“I’m more disciplined during a challenging time than when I’m getting pats on the back. When I’m on top of the world and everything’s going good and I just won the gold cup, I’m liable to break the [whole] thing.” ~Jerry Wayne on his role in the Cowboys’ fracture after back-to-back Super Bowl wins

Episode 4 of the Netflix docuseries is a glorious review of the Cowboys’ first Super Bowl win over the Bills, and then an almost week-by-week breakdown of the following season, which culminated in the first back-to-back championships in team history. And all the cracks that were forming that eventually turned into a seismic catastrophe from which the team has still not recovered.

Remember that beautiful day in Pasadena when the Cowboys played flawless football and destroyed the AFC Champion Bills 52-17? It’s even better watching Troy, Emmitt, and Michael relive it today. It was just an absolutely perfect day when the best team of that decade played its best game. Dallas scored twice in 18-seconds at the start of the second quarter, knocked Buffalo quarterback Jim Kelly out of the game with a blown out knee, and just rolled. The best part is seeing the scene on the sidelines between players and teammates, players and coaches, and everybody with Jimmy. Or maybe Jimmy’s hair. Total jubilation. Complete validation.

And then Jerry snatched the Lombardi Trophy out of Jimmy’s hands on the podium. Jimmy looked surprised, and then quickly recovered to joke about getting a new ring. But the scene perfectly captures the tension between the two that was coming. Jimmy remembers, “After the first Super Bowl, things changed. Jerry and I started hollering about who got credit for what and we started going different ways.”

The rest of the episode takes us through that ’93 season that began with the Emmitt Smith holdout. Emmitt had just won his second straight NFL rushing title and a Super Bowl, and he wanted to be paid like an elite running back. When Jerry wouldn’t meet his demands, Emmitt sat, and the Cowboys started the year with rookie running back Derek Lassic and promptly went 0-2. Jerry’s explanation as to why he has more leverage in these kinds of situations is slightly confusing: “I have a very high tolerance for ambiguity, because I can go longer than most and not have the answer.” Yeah, we know; at least 29-years now.

After the second loss to open the season, the players started grumbling. The media started pushing. As Charles Haley said at the time, “I don’t understand. We’ve got the best running back in the world, but we’re playing a rookie.” The frustration Jimmy and the players were feeling boiled over when Jimmy faced the press in the interview room after that second loss. When he was asked for the millionth time about Emmitt, Jimmy just stared at the reporter, started and then stopped a couple of sentences, let out an exasperated, “Oh, boy…” and just walked off the podium.

Jimmy had said earlier that week, “We’re fighting a lot of things here, more than just the game itself.” That sentence has been said out loud multiple times by every Cowboys coach since.

Jerry finally makes Emmitt the highest paid running back in NFL history and the Cowboys scratch and claw back into the race to face the Giants in the Meadowlands in the final game of the year. The winner would win the division and earn a first round bye in the playoffs; the loser would hit the road the following week in the Wild Card round. Emmitt suffered a grade three shoulder separation at the end of the second quarter, but gutted it out, carrying the team with one arm and suffering untold pain through the final two quarters and overtime to give the Cowboys the win. It was one of Emmitt’s finest and most inspiring performances. He missed the first two games of the year and still won his third straight rushing title. Yes, I do contend that Emmitt Smith is the greatest running back in NFL history. Better than Walter Payton, better than Barry Sanders, better than Jim Brown. If you don’t think so, the burden of proof is on you.

There’s a really cool montage in the middle of this episode that reminds us just how huge the Cowboys were in the early ’90s. Led by the The Triplets, the Cowboys players were on the covers of every magazine, making appearances on every late night talk show, showing up for cameos in popular TV shows, doing movies and public service spots, dating actresses, supermodels, and country singers, and hawking everything from sneakers and cars to watches and potato chips. The Cowboys were everywhere. It was during this year that the Cowboys officially became the most valuable sports franchise in the world, and Jerry thought it was because his players were everywhere.  In the middle of all these shots, Jerry says, “There’s a constant buildup of interest and attention. That’s where the value is! I want to make sure it’s a soap opera year around.”

Jerry didn’t realize the interest and attention came because they were winning Super Bowls. They weren’t winning Super Bowls because it was a soap opera. They weren’t valuable because they had great looks and personalities and could entertain; it was because they were winning championships. Thirty years later, he’s still got it backwards. He still believes the soap opera is the main thing. If attention is waning, If interest in the Cowboys is down, if the spotlight threatens to move somewhere else, Jerry will intentionally say or do something just to stir things up. Still.

The rest of the episode details the growing tension between owner and coach, especially as it turned into a full-blown national obsession during Super Bowl week. It went all the way back to the way Jerry stubbornly refused to pay Emmitt at the beginning of the year. But it increased as Jimmy flirted publicly with the Jacksonville Jaguars, as they argued publicly about who came up with the idea of trading Herschel Walker, as Jerry invaded the draft room and the locker room and began prowling the sidelines during games. It’s so tense watching Bob Costas interview Jimmy and Jerry side by side, in the same room, about each other, it’s like watching an episode of The Office. Jerry claims that he could coach the team. Jimmy says he doesn’t respect Jerry. Sitting beside each other on national TV three days before the Super Bowl! These last 15-minutes are fascinating. It’s the tragic car accident, the train wreck, that everybody sees coming miles away but can’t stop.

The episode ends with Ed Werder and Rick Gosselin, the Cowboys beat writer and the NFL writer for the Dallas Morning News, sitting together and remembering that fateful night at the owners meetings in Orlando, just a few weeks after the team’s second straight Super Bowl victory. Jerry’s unrequited toast was the deal-breaker for the Cowboys owner. He told Ed and Rick not to leave because they would miss the story of the year. Out of jealousy, envy, and pride Jerry was about to fire his coach who had just won back-to-back Super Bowls.

Even now, on my couch, sitting between Carrie-Anne and Whitney, I ask out loud, “Surely, this isn’t going to happen. He’s not going to fire him. They’re not going to split this thing up. It’s too crazy.” Netflix does such a good job of building it up, of reminding us how insane the whole thing was. “There’s no way. It’s makes no sense. They didn’t really do this!”

Spoiler: They did.

Peace,
Allan