Since 1996, only seven of the NFL's 32 teams have not won a playoff game. Six of them are Kansas City, Houston, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Buffalo, and Detroit. These are names that conjure up images of paper bags over heads, middle fingers, and many appearances on NFL Football Follies.
The other team has a legacy of irrefutable success and prominence after compiling 10 conference championships, 19 divisional titles, and five Super Bowl rings.The Dallas Cowboys built their bedrock reputation with a head coach and GM in Tom Landry and Tex Schramm along with an owner who trusted them and didn't meddle.
In 1989, maverick owner Jerry Jones bought the team, and quickly installed Jimmy Johnson as head coach and GM. While he didn't disappear into the backdrop like Clint Murchison, he still allowed Johnson to evaluate talent, make trades, and run this team like General Patton.
This produced a dynasty. In six years, Dallas won three Super Bowls and appeared in four straight conference championships. But, Jones believed that if something wasn't broke, it needed fixing and soon inserted himself as GM and began hiring puppet head coaches.
He evaluated the talent and ran the draft. His thirst for winning replaced his trust in other men, and thus, the Cowboys thrived in mediocrity. Jones even bit his lip in two and hired Parcells to change the direction of this team in 2004. Big Bill did wonders and reminded many of Jimmy, but decided to resign under speculation that Jerry just wouldn't leave him alone.
Jones went back to his puppet show and hired Wade Phillips in 2007. Any football pundit could see from miles away that Phillips wasn't going to raise any one's skirt. With a new coach and new ideas from the coaching staff, Dallas went 13-3 but still couldn't break the playoff curse. As a result, expectations flew off the handle for this year.
Then, the unraveling began. Dallas missed the playoffs after posting a 9-7 record.
There are countless excuses and reasons that you could point to as the reason for this collapse. They include Terrell Owens, injuries to key players, Wade Phillips, Jason Garrett, and so on.
My theory is that it rests solely with the owner.
Jerry Jones has shown in the past to be a brilliant businessman, having an unquenching thirst for winning, and knowing football. He's also gotten older and more stubborn in his ways. If he's not careful, he will become the NFC's Al Davis who eats senility three meals a day.
He is now the owner of the richest and most visible sports franchise on the planet. He is building a brand new stadium that is the same size as Rhode Island. It is time for him to pull a "Murchison" and lean back in his luxury box seat and watch with pride...and stay there for all four quarters. He needs to hire a GM, and he must insert a head coach that players want to go to battle and risk their careers for.
Wade Phillips is not that kind of coach.
Troy Aikman said that a head coach must "be able to stand in front of 53 guys and command the room." He went on to say, "If he couldn't, I wouldn't hire him. If he couldn't command the room, he couldn't be my coach...It's like at home. I don't ask my daughters to clean their room. I tell them."
Phillips appears to have lost control of this team. How else to do you explain a team that led the league in penalties and ranked near the top in turnovers? Players were fined $100 for being late to meetings; lower amounts for other infractions. Back-stabbing and throwing other players and coaches under the bus ran rampant in the locker room all year. His press conferences were more like listening to a gardener talking about why his tomatoes didn't produce like they normally do.
That attitude has cascaded to the players. After being dismantled by Philly in the last game of the year knocking the Cowboys out of the playoffs, QB Tony Romo responded to the loss with this gem, "I wake up tomorrow and keep living. You just keep playing the game. It's a fun game, it's enjoyable. We're going to try to win next year. We're going to try to get back in the playoffs, and we're going to try to win the Super Bowl. That's all you can do. I mean, if you don't
He went on to say, "I've had a lot worse happen to me than a loss in a sporting event that's for sure and if this is the worst thing that ever happens to me then I've lived a pretty good life."
I want to still believe that Romo is passionate about football and has a deep thirst to bring a championship to Dallas, but those words don't provide a lot of promise. Those aren't the words of a leader.
Which brings up another handicap handcuffing this team - leadership. The Cowboys don't have a leader on the field because they didn't draft or sign one and don't have one in the head coach. If it says anything, the one player who has come the closest to filling that role is Terrell Owens, but even himself has continued his Woe-Is-Me attitude win or lose.
Compare T.O.'s attitude with that of the Cardinals' Larry Fitzgerald who is in in the Super Bowl. "I want to make sure I'm accountable, and if I'm not, I get that death stare from Kurt, and I try to stay away from that as much as possible."
As you can see, there's something missing at Valley Ranch.
Coach Phillips vowed in his press conference following the season that he's going to change. He's 61. How many men do you know who are 61 that can change their ways, habits, and routines on the turn of a dime...which in this case means six months?
After all of this chaos, drama, and soap operas, now we have word that Jerry Jones and Michael Irvin have received the green light to have their own reality show on Spike TV. The premise is sending a group of guys through workouts to see who will win a spot on the Cowboys training camp roster. Jones will be one of the judges.
This team needs a lesson in perception, timing, and teamwork. They are void of leadership, accountability, and a deep-gutted passion to lay down their lives for their teammates.
The only way to accomplish that is for Jerry Jones to establish the same management model that worked for him his first six years on the job and that continues to work for most of the other teams in the NFL today. He must hire a GM who knows talent and team management like Jack Nicklaus knows golf.
He needs a head coach that will control a locker room like a NASA flight director controls a launch; a man that the players are proud to go to battle for every single game. He needs a coach who will bleed enthusiasm and toughness.
But, it all starts at the top -- the very top. For Dallas to succeed, Jerry Jones must demolish the present way of doing things and take a back seat, but I'm not sure that's a reality that the city of Dallas will see as long as Jones is running the show.
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