll bury your head in the nearest sand box.
Anything but believe the truth, because your mind is already long past made up, and has been really, for the last, oh, 30 years, give or take a month.
Just over a month from now, on Feb. 25 – a date which will always live in infamy for some (yes, almost as heinous in its own way as Dec. 7, 1941 in the minds of Dallas-Fort Worth football fans) – Jerry Jones will celebrate his 30th year as owner of the Dallas Cowboys.
Of course, it’s also the day Jerry fired the only head coach the team had ever known, a Texas-born and bred saint named Tom Landry.
Oh, the horror.
Frankly, even though I was one of those who believed that it was at long last time for a change and that Landry had lost his connection with the players, I was offended for him, too.
It was just so . . . so abrupt. Who didn’t have admiration for Landry and all that he’d stood for during almost three decades as the Cowboys’ leader?
And now this outsider, this usurper waltzes in from, of all places, Arkansas, and has the gall to tell us that a man who had taken the Cowboys to five Super Bowls, winning two, wasn’t good enough for him?
Give me a break. What’s he gonna do next, kick our dog? Eat all our Tex-Mex?
No wonder people were fighting mad.
If that’s still your problem with Jerry, I understand.
Guess what, he understands, too, and has admitted on more than one occasion that if he had it to do over again, he would do things differently. Not that he wouldn’t have still fired Landry and brought in Jimmy Johnson, who won two Super Bowls himself and was the architect of a third, but that he would have at least waited a week or so and tried to do the deed a little less ham-handedly.
But for many to suggest on social media this week, following last weekend’s playoff lost to the Rams, that the only thing Jerry cares about is money….
Oh, come on, people. You can do better than that.
Son Stephen Jones called the idea “laughable” during his radio show on 105.3 The Fan.
I call it ludicrous. Preposterous. Outrageous.
Money? Are you kidding me? Jerry has more money – almost $7 billion and counting according to Forbes magazine – than he could spend in dozens of lifetimes. More, really, than any of us can even imagine.
Like Stephen said, you don’t even want to know how much of that money Jerry would swap for another Lombardi Trophy.
I get it that making money is what driven businessmen like Jerry do. It’s how they compete. But that’s not the driving force behind Jerry’s ownership of the Cowboys. Far from it.
He wants to win. He wants to win so desperately that there is no price tag he would put on it.
As an NFL owner, there is no better one than Jerry Jones when it comes to doing what it takes to win.
It’s when he puts on his general manager hat that things sometimes get a little dicey, a little loosey-goosey.
If you want to criticize Jerry for his trades, his drafts, his seemingly cocky decision-making as GM, be my guest. Get out the machetes and hack away. He’s vulnerable there, for sure.
For many, its just Jerry’s public persona that invites the critics to flail away. Those 10—20 second sound bites make him seem insufferable at times.
Since my book, Dallas Cowboys: The Legends of America’s Team came out two years ago, I’ve spoken to many civic and church groups and often the first question I ask is “How many here can’t stand Jerry Jones?” I’m always astounded by how many hands go up.
And then I tell them about the Jerry Jones I know.
Of course, inevitably none of those people have ever actually met Jerry or spent any time around him. The truth is this: You can’t know Jerry and not sense his passion for winning, his love of people and his drive to win, not just for himself, but for the fans.
Jerry has his faults, for sure. He could make a lot of people happy by firing himself as GM and hiring an “experienced” football guy. But consider this: Jerry has 30 years of hands-on experience at that job now. He has made his mistakes, admitted them, and learned from them. Someone could make the argument that there’s not a more “experienced” GM in the NFL.
I’m not going to do that here, though.
I’m just going to tell you the one thing I can guarantee you that the Cowboys’ failure in LA is not about.
It’s not about money.
Revo invites you to chip in with your opinion (or just say hello) by emailing at revo1964@hotmail.com .
