Game Over 
The Jones Gang
With a record third Super Bowl win in four years, the Cowboys are unstoppable. Unfortunately, so is Jerry Jones’s insatiable ego.
(Page 2 of 2)
In the days leading up to Super Bowl XXX, the Cowboys offered no attempt at humility or sportsmanship. “We know we’re good, and we let you know about it,” chirped Deion. Nate Newton observed, “I do not make the money I make to be quiet. Money is power and I make a lot of power.” Jones made headlines by complaining that Arizona’s liquor laws interfered with his plans for a victory party—a week before the game was even played. There were thousands of cameras and microphones in evidence, and Jones seemed able to position himself in front of every one. To help reporters and camera people at media day, the NFL posted signs with players’ names. To our amazement the “Jones” sign, between “Newton” and “Woodson,” wasn’t for middle linebacker Robert, it was for Jerry. As Coach Barry Switzer waited in the wings to address a packed press conference—and as dozens of cameras focused in his direction—Jones sidled up to him and whispered in his ear, as though Jones were the coach sending in the play.
Switzer kept a low profile, as he has since joining the Cowboys. He is not comfortable with self-promotion and has turned down endorsement contracts and opportunities to appear with Leno and Letterman. He made no attempt to rein in any of the players’ off-field excesses or public comments, a coaching style that many have confused with dereliction of duty. “I don’t care what goes on on the periphery,” he said. “It’s what happens on the field that concerns me.” Instead, he wondered why the media were making such a big deal of stuff like limousines and derby hats. Only occasionally did Switzer lose patience and tell reporters what he truly believed. “It’s really incidental and irrelevant to me what you think or write,” he said during one media conference. “I don’t need to tell you how good a coach I am.”
In my judgment, Switzer was the real hero of Super Bowl XXX because he kept his cool and somehow managed to win in what everyone agreed was a no-win situation. Jerry Jones, you may recall, had said that any of five hundred coaches could take this team to the Super Bowl. From Switzer’s first day in the NFL, insiders had whispered that he was a college coach, in over his head—never mind that he had won three national championships at Oklahoma, two more than Jimmy Johnson had won at Miami. Even if Switzer did win a Super Bowl, insiders agreed, he would do it with Jimmy’s team. No less an authority than Bill Walsh observed during Super Bowl week: “Jimmy Johnson put together the team and the chemistry. He established a formula for winning. They’re still winning with that and will until the great players leave.”
Few people outside the Cowboys organization know what Switzer endured during the final weeks of the 1995 season or how well he endured it. Holdouts, injuries, drug suspensions, the hoopla over Deion’s contract, the death of the son of Super Bowl MVP-to-be Larry Brown—I doubt if any other coach, including the sainted Jimmy, could have held this team together. And yet Switzer’s reputation, intelligence, and coaching abilities were reviled from coast to coast. He was called a bozo, an idiot, and a hood ornament. After the fourth-and-one fiasco in Philadelphia, the New York Post ran a photo of Jerry and Barry captioned “Dumb and Dumber.” In his syndicated newspaper column Johnson wrote that that single call would permanently destroy Switzer’s reputation as an NFL coach.
There were rumors that Barry had lost Aikman’s respect, and we learned a few days before Super Bowl XXX that the rumors were true. In December, between consecutive losses to the Redskins and the Eagles, assistant coach John Blake, for reasons yet unknown, complained to Switzer that Aikman was singling out black players for criticism. The accusation was absurd. Still, Switzer was obligated to listen to Blake, a loyal assistant and a former Oklahoma player who is also black. Switzer’s mistake was taking the complaint to Aikman, who was outraged that an assistant coach would question his character. Troy is the ultimate team player, a fierce competitor, a perfectionist famous for berating teammates who screw up assignments. Since only 4 of Dallas’ 22 starting players are white, the object of Aikman’s wrath is likely to be black. When word of Blake’s accusations got out, every one of the black Cowboys rallied around Aikman—and around Switzer. Even Charles Haley, who has never knowingly said a kind word about any coach, called Barry “a good man.” After the NFC championship game, Irvin stood before the crowd at Texas Stadium and announced before a live camera, “Barry’s taken so much shit from people. We ain’t going to let that happen no more.” Blake was quietly shuttled out the back door and into the head coaching job at Oklahoma, maybe the only time on record that an assistant coach has been encouraged to desert a team bound for the Super Bowl.
In the locker room after the fourth-and-one embarrassment, Barry delivered what may have been the greatest inspirational talk since Knute Rockne implored the Fighting Irish to win one for the Gipper. He started by accepting all blame for the defeat, though everyone knew there was plenty to go around. But hell, he reminded them, this ain’t the end of the damn world. People have recovered from worse. Take his own upbringing, the son of a bootlegger who was murdered by his mistress and an alcoholic mother who committed suicide. Did he quit? Irvin said later that Barry’s speech galvanized them for the final great push to the Super Bowl.
During Super Bowl week, the Cowboys were effusive in their praise for Switzer—especially the black players—in a way they had never been for Johnson or even Landry. Nate called Barry an honest man and Deion professed to love him. Veteran Bill Bates, who had played for both Landry and Johnson, summed it up better than anyone: “How could you not like the guy? He’s nothing but positive. He has fought for players behind the scene. He has fought for players against the media.”
It’s my impression that a lot of journalists who came to Phoenix believing that Switzer was an arrogant, egocentric lightweight went home with a vastly altered opinion. Once you’re around Barry for any length of time, it’s almost impossible not to like him.
The game was much closer than the Cowboys or most anyone else had predicted, but Dallas’ superior talent ultimately won out. The difference was mistakes—Dallas suffered no interceptions, no fumbles, no coaching blunders. Barry’s emotions finally got away from him when the commissioner handed over the Lombardi Trophy. “We did it! We did it! We did it!” he blurted. In the media conference later he refused to gloat or to acknowledge that in the victory he had been vindicated. “There’s no redemption, no vindication,” he said. “That’s never been important to me. I’m going to stand on the curb when we have our parade, and I’m going to applaud as the players go by.”
As for Jerry Jones, he appeared somewhat humbled by the experience. Perhaps he was saying a silent prayer, thanking God for allowing him to be one of the five hundred owners capable of taking this team to the Super Bowl.
Pages: 1 2
My Library
