Jerry Jones Keeps the Dallas Cowboys in Headlines and Out of Super Bowls

Illustration by George Newman

“How about dem Cowboys?”

Right…how about them? Jimmy Johnson’s famous words once rang through the Dallas Cowboys’ locker room at a time when the Dallas team was synonymous with success. Now over twenty years have passed since the Cowboys had anything that resembled real success. During all that time, only one thing has been constant. Jerry Jones.

America’s team has coincided with mediocrity for quite some time. Are the Cowboys even America’s team as this point?

On the one hand you can say Jerry Jones has built the Dallas Cowboys into a billion-dollar franchise. The Cowboys games generate some of the season’s highest television ratings and you would be hard pressed not to find a Dallas Cowboy fan in any state. The fandom does not just extend to Texas. There are Cowboys fans everywhere. Even in London.

But on the other hand, while creating that billion-dollar franchise, Jerry Jones has made the team irrelevant on the field. Because of his insistence on continuing to be heavily involved in team decisions, Jerry Jones has contributed to their lack of success of the past two decades in numerous ways. Mainly, his insistence of keeping coaches that lack quick in game decision making to lead his team. (The past two playoff games against the San Francisco 49ers) Then passing on players that could have a real impact on the team. (Derrick Henry) His meandering with players’ contracts that almost borderlines on a raucous episode of Tom and Jerry. (Dak Prescott and CeeDee Lamb). And ultimately the lack of control with media availability. After every bruising loss, the microphones find Jerry Jones and…a litany of words follow. With some of those needing translated through a dictionary that doesn’t exist.

Every season’s beginning, the Dallas Cowboys find themselves in the national conversation of best teams and the expectations reach a fever pitch. The reasoning for that almost seems illogical. The Cowboys have not won a playoff game since January 15, 2019 against the Seattle Seahawks. The last Super Bowl win was in 1995. While many teams have had playoff droughts and Super Bowl droughts (The Detroit Lions have never even reached a Super Bowl), the difference is that the Cowboys are always in the conversation and never live up to expectations. A few years ago, a young Green Bay Packers team led by Jordan Love, ran the Cowboys off the field by the second quarter. Dak Prescott threw two inexcusable interceptions, and the Packers took advantage of it. Since the game was on national television, the Cowboys quickly became the brunt of memes and criticism in the following weeks. But…that summed up what the Cowboys have been. Mediocre. Such lofty expectations and underwhelming results.

Whether or not you agree with the hire of Brian Schottenheimer as their next head coach, one thing most people cannot disagree with is that Jerry Jones wants to continue to be star of the show. It is common knowledge that the Cowboys teams lack real leadership and need a real leader that even rivals what Jimmy Johnson once did. Jason Garrett and Mike McCarthy, even though McCarthy won the Super Bowl, never quite moved the needle. The players never really took them seriously and with that lack of seriousness, the team never had real leadership. Dak Prescott, considered to be one of the top quarterbacks in the league, appears to be the most respected player on the team but Jones almost eliminated that aspect with the prolonging of Dak’s contract until the beginning of the preseason. Not because he was seriously considering the contract he wanted to give Dak but because he wanted to make a headline every day of the off season.

For Jones, the Dallas Cowboys are successful when they make headlines or when they are the talking point of every radio show in the country. When they are winning, that only illuminates the headlines but even with losses, the conversation still exists. All Jerry Jones seems to want is acclaim. A Super Bowl, at this point, would be a self-glorifying afterthought.

Last season, the New York Knicks were a good team. With their success, the lights of Madison Square Garden seemed to shine even brighter. With that, the courtside seats were full of celebrities throughout the season. The allure of the New York Knicks had reached the allure of years past. That is what Jerry Jones could only hope for. His own celebrity row. For the AT&T stadium in Arlington to be a place everyone wanted to go to. Anything that would bring more legions of Dallas Cowboys fans. If Jerry Jones was concerned about winning, would Mike Vrabel be the coach of the New England Patriots? Would Belichick be the coach of the North Carolina Tarheels?

In the 1990s the Cowboys were at the peak of their success and Jerry Jones could not have been happier. Now in the 2020s, the Cowboys are at the peak of their mediocrity and Jerry Jones…still could not be any happier.