# Shannon Penn on The Rise and Fall of the Cowboys' Dynasty: 30 Years Later | 02.03

An episode of [The Right Time with Bomani Jones](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/982639043), 3 Feb 2026, 1 h 04 min.

Audio: https://podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/pscrb.fm/rss/p/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/370fc844-36bd-4f61-8b8f-b4bb010de39a/6b293dfe-80d6-4f49-8525-b4bb01173427/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=919a7cbe-003c-4146-b592-b4bb010de3a5

Bomani Jones is joined by Shannon Penn, a former producer of The Right Time and currently at ESPN. They delve into the history and cultural significance of the Dallas Cowboys and their 1990s dynasty. They break down the cultural significance of Michael Irvin and Deion Sanders while pondering what is keeping the Cowboys from returning to their past success. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:05] Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the right time, A Wave Original.
[0:09] Speaker 1: My name is Beaumont Jones. Thanks for listening wherever you
[0:11] Speaker 1: get your podcasts. Thanks for watching us on YouTube. Subscribe, like,
[0:15] Speaker 1: rate us, review us, give us five stars. You only
[0:18] Speaker 1: give us four stars. I'm inclined to believe you are
[0:20] Speaker 1: a hater. It is Time Machine Tuesday. This week we
[0:25] Speaker 1: are going to talk about 30 years ago. Not exactly
[0:28] Speaker 1: this week, but 30 years ago in this neighborhood of time,
[0:31] Speaker 1: the Dallas Cowboys won their third Super Bowl in four
[0:34] Speaker 1: years and little did we know, Not only would they
[0:38] Speaker 1: not win a Super Bowl since then, not only would
[0:41] Speaker 1: they not go to a Super Bowl after this, they
[0:44] Speaker 1: ain't been to a conference championship game since this happened.
[0:48] Speaker 2: So, you know, who knew? We will look back on
[0:51] Speaker 2: that and join me now.
[0:52] Speaker 1: You can check him out on Freddie and Harry on
[0:55] Speaker 1: ESPN Radio and, you know, OG, Right Time member, Shannon Penn.
[1:01] Speaker 2: What's going on, brother?
[1:02] Speaker 3: What's good, my man?
[1:03] Speaker 2: Hey, man. You know, it's another day in the life.
[1:06] Speaker 1: I was actually thinking about this with the Cowboys kind
[1:10] Speaker 1: of in the context of us, right? So for people
[1:13] Speaker 1: who don't know, Shannon and I worked together in North
[1:16] Speaker 1: Carolina on the radio. We were doing Saturday, Sunday morning shifts.
[1:20] Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying? My first show ever, Sports Saturday,
[1:23] Speaker 1: was with Shannon. We were talking about, I did a
[1:25] Speaker 1: shout out to, what's his name? DeMond Wilson on Monday.
[1:28] Speaker 1: And I was like, we used to have the big
[1:29] Speaker 1: dummy of the week. on radio back in the day,
[1:32] Speaker 1: which looking back was a little bit harsh.
[1:34] Speaker 2: But you know what I mean?
[1:37] Speaker 3: But it hit though, it hit though.
[1:38] Speaker 2: It hit every week.
[1:40] Speaker 3: We had the Baltimore house music, you big dummy.
[1:43] Speaker 1: Yes, we had people waiting on it, you know what
[1:45] Speaker 1: I'm saying? Like we had those things, but we started
[1:49] Speaker 1: doing that show in January of 2008. And that is
[1:54] Speaker 1: the year that the Giants beat the Patriots, right?
[1:59] Speaker 2: And think about this, Shannon.
[2:00] Speaker 1: That was 12 years after the Cowboys had last won
[2:05] Speaker 1: a championship, right? Neither of us grew up as Cowboys fans, right?
[2:10] Speaker 1: My dad is like an old school, like old black man.
[2:13] Speaker 2: Cowboys fan, right?
[2:14] Speaker 1: Like crying, you know, not crying because he don't do that,
[2:16] Speaker 1: but over the ice bowl type of situation, right? You,
[2:21] Speaker 1: as we said, were a Giants fan. That was your bang.
[2:24] Speaker 1: But the Cowboys in that run, I'm curious about, if
[2:28] Speaker 1: you felt the way that I felt before they got good,
[2:31] Speaker 1: which was they felt to me in some ways like
[2:35] Speaker 1: the Packers did. And this won't be the same for
[2:38] Speaker 1: you because you were a Yankees fan, but like the
[2:40] Speaker 1: Yankees did to me where y'all say they used to
[2:43] Speaker 1: be good.
[2:45] Speaker 4: Right.
[2:45] Speaker 1: Like, like, like, like, like it felt like forever ago
[2:48] Speaker 1: they were good, except they had only been bad for
[2:50] Speaker 1: like three years.
[2:51] Speaker 2: But it was a formative three years for me.
[2:54] Speaker 1: Right. We watch it like the games on every week.
[2:56] Speaker 1: They go one in 15. I was like, what are
[2:59] Speaker 1: we talking about here?
[3:01] Speaker 5: Right. And that was the thing for me, like the
[3:04] Speaker 5: rise of the Cowboys. Like I didn't grow up with
[3:07] Speaker 5: that like in the 80s as far as the Cowboys
[3:10] Speaker 5: being relevant living in New York. Like for me, it
[3:12] Speaker 5: was obviously Giants still coming off of the 86 Super Bowl.
[3:15] Speaker 5: And then you had the Niners being as dominant as
[3:18] Speaker 5: they were. Like for me, the Cowboys. And the Bears
[3:21] Speaker 5: as well and what they were and Walter Payton, the
[3:24] Speaker 5: Super Bowl shuffle, the whole nine. So for me growing up,
[3:26] Speaker 5: the Cowboys really in the 80s for me in New York,
[3:29] Speaker 5: they really weren't that relevant for me.
[3:31] Speaker 1: Yeah, they might as well have been like Chubby Checker.
[3:35] Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying? Cab Calloway. You know, because
[3:39] Speaker 1: as a small child, all that shit is the same.
[3:42] Speaker 5: Like, for me, a lot of you know, to cut
[3:44] Speaker 5: you off in the same vein, for me, that was
[3:45] Speaker 5: the Packers as well.
[3:46] Speaker 3: Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Like, the Packers, for me, like,
[3:48] Speaker 3: that was.
[3:48] Speaker 5: I'm only looking at old grainy footage of the Packers,
[3:51] Speaker 5: you know, Super Bowl I and II, Vince Lombardi. Like,
[3:54] Speaker 5: for me, it was like, oh, who is this team?
[3:57] Speaker 1: Like, the Packers, for me, were like, by definition, sorry. Now,
[3:59] Speaker 1: keep in mind, with the Packers, though, they went to
[4:01] Speaker 1: the playoffs twice in 20 years. Like after Lombardi, they
[4:04] Speaker 1: had that long run. You remember that Don Makowski year.
[4:07] Speaker 1: It was like, oh, the pack is back. But the Cowboys,
[4:11] Speaker 1: just because of the timing of our youth, may as
[4:14] Speaker 1: well have been the same. But the truth is, they
[4:17] Speaker 1: only had like two, like the Tom Landry years, it
[4:20] Speaker 1: was like the last three.
[4:22] Speaker 2: Two or three. that weren't good. And then it moved
[4:25] Speaker 2: into that new era.
[4:26] Speaker 1: But like the first Cowboys team I ever really remember
[4:29] Speaker 1: watching or knowing anything about was like the 88 Cowboys
[4:33] Speaker 1: when they quarterbacked with Steve Palua. I don't know if people,
[4:37] Speaker 1: even every other Cowboys quarterback, basically, since they got good
[4:41] Speaker 1: in the mid-60s, has been some kind of famous, right?
[4:44] Speaker 1: Craig Morton, Don Meredith, Roger Starbuck, Danny White. Like, you
[4:49] Speaker 1: don't have to know about Danny White if you're young,
[4:50] Speaker 1: but if you talk to people at the time, like,
[4:52] Speaker 1: you know, Danny White was something. Troy Aikman, you know,
[4:56] Speaker 1: threw that run. And then in between was Steve Palua.
[4:59] Speaker 1: but he was my first Cowboys quarterback. He was the
[5:02] Speaker 1: one that I knew of, man.
[5:03] Speaker 2: They were sorry.
[5:04] Speaker 3: Look, I'll take your word for it.
[5:06] Speaker 5: Because look, prior to Ryan hitting me up for this episode,
[5:14] Speaker 5: I had to look up.
[5:14] Speaker 3: Who dude was. I was like, oh, wait a minute.
[5:16] Speaker 3: There was a quarterback.
[5:18] Speaker 1: All I think I know is that he wore number 11.
[5:20] Speaker 1: I don't know what he looked like. He could be
[5:22] Speaker 1: left-handed for all I know. I don't know anything, right?
[5:25] Speaker 2: I just know... That team was sorry.
[5:28] Speaker 3: Yeah.
[5:28] Speaker 1: And then that year that Troy Aikman pulled up, they
[5:32] Speaker 1: was extra sorry. Right. Right.
[5:35] Speaker 5: And, and, and, and two, like, and obviously a lot
[5:38] Speaker 5: of this is documented in the, in the, the Cowboys doc,
[5:40] Speaker 5: but like they were bad, bad. And then obviously now
[5:43] Speaker 5: looking at revisionist history and you talk about Aikman, that's
[5:45] Speaker 5: what wanted to go like, yeah, he was the number
[5:47] Speaker 5: one pick, but it wasn't all glowing for Aikman to start. Like,
[5:50] Speaker 5: not only was he bad, the team was bad. There
[5:53] Speaker 5: wasn't a lot of confidence in him as well for
[5:55] Speaker 5: a guy coming, Coming off being the number one overall pick.
[5:58] Speaker 1: First of all, if I'm not mistaken, the one game
[6:00] Speaker 1: they won that year was a game he did not play.
[6:02] Speaker 1: I think they were 0-11 with him as starting quarterback.
[6:04] Speaker 1: Jimmy was never really sold on him. You know, Jimmy
[6:08] Speaker 1: went and got his guy. He went and got.
[6:11] Speaker 2: Steve Walsh, right?
[6:13] Speaker 1: The same year, they basically spent two number one overall
[6:17] Speaker 1: picks on quarterbacks at the same time.
[6:19] Speaker 2: They took Aikman in the.
[6:20] Speaker 1: Draft draft and they took Steve Walsh in the supplemental
[6:22] Speaker 1: draft with a first round pick that wound up being
[6:25] Speaker 1: worthy of the number one pick. But I'm going to
[6:27] Speaker 1: run this by you because I don't think that this
[6:29] Speaker 1: is something that people quite understand if you are of
[6:33] Speaker 1: a certain of like of our age, which is how
[6:37] Speaker 1: good the Cowboys were when Tom Landry was the coach. OK,
[6:42] Speaker 1: now keep in mind that they only won two Super Bowls.
[6:46] Speaker 2: He went to five. They only won two. And that's
[6:48] Speaker 2: the way we measure people.
[6:49] Speaker 3: Right.
[6:49] Speaker 2: OK, I'm going to give you win totals.
[6:52] Speaker 1: Keep in mind, these are 14, 14 game seasons through
[6:54] Speaker 1: 1976 or is it 1970 through 1977? OK, I'm going
[6:57] Speaker 1: to start in 1966, 10, 3 and 1, 9 and 5,
[7:00] Speaker 1: 12 and 2, 11, 2 and 1, 10 and 4,
[7:01] Speaker 1: 11 and 3. 10 and four, 10 and four, eight
[7:13] Speaker 1: and six, 10 and four, 11 and three, 12 and two,
[7:15] Speaker 1: 12 and four, 11 and five, 12 and four, 12
[7:18] Speaker 1: and four, six and three, 12 and four, nine and seven,
[7:22] Speaker 1: 10 and six. That's 20 years basically through 1985.
[7:26] Speaker 2: That's what they were.
[7:27] Speaker 1: They weren't just kind of good all these years, right?
[7:30] Speaker 1: They were a boss year after year after year. Even
[7:34] Speaker 1: Danny White had three straight years of going to the
[7:37] Speaker 1: NFC Championship game. They didn't win them, but in the
[7:39] Speaker 1: early 80s, if Dwight Clark doesn't make that.
[7:41] Speaker 2: Catch, they're going to the Super Bowl.
[7:44] Speaker 1: They were, all the way through the 70s and through
[7:47] Speaker 1: much of the 80s, really really good and then as
[7:51] Speaker 1: happens like this what happened to tom landry this last
[7:54] Speaker 1: three years was 79 7 and 8 and 13 and
[7:56] Speaker 1: 3 79 and 7 and 8 are not really that
[7:59] Speaker 1: terrible 13 and 3 and then the team gets sold
[8:01] Speaker 1: you know you wind up getting fired but it was
[8:05] Speaker 1: the bill belichick ending basically it's kind of belichick just
[8:07] Speaker 1: without the superbowls i mean i understand that that's a
[8:10] Speaker 1: big gap but just to give you an idea of
[8:12] Speaker 1: what the cowboys meant and we saw none of it
[8:15] Speaker 1: We just pulled up to mediocrity. Right.
[8:18] Speaker 3: Look, I'll take your word for it.
[8:20] Speaker 5: Like, yeah, I knew of Tony Dorsett, but I was
[8:23] Speaker 5: too young to remember him as a player.
[8:25] Speaker 3: Like, I know the 88 Drew Pearson.
[8:27] Speaker 5: Like, I know all of that, but I don't know
[8:29] Speaker 5: it enough, like, to have experienced it when it was
[8:32] Speaker 5: happening in real time.
[8:33] Speaker 1: Or even, like, I was very aware of Herschel Walker
[8:37] Speaker 1: as an idea, but we didn't get great Herschel Walker
[8:40] Speaker 1: out on field.
[8:41] Speaker 3: No, no. Like, for me, it was Herschel Walker, Georgia
[8:44] Speaker 3: Herschel Walker.
[8:44] Speaker 5: That's That's the Herschel Walker that I knew of was
[8:47] Speaker 5: college Herschel Walker.
[8:49] Speaker 1: Yeah, see, I guess I understood the magnitude of Herschel
[8:52] Speaker 1: Walker as, like, best player on Dallas Cowboys, and I
[8:56] Speaker 1: guess also because of the Atlanta nature of my household.
[9:00] Speaker 1: Herschel Walker, you know, Herschel Walker had been a star
[9:02] Speaker 1: to them. He was a junior in high school because
[9:04] Speaker 1: of the newspaper, right? You know, that was kind of
[9:07] Speaker 1: where it was. But they were so bad in that
[9:10] Speaker 1: 1-15 season that Jerry– I don't think we talk enough
[9:14] Speaker 1: about how, like I was just reading this book that
[9:17] Speaker 1: made a point about when the Spanish invaded some of
[9:21] Speaker 1: these folks, that because the people had never seen guns before,
[9:27] Speaker 1: they couldn't even conceptualize what a gun was. Like imagine
[9:31] Speaker 1: you don't know what a gun is. You out here
[9:33] Speaker 1: ready to fight with your spears and your arrows and
[9:36] Speaker 1: everything else. And then this dude points something at you
[9:39] Speaker 1: and the next thing you know, people is dying.
[9:41] Speaker 3: Right.
[9:42] Speaker 1: Like you, you have no concept and no idea of
[9:46] Speaker 1: what you're up against.
[9:47] Speaker 3: Right.
[9:47] Speaker 1: You like, wait a minute, give me a minute here
[9:49] Speaker 1: with that Herschel Walker trade. What I don't think that
[9:51] Speaker 1: people get is that it's not simply that the Cowboys
[9:54] Speaker 1: got a bunch of picks in the draft is that
[9:56] Speaker 1: the cowboy in the trade is that the Cowboys got
[9:58] Speaker 1: a bunch of players in in that trade and there
[10:01] Speaker 1: was a provision that said that if the Cowboys released
[10:05] Speaker 1: those players then they would receive certain picks and the
[10:10] Speaker 1: Vikings thinking was well they're not going.
[10:12] Speaker 2: To get rid of all these perfectly good players. Why
[10:15] Speaker 2: would you ever do such a thing, right?
[10:17] Speaker 1: And Jimmy's plan the whole way was to cut them off.
[10:24] Speaker 2: There was never any plan.
[10:25] Speaker 1: Like Darren Nelson, Jesse Solomon, all these guys.
[10:29] Speaker 2: Never once did he consider keeping them.
[10:32] Speaker 1: Nobody had ever thought of a trade in the way
[10:36] Speaker 1: that they had thought of a trade. And so they
[10:39] Speaker 1: tanked without tanking, right? Like, because it didn't matter. They
[10:42] Speaker 1: didn't have their number one, they didn't have their first
[10:44] Speaker 1: round pick. They gave it up in the supplemental draft.
[10:46] Speaker 2: So they didn't even have any purpose.
[10:48] Speaker 3: And on that, and are we sure? All right. Are
[10:50] Speaker 3: we sure that was all Jimmy's idea, though?
[10:53] Speaker 5: Like, I'm not going to cape for Jerry, not at all,
[10:56] Speaker 5: because Jimmy's the football guy. We sure that was Jimmy's plan,
[10:59] Speaker 5: because we got to give Jerry... Jerry's a shrewd businessman,
[11:02] Speaker 5: so if there's any.
[11:02] Speaker 3: I agree.
[11:03] Speaker 5: Like, looking at this from a business nature, not necessarily football, like,
[11:06] Speaker 5: the idea to put that language in that trade is
[11:09] Speaker 5: a shrewd business move. Now, it's probably Jimmy's idea, but, like,
[11:13] Speaker 5: I wouldn't put it past Jerry to, like... a Texas oil,
[11:15] Speaker 5: like an oil man. Like I wouldn't try to pass
[11:18] Speaker 5: them either.
[11:19] Speaker 2: That's a, that is a fair point, right?
[11:21] Speaker 1: It is entirely possible, but some combination of the two
[11:24] Speaker 1: of them made fools of the Vikings, right?
[11:28] Speaker 2: Like think about this for the Vikings. They lost the players.
[11:31] Speaker 2: And they lost the picks, right?
[11:34] Speaker 1: The Cowboys got the players and played them because why not?
[11:37] Speaker 1: You're not going to have your pick. You don't have
[11:39] Speaker 1: any incentive, really. I guess the later round picks you
[11:41] Speaker 1: have to think about. But then at the end of
[11:42] Speaker 1: the year, man, they cleaned house and got all of
[11:45] Speaker 1: those dudes out of there. And it set up a
[11:49] Speaker 1: crazy run where not only did they have the picks,
[11:52] Speaker 1: they nailed the picks. And so the next year, if
[11:54] Speaker 1: I'm not mistaken, Emmitt Smith was one of those picks.
[11:57] Speaker 1: And he had to be yet because he was drafted
[11:59] Speaker 1: the next year. They go from 1-15 and they go
[12:02] Speaker 1: to 7-9.
[12:04] Speaker 3: Right?
[12:04] Speaker 1: And Emmitt Smith is, I think he ran for like
[12:07] Speaker 1: 900-something yards that year. He was a very good college
[12:11] Speaker 1: player that you weren't necessarily sure was going to turn
[12:13] Speaker 1: into an excellent NFL player. But what we learned in
[12:18] Speaker 1: the year after they went 7-9 and almost made the playoffs,
[12:21] Speaker 1: the next year they made the playoffs, they played against
[12:22] Speaker 1: the Bears, and they won a wild card game against
[12:25] Speaker 1: the Bears.
[12:26] Speaker 2: And then they got smoked by the Detroit.
[12:27] Speaker 1: Lions with Troy Aikman able to play and Jimmy Johnson
[12:31] Speaker 1: playing Steve Burleigh.
[12:35] Speaker 3: Yeah. He was... See, that's my thing. You look back
[12:38] Speaker 3: on it.
[12:39] Speaker 2: Hold up, hold up, hold up. And then after the
[12:41] Speaker 2: game was out of hand, put Troy in.
[12:46] Speaker 3: Like he was trying to, look, he was trying to
[12:48] Speaker 3: force Troy up out of there.
[12:49] Speaker 2: Yeah, he was trying to find any way possible. He
[12:52] Speaker 2: was just like, I just don't know about this guy.
[12:56] Speaker 1: But in that time, what we also learned though, was
[12:59] Speaker 1: they had put together an offensive line. Emmitt Smith was
[13:02] Speaker 1: that dude. And the last first-round pick, I recall, of
[13:06] Speaker 1: the Troy... No, yes, of the Tom Landry era was
[13:09] Speaker 1: Michael Irvin.
[13:10] Speaker 2: Yeah. They were on the way, boys.
[13:13] Speaker 3: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And that's the part of it, too.
[13:15] Speaker 5: Like... not just accumulating those draft picks, as you said,
[13:20] Speaker 5: hitting on those draft picks as well. Like, we talk
[13:22] Speaker 5: about the number of players that were involved, but it
[13:24] Speaker 5: wasn't just the mass number. It's hitting on those guys, too. Like,
[13:28] Speaker 5: you couldn't just go out there and get these numbers.
[13:31] Speaker 5: It was making the right selection, like you said, building
[13:33] Speaker 5: the offensive line, you know, Having the belief in a
[13:36] Speaker 5: guy like Emmitt, who, like you said, there were still
[13:38] Speaker 5: some questions. It wasn't a no-brainer that this guy was
[13:41] Speaker 5: going to hit and him becoming what he became. So
[13:45] Speaker 5: it was absolutely like having a foresight in the player
[13:49] Speaker 5: personnel that Jimmy had turned the Cowboys into what they became.
[13:53] Speaker 1: All right, so let's look at who some of these
[13:55] Speaker 1: players were that the Cowboys got as a result of
[14:00] Speaker 1: this trade.
[14:02] Speaker 2: Emmitt Smith. they got as a result of this trade
[14:05] Speaker 2: they did.
[14:05] Speaker 1: Some other finagling help use some of the picks to
[14:08] Speaker 1: get the number one pick in 91 they got russell
[14:10] Speaker 1: maryland so emma smith the all-time leading rusher russell maryland
[14:13] Speaker 1: a pro bowl um defensive lineman yeah a weird number
[14:18] Speaker 1: one overall pick though like you'll never ever again see
[14:22] Speaker 1: a number one pick where why'd you get him and
[14:24] Speaker 1: we're we're sure he'll be okay Right? Maybe the most
[14:29] Speaker 1: low-ceiling number one overall pick there's ever been. Kevin Smith,
[14:32] Speaker 1: who's the first-round pick with Texas A & M defensive back.
[14:35] Speaker 1: I think he became a pro bowler. Darren Woodson, who
[14:38] Speaker 1: will be a perennial Hall of Fame finalist.
[14:41] Speaker 3: Finalist, yeah.
[14:42] Speaker 2: One of those guys.
[14:44] Speaker 1: Every year, they just gonna toy with that man every year.
[14:47] Speaker 5: Shout out to Darren Woodson. We got him on my
[14:49] Speaker 5: show tomorrow, too. And when I have to send him
[14:51] Speaker 5: my email every year, it's Hall of Fame finalist.
[14:54] Speaker 2: Yeah, hey, man, look. He seemed like a good dude.
[14:58] Speaker 2: You know what I mean? I just don't think he's
[15:00] Speaker 2: a Hall of Famer. And they just keep doing this.
[15:02] Speaker 2: And they keep doing this. And they keep doing this. Oh,
[15:04] Speaker 2: the Vikings got Jake Reed out of the deal. There
[15:08] Speaker 2: you go.
[15:08] Speaker 3: There you go.
[15:09] Speaker 2: HBCU legend.
[15:10] Speaker 3: There you go.
[15:11] Speaker 2: HBCU legend, right?
[15:14] Speaker 1: But they made a rise in a way that I
[15:21] Speaker 1: don't think I fully grasped how polarizing the Cowboys were
[15:24] Speaker 1: as an entity at that point, because again, they had
[15:26] Speaker 1: been sorry, but also I felt like it was a
[15:29] Speaker 1: rise that made the team somewhat endearing, right?
[15:33] Speaker 2: Like it was rapid, but there were.
[15:35] Speaker 1: Still steps like, you know, to, to like, we watched
[15:38] Speaker 1: them go a little bit up a little bit up
[15:40] Speaker 1: in that time period. And again, 1992 became a crazy
[15:46] Speaker 1: year to think about, right?
[15:47] Speaker 2: Like the 49ers, they've been down a couple years.
[15:50] Speaker 1: Washington in 91, and for those of you who are unaware,
[15:53] Speaker 1: probably the best football team I've ever seen.
[15:56] Speaker 2: Was the 91 Washington team.
[15:59] Speaker 1: And there's no explaining to you why.
[16:02] Speaker 2: Like showing you the list of players isn't going to
[16:04] Speaker 2: do it.
[16:05] Speaker 1: You kind of just had to be there.
[16:07] Speaker 2: They were crazy.
[16:08] Speaker 1: Unreal.
[16:08] Speaker 2: And the one game they lost.
[16:10] Speaker 5: And they hit like that year and they hit like
[16:13] Speaker 5: Mark Rippon was going to have a season like he
[16:15] Speaker 5: did that year.
[16:15] Speaker 2: No, no, no.
[16:18] Speaker 1: And the Cowboys beat him that year. And the Cowboys
[16:21] Speaker 1: beat him that year. But you got to 92 and
[16:24] Speaker 1: the 49ers now we're back.
[16:26] Speaker 3: Right.
[16:26] Speaker 2: They had gone through the Joe Montana, Steve Young transition.
[16:30] Speaker 1: So in 1990, the Giants beat the 49ers in the
[16:34] Speaker 1: NFC Championship game 10 to 9. Joe Montana got broken half.
[16:38] Speaker 1: Leonard Marshall hit him so hard in the back. Like
[16:40] Speaker 1: they don't let you.
[16:41] Speaker 2: Do that no more. Right.
[16:44] Speaker 3: Like that's roughing the passer.
[16:46] Speaker 2: Oh, my God. That's roughing the passer. Even though it
[16:49] Speaker 2: was in the course of the play.
[16:51] Speaker 3: Right.
[16:51] Speaker 1: He breaks Joe Montana in half. The Giants win the
[16:54] Speaker 1: Super Bowl that year. Washington wins the next year. Steve Young,
[16:57] Speaker 1: who they've had on ice for three years, three, four years,
[17:01] Speaker 1: just waiting, right? He now gets to be the starter.
[17:05] Speaker 1: The 49ers eventually have to trade Montana. I would say
[17:08] Speaker 1: they trade him at the end of 92 because Joe's like,
[17:10] Speaker 1: I can still play. And they're like, yo, we've moved on.
[17:12] Speaker 1: Just so you understand, even Joe Montana, they could do
[17:15] Speaker 1: that too. Steve Young comes in. mvp caliber player and
[17:20] Speaker 1: now it's 92 the 49ers are back jerry rice is
[17:23] Speaker 1: as good as he has ever been they they play
[17:27] Speaker 1: the cowboys in the 92 nfc championship game and jimmy
[17:30] Speaker 1: johnson has said that for that game um they knew
[17:33] Speaker 1: that was the super bowl when nobody really tripping on
[17:37] Speaker 1: whatever was going on over there buffalo i think they
[17:40] Speaker 1: played the dolphins that year i can't remember what they
[17:42] Speaker 1: were like hey man That ain't even really no thing here.
[17:45] Speaker 2: The game is here.
[17:47] Speaker 1: And, boy, like, I didn't appreciate it fully at the time,
[17:50] Speaker 1: but I did, of course, as the years went. And
[17:51] Speaker 1: really looking back on it now, the idea that you
[17:54] Speaker 1: had the old dynasty and the new dynasty and the
[17:57] Speaker 1: old dynasty never really slipped.
[17:59] Speaker 2: They had a year where they missed the playoffs, but
[18:00] Speaker 2: they went 10-6. You know what I mean?
[18:03] Speaker 5: And it's funny you bring up 92 because that was really, like,
[18:05] Speaker 5: for me as a Giant fan– that was really like
[18:08] Speaker 5: the first year of my dislike for the Dallas Cowboys.
[18:12] Speaker 5: Because like, although I'm a Giants fan, I like the
[18:15] Speaker 5: 49ers as well.
[18:15] Speaker 3: How could you not? Like Jerry Rice, whenever you're out
[18:18] Speaker 3: there in the.
[18:18] Speaker 5: Street, I'm Jerry Rice. If I'm a receiver, I'm Jerry Rice.
[18:20] Speaker 5: If I'm a quarterback, I'm Joe Montana or whatever. So
[18:23] Speaker 5: like the 49ers were the 49ers. And then here comes
[18:26] Speaker 5: this team that I hadn't really checked for because in
[18:29] Speaker 5: the NFC East for me growing up, Eagles, Redskins, those
[18:33] Speaker 5: were the teams that I looked at as more of
[18:37] Speaker 5: the opponents there for the Giants. And then you had
[18:39] Speaker 5: this Cowboys team that's like, wait a minute, hold on,
[18:41] Speaker 5: where did these guys come from?
[18:43] Speaker 3: And how dare you? How dare you?
[18:45] Speaker 5: The unmitigated goal to go out here and play the
[18:48] Speaker 5: 49ers in this NFC Championship game.
[18:50] Speaker 2: How dare you?
[18:52] Speaker 1: By the way, right fast, because you mentioned Jerry Rice,
[18:54] Speaker 1: who I think is, at worst, the second best football
[18:58] Speaker 1: player who ever lived.
[19:00] Speaker 2: I think you go look at it numerically, there's no.
[19:03] Speaker 1: Nobody's ever, like, nobody's ever catching him for any of
[19:06] Speaker 1: the stuff that he did, and he did it in
[19:07] Speaker 1: the era where they didn't really throw the ball like.
[19:09] Speaker 3: That, right?
[19:10] Speaker 1: You realize how crazy it is that you can show somebody, like,
[19:13] Speaker 1: show somebody the best five-minute video of Randy Moss on YouTube,
[19:16] Speaker 1: and then try to explain he's number two.
[19:20] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm. Right. And try to explain what the DBs were
[19:26] Speaker 3: allowed to do. Yes.
[19:28] Speaker 5: The DBs and the hits that the safeties were allowed
[19:32] Speaker 5: to employ on the wide receivers at that time.
[19:35] Speaker 3: Right.
[19:36] Speaker 1: Like when people talk about Randy Moss, they're like, yo,
[19:38] Speaker 1: you know, we always shaded the safety over that way.
[19:40] Speaker 1: I don't hear people talk about Jerry Rice like.
[19:42] Speaker 2: That because that didn't matter. It didn't matter what you
[19:45] Speaker 2: was doing.
[19:47] Speaker 3: No, no.
[19:48] Speaker 5: It was easily the most unguardable offensively player. as a
[19:52] Speaker 5: wide receiver in history. And that's the thing, too. It's like,
[19:55] Speaker 5: because you bring up Randy Moss, like, at least with Moss, like,
[19:57] Speaker 5: he had the measurables. Like, you look at Moss and
[19:59] Speaker 5: he walks into a room, it's like, oh.
[20:01] Speaker 3: Oh, that dude. Like, Jerry, not the same way.
[20:03] Speaker 5: So for him, the route running, the catching, the run,
[20:06] Speaker 5: they always talk about he's faster after he catches the ball. Like,
[20:08] Speaker 5: all of those stories. And then you look at Jerry Rice,
[20:11] Speaker 5: it's like, okay, You look at the highlights, that makes sense. Oh,
[20:13] Speaker 5: that's why Jerry Rice is who Jerry Rice is.
[20:15] Speaker 2: Just the illest, right? Yeah, right. Just the illest.
[20:19] Speaker 1: But you know what's interesting to look back on with
[20:21] Speaker 1: those Cowboys teams in terms of style of play? Because
[20:24] Speaker 1: I'm getting to kind of like personality and stuff like
[20:26] Speaker 1: that after the break. But what's interesting to me about
[20:30] Speaker 1: them is Jimmy Johnson football is not an exciting brand
[20:35] Speaker 1: of football, right? It wasn't exciting at Miami. It wasn't
[20:39] Speaker 1: exciting with the Cowboys. They had a pop tool, right?
[20:44] Speaker 2: Like, they was it. They was them.
[20:46] Speaker 1: But in the end, we're going to run the ball
[20:49] Speaker 1: over and over and over again. And then on defense,
[20:53] Speaker 1: we're going to rush four and we're going to drop seven.
[20:56] Speaker 2: Why? Because our players... are better than yours. That is
[21:00] Speaker 2: our strategic advantage.
[21:02] Speaker 3: Well, then that goes back to Jerry.
[21:03] Speaker 5: I mean, excuse me, with Jimmy and his scouting and
[21:06] Speaker 5: his player evaluation. The fact that we didn't have to
[21:08] Speaker 5: do all this other extra stuff because when we step
[21:11] Speaker 5: out here, no matter if we're offensive defense, the 11
[21:13] Speaker 5: guys that we put down here is better than the
[21:15] Speaker 5: 11 guys you're going to put out here. What you
[21:16] Speaker 5: going to do about it?
[21:17] Speaker 3: Here you go. Boom. Stop it. We're going to run it. Here,
[21:19] Speaker 3: we're going to give it to Emmitt 40 times. Go ahead.
[21:21] Speaker 3: Stop it. Aikman's going to pass it maybe 15 times.
[21:26] Speaker 2: Bro, well, think about this, right?
[21:28] Speaker 1: And I think most people know, there's people who don't know,
[21:30] Speaker 1: Jimmy coached at Miami before he got to Dallas.
[21:35] Speaker 2: University of Miami.
[21:36] Speaker 1: Howard Schnellenberger starts the era, but the U is born
[21:40] Speaker 1: truly as a brand, as a personality, as an entity.
[21:42] Speaker 2: That is with Jimmy.
[21:46] Speaker 1: Jimmy somehow was able to treat the NFL like it
[21:51] Speaker 1: was when he was coaching Miami as an independent. Every week,
[21:57] Speaker 1: we are going to have better players than you, right?
[22:02] Speaker 1: And if what we do is we execute what we
[22:06] Speaker 1: do with our better players, You will not be able
[22:09] Speaker 1: to beat us. You are not supposed to be able
[22:12] Speaker 1: to do that in the NFL. Even if this is
[22:14] Speaker 1: the pre-free agency era, right? Like the Steelers managed to
[22:18] Speaker 1: do this because they had that unreal draft run, right?
[22:21] Speaker 2: Where they were just out here drafting Swann, Stallworth, Elsie Greenwood, Melville.
[22:25] Speaker 2: Just everybody.
[22:26] Speaker 3: Hall of Fame draft classes, right? Hall of Fame draft classes, right.
[22:29] Speaker 2: Right, like with three or four at the same time, right?
[22:31] Speaker 3: Right.
[22:32] Speaker 1: Okay, maybe you can pull this. But by the 90s,
[22:35] Speaker 1: you're not supposed to be able to just say, how
[22:37] Speaker 1: about we just line them up and see who's best?
[22:44] Speaker 2: What do you say?
[22:44] Speaker 3: I like our guy's chances. Go ahead. That's cute. That's cute.
[22:48] Speaker 3: Go ahead. That's cute. Oh, your little run defense. Oh,
[22:52] Speaker 3: that's cute. Have you seen my offensive line?
[22:53] Speaker 1: Yo, Jimmy's shit is like, we could have won this
[22:58] Speaker 1: if it was tech bowl bowl, right? If we got
[23:01] Speaker 1: four plays and y'all got four plays and you just
[23:04] Speaker 1: got to figure out what four plays we're going to,
[23:07] Speaker 1: we're going to run, right? We'll beat everybody that way.
[23:11] Speaker 1: If you want it, if that's how you want to
[23:13] Speaker 1: do it, we'll do it. And the other interesting part
[23:16] Speaker 1: to me, and of course, like you have Aikman, you
[23:18] Speaker 1: have Emmett Smith, you have Michael Irvin, right? Those three
[23:21] Speaker 1: hall of famers that would, you know, talk about it
[23:24] Speaker 1: here about the offensive line and everything else. But when
[23:27] Speaker 1: you really stop and think about them, especially on defense,
[23:30] Speaker 1: that wasn't about superstars. Like, who do you think is
[23:35] Speaker 1: the best of that run? I guess they went and
[23:37] Speaker 1: got Charles Haley, and that's an interesting one. But he's
[23:42] Speaker 1: a guy that I don't count in a way because
[23:44] Speaker 1: he's not one of the dudes that came through the
[23:46] Speaker 1: rise of what this team was.
[23:49] Speaker 2: Like, who's the best of those defensive guys? Is it
[23:51] Speaker 2: Russell Maryland? Like, who are we talking about? Jim Jeffcoat?
[23:54] Speaker 3: Ken Norton, maybe?
[23:55] Speaker 2: Ken Norton, yeah.
[23:56] Speaker 3: In that vein, right.
[23:57] Speaker 2: We're not talking about Hall of Fame players.
[24:00] Speaker 3: Right?
[24:00] Speaker 2: I think that's a big part of why there's the
[24:02] Speaker 2: push for Darren Woodson.
[24:03] Speaker 1: Often is because somebody over here has got to be
[24:06] Speaker 1: a hall of famer, right? Even that offensive line, Larry
[24:09] Speaker 1: Allen went to the hall of fame, but he was
[24:11] Speaker 1: only on one of those Superbowl teams. Like the, while
[24:15] Speaker 1: they had better players, it also was a case that
[24:18] Speaker 1: the sum was greater than the whole of the, the
[24:20] Speaker 1: whole is greater than the sum of the parts.
[24:22] Speaker 3: Right. Right.
[24:23] Speaker 2: I almost had a George W. Bush moment right there.
[24:27] Speaker 3: I'm sure a saying in Tennessee too.
[24:30] Speaker 1: Yes. Yes. But they had a collection of guys. Now,
[24:36] Speaker 1: you had dudes like Eric Williams, Nate Newton.
[24:40] Speaker 2: They had guys. I'm not saying the guys weren't good.
[24:42] Speaker 5: And they had guys that might not have been Hall
[24:44] Speaker 5: of Famers, but they were perennial Pro Bowlers. You look
[24:46] Speaker 5: at the 90s teams, whenever you would have, because whenever
[24:49] Speaker 5: I would play Tecmo Bowl or whatever... And every year
[24:53] Speaker 5: it's either it's the full NFC Pro Bowl is Cowboys
[24:56] Speaker 5: in the 49ers. Like that was that was in the 90s.
[24:59] Speaker 5: So like you said, even though they weren't Hall of Famers,
[25:01] Speaker 5: those guys up and down the line, whether it was
[25:03] Speaker 5: offensive line or some of the defensive guys were still
[25:05] Speaker 5: Pro Bowl caliber players.
[25:07] Speaker 3: Wouldn't that still matter?
[25:08] Speaker 1: Yeah, they they they they did a lot. They got
[25:12] Speaker 1: a lot of it done at one time. And coming
[25:15] Speaker 1: up next, we'll talk about the next fun part of
[25:17] Speaker 1: it is we'll talk about. Obviously, you got Aikman, you
[25:20] Speaker 1: got Smith, you got Irvin. But what you also have
[25:22] Speaker 1: is the personality of this team, which is kind of
[25:25] Speaker 1: unlike anything we've seen since.
[25:27] Speaker 2: Coming up next.
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[27:57] Speaker 1: All right, we are back with Shannon Penn talking about
[28:01] Speaker 1: the Cowboys dynasty of the 1990s. One thing that's always
[28:03] Speaker 1: very interesting to me is hearing Troy Aikman talk about
[28:07] Speaker 1: Michael Irvin. And the recognition of Michael Irvin as leader
[28:13] Speaker 1: and the importance of having Michael Irvin to him as
[28:16] Speaker 1: a quarterback.
[28:16] Speaker 2: Because if you go back and look at the numbers for.
[28:19] Speaker 1: Those Cowboys teams, basically, if they were passing the ball,
[28:23] Speaker 1: they were throwing the ball to Michael Irvin.
[28:25] Speaker 3: Right.
[28:25] Speaker 1: Right.
[28:26] Speaker 2: We're like, you got to remember, they didn't pass the
[28:28] Speaker 2: ball much.
[28:29] Speaker 1: And Troy Aikman had one season over 20 touchdowns in
[28:32] Speaker 1: his whole career.
[28:33] Speaker 2: Fun fact that people do not know. But Michael Irvin
[28:36] Speaker 2: was by and large getting his numbers.
[28:38] Speaker 1: And you've seen that clip where he talks about where
[28:41] Speaker 1: he got to cuss and explain to them dudes, I.
[28:42] Speaker 2: Played when there was pain. And that's real, right? Like
[28:48] Speaker 2: nobody in the league anymore.
[28:49] Speaker 1: There used to be a league where, what do you
[28:51] Speaker 1: say about that guy? Man, he make the hard catches.
[28:55] Speaker 1: there aren't hard like we don't i'm not saying catches
[28:57] Speaker 1: are easy now but we don't have like them hospital
[29:00] Speaker 1: balls ain't what they were back in the day michael
[29:03] Speaker 1: irvin made the hard catches on a team where everybody
[29:08] Speaker 1: knew that the ball was going to.
[29:10] Speaker 5: Him absolutely and that's the thing too with with irvin
[29:13] Speaker 5: and obviously we'll get to jerry but But Irvin was
[29:17] Speaker 5: the spirit of those teams. Like, even– I mean, he
[29:19] Speaker 5: was on those bad Cowboys teams. Like, he was the
[29:21] Speaker 5: spirit of it. So then when they then brought in Jimmy,
[29:23] Speaker 5: they were able to usher in some of that same–
[29:26] Speaker 5: that spirit and emotion that you saw Jimmy have and
[29:30] Speaker 5: Irvin have with those Miami teams.
[29:32] Speaker 3: And then he brought that– and.
[29:34] Speaker 5: That leadership value, too, that leadership aspect to the Cowboys
[29:37] Speaker 5: when they were starting.
[29:38] Speaker 3: To get good.
[29:39] Speaker 5: You know, given– the Aikman, that confidence when he knew
[29:42] Speaker 5: the head coach didn't have that with him, but still
[29:44] Speaker 5: giving him the confidence.
[29:45] Speaker 3: And of course he's a playmaker.
[29:47] Speaker 5: So when he knew he was getting the ball going,
[29:48] Speaker 5: the ball was going to him, he was going to
[29:49] Speaker 5: make the plays because they weren't throwing at a time.
[29:52] Speaker 1: I think that Michael Irvin has an argument for being
[29:57] Speaker 1: like culturally a The most significant football player that there
[30:01] Speaker 1: has ever been. Not saying he is all the way,
[30:05] Speaker 1: but he has an argument like we don't. The line
[30:09] Speaker 1: I've used is like, what if Jalen Rose was a
[30:13] Speaker 1: first ballot Hall of Fame type of player?
[30:15] Speaker 3: Right.
[30:15] Speaker 2: So think about this.
[30:17] Speaker 1: The influence of the university of Miami on the culture
[30:20] Speaker 1: of college football, right? Like that was, it takes a
[30:23] Speaker 1: nation of billions to hold us back type shit where
[30:24] Speaker 1: they were like this, they became something in the NCAA
[30:28] Speaker 1: was like, this has to stop.
[30:30] Speaker 2: And this has to stop right now.
[30:32] Speaker 1: But the truth is, the dominant culture in football really
[30:37] Speaker 1: over the last 35 years has been the culture of
[30:40] Speaker 1: the state of Florida, right? Like when you started looking
[30:42] Speaker 1: around and looking up and it's all these dudes with
[30:44] Speaker 1: goals and all these dudes who dread like Florida became
[30:47] Speaker 1: the football when Atlanta became the rap.
[30:49] Speaker 2: Like it was, it influenced everything it touched. And even
[30:51] Speaker 2: if Michael Irvin.
[30:52] Speaker 1: Did not fit the archetype of that, the attitude of
[30:55] Speaker 1: Florida of state of Florida football was the attitude of
[30:58] Speaker 1: the university of Miami, even Florida state, which was mean
[31:03] Speaker 1: trafficking and very similar players and billy bobby bowden was
[31:06] Speaker 1: a very live and let live sort of dude no
[31:08] Speaker 1: no no no it was the miami hurricane starting really
[31:12] Speaker 1: in 1985 right that's the year they went to oklahoma
[31:17] Speaker 1: it would have punked them at midfield right that is
[31:20] Speaker 1: the beginning of the u era as far as i'm
[31:23] Speaker 1: concerned and the personification of that is Michael Irvin, right?
[31:27] Speaker 2: Like, of course, you had Melvin Bratton, you had Alonzo Highsmith.
[31:29] Speaker 2: It's not like there aren't other dudes.
[31:30] Speaker 1: But Irvin then takes this to the NFL and the
[31:34] Speaker 1: Cowboys become the Miami of this. And I think, yes,
[31:38] Speaker 1: some of that's about Jimmy because Jimmy kind of liked
[31:40] Speaker 1: that stuff. Jimmy enjoyed, like, running up the score on
[31:42] Speaker 1: people and everything else.
[31:44] Speaker 2: But no, no, no.
[31:44] Speaker 1: The center of this is Michael Irvin. And a big
[31:46] Speaker 1: part of that is, is Michael Irvin will tell you
[31:48] Speaker 1: he's a winner, dawg. Everything around Michael Irvin, man, that
[31:54] Speaker 1: dude worked hard. That dude put in the grind. That
[31:57] Speaker 1: dude did the difficult.
[31:59] Speaker 2: Things, right? That dude had a, shall we call it,
[32:02] Speaker 2: savvy understanding of power dynamics.
[32:05] Speaker 3: Yes.
[32:05] Speaker 2: Who to push.
[32:06] Speaker 1: Back on and who not to push back on and
[32:10] Speaker 1: the likes and everything else. But the truth is, he
[32:14] Speaker 1: was every bit as good as he said he was.
[32:17] Speaker 2: In a way that was like old school, very old school.
[32:21] Speaker 5: And like this whole Cowboys thing don't hit without Michael Irvin.
[32:24] Speaker 5: Like it don't hit in the same way. Not saying
[32:26] Speaker 5: they wouldn't have been good. It don't hit the same
[32:28] Speaker 5: way because like he brought that The confidence. I'm not
[32:32] Speaker 5: going to use the word swagger because that gets you overused.
[32:34] Speaker 5: But he brought that confidence and that standard to the Cowboys. Like, hey,
[32:38] Speaker 5: like you said, I'm a winner and we should be winning.
[32:41] Speaker 5: And I'm not going to accept anything less than winning. Like, yes,
[32:44] Speaker 5: you might seem loud or whatever, but I'm putting in
[32:47] Speaker 5: the work. And why aren't you putting in that same
[32:49] Speaker 5: level of work? Because I'm about winning, dog. So if
[32:52] Speaker 5: you ain't about winning, we bring in a coach who's
[32:55] Speaker 5: about winning, who's about to do anything possible to get
[32:58] Speaker 5: these dubs.
[32:59] Speaker 1: And he handed Jimmy Johnson a list of the dudes
[33:02] Speaker 1: that needed to go.
[33:03] Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah.
[33:04] Speaker 1: When he shows up, he was like, these guys are losers.
[33:08] Speaker 1: And we need to get them out of here. Because
[33:12] Speaker 1: that was the thing about the Canes. Look, man, one
[33:14] Speaker 1: thing about that Miami era we don't talk enough about
[33:16] Speaker 1: is they suffered some horribly embarrassing losses along the way.
[33:20] Speaker 2: There's the 92 Sugar Bowl.
[33:21] Speaker 1: There's the 85 Sugar Bowl against Tennessee where they lost
[33:25] Speaker 1: like 38 to 9. There's the 86 Fiesta Bowl, you know,
[33:28] Speaker 1: where they took that L. They Michael Irvin been through
[33:31] Speaker 1: some football things.
[33:32] Speaker 3: Right.
[33:33] Speaker 2: Like he got in.
[33:33] Speaker 1: He got that national championship in 87. They didn't get
[33:36] Speaker 1: in 86 where they were supposed to.
[33:38] Speaker 3: Right.
[33:38] Speaker 1: And I remember him after that game in 86 being
[33:41] Speaker 1: out there doing the interviews after they had been so
[33:42] Speaker 1: obnoxious the whole way and like owning the fact that
[33:46] Speaker 1: they did not get it. Like that dude learned the
[33:48] Speaker 1: hard way what it takes in order to get it.
[33:51] Speaker 2: He suffered through a one in 15 season. in the NFL.
[33:54] Speaker 2: He went through all of that, and man, he was good.
[33:58] Speaker 1: Like, I just can't, and again, not in a way
[34:01] Speaker 1: where you're going to see, like, unreal footage of how
[34:04] Speaker 1: good he was.
[34:05] Speaker 2: It's just going to be like, damn, he caught another one, huh?
[34:07] Speaker 5: And that's the thing, because it wasn't the cumulative numbers. Like,
[34:10] Speaker 5: it was the important, like, the playmaker. Like, it was
[34:13] Speaker 5: making plays when they counted most, because he wasn't going
[34:15] Speaker 5: to put up numbers because they didn't pass at the
[34:17] Speaker 5: same level as some of the other receivers of his time.
[34:20] Speaker 5: But it was like, all right, we need a big play,
[34:21] Speaker 5: big third down. Let's go to Michael Irvin. You saw
[34:24] Speaker 5: it in some of those 49er games. You saw it
[34:26] Speaker 5: in some of those playoff games against the Packers.
[34:27] Speaker 3: Hey, we need a big catch. Hey, go to Michael Irvin.
[34:30] Speaker 2: Hey, when there was pain.
[34:33] Speaker 1: He's like, these little youngsters, you are not going to
[34:40] Speaker 1: minimize this bang eight, dog.
[34:42] Speaker 2: No, sir.
[34:43] Speaker 1: When there was pain. Then we also have Emmitt Smith.
[34:49] Speaker 1: And as I look back on it, I don't think
[34:53] Speaker 1: we gave Emmitt Smith enough credit at the time. And
[34:55] Speaker 1: I think especially because Barry Sanders looks so incredible that,
[35:01] Speaker 1: you know, the argument very frequently was, well, what if
[35:03] Speaker 1: Barry Sanders got to play behind the Cowboys offensive line,
[35:07] Speaker 1: which is fair. I also think that the Lions were
[35:10] Speaker 1: better in that era than the, they got credit for
[35:13] Speaker 1: being with Barry Sanders. Like they were not, this was
[35:16] Speaker 1: not the Joey Harrington lions that he was playing for.
[35:19] Speaker 1: They were not great, but they were not, they were
[35:22] Speaker 1: not abject, right? Like he was not just out there
[35:24] Speaker 1: entirely by himself, but that is the comparison that Emmitt
[35:27] Speaker 1: Smith always had to deal with.
[35:29] Speaker 2: And it was almost held against him that he was
[35:31] Speaker 2: so durable, right?
[35:33] Speaker 1: Like the, you could just keep giving them the ball,
[35:34] Speaker 1: but if a hole was there, he was going to
[35:36] Speaker 1: hit it and he was going to hit it quick.
[35:38] Speaker 1: And next thing you know, like you don't become the
[35:40] Speaker 1: all time leading rusher in the history of NFL. without
[35:43] Speaker 1: being a beast. You don't win a Russian title in
[35:45] Speaker 1: 14 games without being an actual factual beast.
[35:48] Speaker 5: Right. And, too, because it didn't look like Barry Sanders did.
[35:52] Speaker 5: Like I mentioned before, when we out here in the
[35:54] Speaker 5: streets playing, if you were quarterback, you wanted to be Montana.
[35:57] Speaker 5: If you were wide receiver, you wanted to be Rice.
[35:59] Speaker 5: If you were running back, you wanted to be Barry Sanders.
[36:01] Speaker 5: No one, and I mean it, no one was out
[36:02] Speaker 5: there saying, yo, I'm Emmitt Smith.
[36:04] Speaker 2: Right.
[36:06] Speaker 3: Like, look, you weren't the Cowboys in the 90s.
[36:08] Speaker 5: No one wanted to be Emmitt Smith, but he just
[36:11] Speaker 5: went about his business because he didn't look like Barry Sanders.
[36:14] Speaker 1: Well, especially if you playing against like an imaginary person,
[36:16] Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying?
[36:18] Speaker 2: Like all you're doing is just running in straight lines
[36:20] Speaker 2: if you're Smith. Like you're Barry Sanders, you're out here spinning,
[36:23] Speaker 2: you know, like unreal stuff. That's all I'm talking about.
[36:26] Speaker 2: I can't imagine going in the backyard pretending to be
[36:28] Speaker 2: Tom Brady. What, just standing there?
[36:30] Speaker 3: Right, exactly.
[36:31] Speaker 5: Like I'm not out here in the streets like being
[36:33] Speaker 5: applauded for being a patient running back.
[36:35] Speaker 3: No. I'm out here juking. I'm trying to break ankles.
[36:39] Speaker 1: Nah, that dude was so good. All that dude was
[36:43] Speaker 1: so good. And he has, for me, one of the
[36:46] Speaker 1: most memorable running back games ever. And it's the type
[36:49] Speaker 1: of game that nobody is ever going, why you doing that?
[36:52] Speaker 2: Why you doing that?
[36:53] Speaker 3: Why you doing that? I want to see which game
[36:56] Speaker 3: you're referring to.
[36:56] Speaker 2: Why you doing that?
[36:57] Speaker 3: I got a feeling I know which one it's going
[36:59] Speaker 3: to be, but go ahead. Go ahead. Tell us, Bo.
[37:02] Speaker 3: Which game is it?
[37:03] Speaker 1: It is the type of a gladiator performance that we
[37:07] Speaker 1: don't see from running backs anymore. And it is the
[37:11] Speaker 1: last game of the season at Giant Stadium, 1993.
[37:17] Speaker 2: Smith and the Giants.
[37:19] Speaker 1: And sometime toward the end of the first half, I
[37:21] Speaker 1: believe it was, they threw him and Smith on the ground.
[37:24] Speaker 1: He had a separated shoulder that he clearly could not
[37:27] Speaker 1: move at all. He could only move it enough to
[37:30] Speaker 1: take a handoff, basically. And they tied that arm up,
[37:35] Speaker 1: a la Lawrence Taylor in the Superdome against the Saints.
[37:39] Speaker 1: And they just kept giving the ball to Emmitt Smith
[37:42] Speaker 1: over and over again in the second half and just
[37:44] Speaker 1: pounded the Giants to win the NFC East and ultimately
[37:48] Speaker 1: go win the Super Bowl.
[37:49] Speaker 5: How you let this dude with one arm beat you?
[37:52] Speaker 5: That was my thing. I gave no credit, no praise
[37:56] Speaker 5: to Emmitt Smith. My thing was I was so pissed
[37:58] Speaker 5: off and annoyed. You knew he was hurt. Everybody knew.
[38:01] Speaker 5: And you let this dude with one arm beat you.
[38:04] Speaker 5: And it wasn't like they kept feeding him with one arm.
[38:08] Speaker 3: What are you doing? No strip. You couldn't punch him. Nothing.
[38:13] Speaker 3: What are we doing here?
[38:14] Speaker 1: First of all, you have to be that dude for
[38:16] Speaker 1: them to be like, I know you got one arm.
[38:19] Speaker 2: And we still going to give you the ball.
[38:21] Speaker 3: And we still going to beat them dudes. They still.
[38:26] Speaker 2: I can't imagine how insulting that was.
[38:29] Speaker 3: Bro, like, try to explain that.
[38:30] Speaker 5: It's like you feel like you're the damn Harrison Ford
[38:33] Speaker 5: in The Fugitive. Like, yo, we just lost to a
[38:35] Speaker 5: one-armed man. Like, what are we out here doing? Like,
[38:38] Speaker 5: come on.
[38:38] Speaker 4: Like, what?
[38:40] Speaker 3: To this day, bro. To this day.
[38:41] Speaker 5: That's how I knew exactly what game he was talking about.
[38:44] Speaker 3: Like, he had one hand, man, and one arm.
[38:46] Speaker 2: So the thing is, I knew you would know what
[38:49] Speaker 2: game it was.
[38:49] Speaker 1: I did not know, however, what an acute memory it
[38:52] Speaker 1: was for you.
[38:54] Speaker 3: No, it wasn't like he was rotating the ball.
[38:56] Speaker 5: He kept the ball in the same strong hand because
[38:58] Speaker 5: he couldn't put it in his other hand.
[39:00] Speaker 3: You knew that. And you still allowed it to happen.
[39:03] Speaker 2: Hey, Jess.
[39:04] Speaker 3: Like.
[39:05] Speaker 1: There's nothing more demoralizing, and that's something this generation will
[39:08] Speaker 1: never understand than the good old nine-minute drive.
[39:12] Speaker 2: You remember back when it would just be nine-minute drives?
[39:15] Speaker 3: Demoralizing.
[39:15] Speaker 2: We're just going to line up in the eye, and
[39:18] Speaker 2: we're going to pound y'all over and over again.
[39:23] Speaker 5: And that and that's worse like if you if it's
[39:24] Speaker 5: a big play drive like there's a shock value to
[39:27] Speaker 5: it like i can't believe it just happened and you
[39:28] Speaker 5: move on i'll be getting the ball back when you
[39:30] Speaker 5: have these demoralizing eight nine minute long drives and you
[39:34] Speaker 5: just beat down to hell and and you got your
[39:36] Speaker 5: third team defensive lineman out there because the other guys
[39:39] Speaker 5: are winded and.
[39:40] Speaker 3: They still just giving it to you.
[39:43] Speaker 5: And then you turn around and look, and it's a
[39:45] Speaker 5: one-armed man that's doing it to you.
[39:49] Speaker 3: On national television. On national television, too.
[39:52] Speaker 2: Everybody saw it.
[39:53] Speaker 3: I was so.
[39:55] Speaker 1: And the Giants weren't supposed to be good that year.
[39:57] Speaker 1: I think that was Dan Reed's first year.
[39:59] Speaker 5: Right.
[40:00] Speaker 1: Either way, y'all thought y'all was.
[40:03] Speaker 2: Going to win a division, and y'all didn't.
[40:06] Speaker 3: Should have won a division.
[40:07] Speaker 1: Could have won a division, except for the fact that
[40:10] Speaker 1: Emmitt Smith was that dude that day.
[40:13] Speaker 2: It was that dude that day. And keep in mind,
[40:15] Speaker 2: his shoulder didn't get unseparated, right? I guess they got
[40:18] Speaker 2: a bye week, but they went and won the Super
[40:21] Speaker 2: Bowl again. And that was the one.
[40:24] Speaker 1: They beat the 49ers in the 92 season. And that
[40:27] Speaker 1: was a... They beat them at Candlestick Park. It felt
[40:32] Speaker 1: like a changing of the guard, but it didn't feel
[40:34] Speaker 1: fair to call it a change of the guard.
[40:36] Speaker 2: The 49ers had already been down for a year.
[40:37] Speaker 3: Um.
[40:40] Speaker 1: The 49ers were the best team in the NFC that
[40:43] Speaker 1: regular season. It was like, okay, you won the game.
[40:47] Speaker 3: 93?
[40:47] Speaker 2: 93 felt like a change into the guard.
[40:49] Speaker 3: That was different. Beat them. That was different. That was different.
[40:52] Speaker 5: And I think a lot of that, too, came from
[40:54] Speaker 5: that winning. More than even the Super Bowl. It was
[40:57] Speaker 5: beating the 49ers in 92. And it was like, oh,
[41:00] Speaker 5: there's nobody out here that can beat us.
[41:02] Speaker 3: Like, yeah.
[41:03] Speaker 5: From that 92 NFC Championship on, it was like, oh,
[41:06] Speaker 5: this is different.
[41:07] Speaker 3: Like, this is different. It don't matter what you guys doing.
[41:10] Speaker 3: Y'all not beating us.
[41:12] Speaker 2: Yeah. And they weren't.
[41:14] Speaker 1: Like, I remember there was a play. I think it
[41:16] Speaker 1: was to Ricky Waters. And this is what I knew.
[41:18] Speaker 1: It was like, oh, man, y'all just finished.
[41:21] Speaker 2: It was a toss play to Ricky Waters or a handoff.
[41:23] Speaker 2: I can't remember which.
[41:24] Speaker 1: But they got him at the line and drove him
[41:26] Speaker 1: back like seven yards. And it would have been forward progress,
[41:30] Speaker 1: except he kept his balance and then tried to run again.
[41:34] Speaker 1: And they took them down, and it's just like, damn,
[41:35] Speaker 1: y'all look like, y'all feel.
[41:37] Speaker 2: Like the Bad News Bears out here now. And y'all
[41:40] Speaker 2: the 49ers. Right, right, right.
[41:42] Speaker 1: Like the gold standard of the NFL for a team
[41:45] Speaker 1: that won 10 games like 14 years in a row,
[41:50] Speaker 1: you know, in nine strike seasons.
[41:52] Speaker 2: They were the gold standard. The Cowboys was like, nah,
[41:54] Speaker 2: it's a snap.
[41:56] Speaker 3: Right.
[41:56] Speaker 5: And two, just how it lined up time-wise, but you
[42:00] Speaker 5: had obviously the 49ers being the team of the 80s
[42:03] Speaker 5: and just how it lined up would it be in
[42:05] Speaker 5: the early 90s. It very much felt like a change
[42:08] Speaker 5: of the garden, not just on the field, but off
[42:10] Speaker 5: the field as well. I know we'll get into the
[42:12] Speaker 5: the off the field stuff with the Cowboys, but it
[42:15] Speaker 5: really did feel like, oh, this is about, this is
[42:17] Speaker 5: what the nineties is supposed to, is going to look like.
[42:19] Speaker 3: Like it very much felt that way.
[42:21] Speaker 1: Right. Cause it was very clear that like Jerry Rice
[42:23] Speaker 1: did not like the Cowboys get down.
[42:25] Speaker 3: Right.
[42:26] Speaker 1: Which led to something very interesting because 94 is when
[42:31] Speaker 1: Deion Sanders goes to play for the 49ers. He has
[42:35] Speaker 1: his best season. He is defensive player of the year.
[42:38] Speaker 1: The 49ers were the best team in the NFC. They
[42:40] Speaker 1: ultimately beat the Cowboys and, in the NFC championship game.
[42:43] Speaker 1: This is also after we have so many things that
[42:45] Speaker 1: we could have gotten to, but Jimmy Johnson getting fired
[42:48] Speaker 1: by Jerry Jones because Jimmy was being disrespectful and Jerry
[42:52] Speaker 1: had enough of it.
[42:54] Speaker 2: It's really the best way to put it, right?
[42:56] Speaker 1: Like Jimmy say, they say they have the owners meeting
[42:59] Speaker 1: and Jimmy pulls up to a table to talk to
[43:01] Speaker 1: guys and Jerry's there. I mean, Jerry pulls up and
[43:03] Speaker 1: Jimmy's there. and Jerry speaks to Jimmy, and Jimmy don't
[43:06] Speaker 1: say nothing.
[43:06] Speaker 2: In front of people.
[43:08] Speaker 1: Yeah, you gonna get fired for that, right?
[43:11] Speaker 3: Like, you can't do this in front of Nick's company?
[43:13] Speaker 2: Like, yo!
[43:14] Speaker 3: You can't be out here embarrassing me.
[43:17] Speaker 1: Yeah, you can make the argument that maybe Jerry should
[43:19] Speaker 1: have put up with it, but I understand why he didn't, right? Like,
[43:22] Speaker 1: I think I've always felt as though there was a
[43:26] Speaker 1: limited shelf life on what Jimmy was doing, and the nature,
[43:29] Speaker 1: and the way that he motivated people, and the incredibly
[43:32] Speaker 1: harsh way that he dealt with people. His belief that
[43:34] Speaker 1: fear was the greatest motivator. It was a very collegiate
[43:37] Speaker 1: style that only goes so far with grown men, right?
[43:40] Speaker 1: After a while, that was going to run out of rope,
[43:43] Speaker 1: no matter what. Now, I don't know if it was
[43:44] Speaker 1: going to run out of rope by 1994, but at
[43:47] Speaker 1: some point it was going to go too far. But 94,
[43:49] Speaker 1: they bring Switzer in. And the truth is, the 49ers
[43:52] Speaker 1: went up like 14-0 mad early.
[43:55] Speaker 2: In that game. And that margin wound up being what mattered.
[43:59] Speaker 1: Um, the Cowboys did not play a bad game after that,
[44:02] Speaker 1: but Dion going to the 49ers, Jerry didn't really like
[44:05] Speaker 1: him when he was, didn't like Dion when he was there.
[44:08] Speaker 1: Cause Dion's whole steez is the opposite of the 49ers
[44:11] Speaker 1: steez and the Jerry Rice steez. But at that point,
[44:14] Speaker 1: Dion Sanders was the best defensive player at football. He
[44:17] Speaker 1: was the defensive player.
[44:18] Speaker 2: Of the year.
[44:19] Speaker 1: And I mean that, that 94 team was loaded. Like
[44:23] Speaker 1: your second best defensive back was Tim McDonald. Your third
[44:26] Speaker 1: best was Merton Hanks.
[44:29] Speaker 5: And Deion and Jerry Wright-Snew, too, was like, look, I
[44:34] Speaker 5: don't get down the way he get down, but in
[44:37] Speaker 5: order for us to beat.
[44:37] Speaker 3: This juggernaut that's on the other side of Dallas Cowboys,
[44:39] Speaker 3: because that's all that was.
[44:40] Speaker 5: Getting Deion was all about beating the Cowboys that year.
[44:44] Speaker 5: That's all it was. It was like, we need this
[44:46] Speaker 5: dude to play at this level. We need an athlete
[44:49] Speaker 5: like this to play at this level to beat these dudes.
[44:51] Speaker 3: That's what that was.
[44:52] Speaker 4: Yeah.
[44:52] Speaker 1: But think about, man, they got Ken Norton also that year.
[44:56] Speaker 1: That was Bryant Young's rookie year. They had Dana Stubblefield.
[44:59] Speaker 1: On defense, they were loaded. Offense, he's talking about Ricky Waters,
[45:03] Speaker 1: Will Floyd, Jerry Rice still at the peak of his powers.
[45:08] Speaker 1: Steve Young, the best that he has ever been. I mean,
[45:12] Speaker 1: there was a lot of really good football players on
[45:15] Speaker 1: the field in that game. And the 49ers got it.
[45:17] Speaker 2: They won it.
[45:18] Speaker 1: They went to the Super Bowl, and that was just, whew. Boy,
[45:21] Speaker 1: that was comical. Steve Young threw for six touchdowns. And
[45:24] Speaker 1: then Deion comes to the Cowboys. And the truth is,
[45:27] Speaker 1: Deion Sanders on the Cowboys, to me, is kind of
[45:29] Speaker 1: like when James Harden went to the Rockets. Not so
[45:31] Speaker 1: much when James Harden went to play for the Rockets,
[45:33] Speaker 1: the basketball team, but.
[45:34] Speaker 2: When he went to Houston.
[45:35] Speaker 1: And James Harden's whole life, he thought he was a
[45:38] Speaker 1: California dude.
[45:39] Speaker 3: You know what I mean?
[45:41] Speaker 1: And then he got to Houston and was like, wait
[45:42] Speaker 1: a minute. This is what I am, right? Deion Sanders
[45:47] Speaker 1: was always a Dallas Cowboy. He just had not played
[45:50] Speaker 1: for them yet. Like the time, the pairing of Deion
[45:54] Speaker 1: with the Cowboys was, yep, this is what this was
[45:57] Speaker 1: always supposed to be.
[45:58] Speaker 4: Right.
[45:59] Speaker 5: It was, I mean, pun intended, but it was prime time.
[46:02] Speaker 5: Like it felt like it was must-see TV. Like the
[46:06] Speaker 5: Cowboys were the Cowboys in the personality, but then when
[46:09] Speaker 5: you add Deion, it's like, oh, we need to watch
[46:11] Speaker 5: every game.
[46:12] Speaker 3: Like every game. It was big.
[46:13] Speaker 5: You also had in that year, too, because you had Deion.
[46:16] Speaker 5: You had the Jerry Jones Nike deal. You had the
[46:18] Speaker 5: Jerry Jones Pepsi deal around that same time as well.
[46:21] Speaker 5: It's like everything that they're doing is elevated to be like,
[46:23] Speaker 5: there's levels to this. It's like, y'all here in the NFL, Cowboys,
[46:28] Speaker 5: we're here. This is different. This is before reality TV.
[46:31] Speaker 5: This is making sure that the Cowboys were going to
[46:35] Speaker 5: be the 24-hour news cycle before such a thing really
[46:37] Speaker 5: even existed to the extent that it does now. It's
[46:39] Speaker 5: like year-round, it was like, all right, what are the
[46:41] Speaker 5: Cowboys doing?
[46:42] Speaker 3: Good, bad, or indifferent?
[46:44] Speaker 1: They were larger than life. And then we start talking about,
[46:47] Speaker 1: you know, the White House, right?
[46:49] Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah.
[46:50] Speaker 2: And all those things that then go around it. They
[46:52] Speaker 2: were large in their life.
[46:54] Speaker 1: And I think this is also in line, not directly
[46:57] Speaker 1: tied to the Miami influence of Michael Irvin, but also
[47:00] Speaker 1: a similarity between them, which is, and look, the Cowboys
[47:03] Speaker 1: had some of this going in the 70s also, but
[47:05] Speaker 1: it's one thing to be the best team in the league,
[47:08] Speaker 1: but this had the college renegade energy to it of,
[47:11] Speaker 1: they weren't cheating, but it felt like they was cheating, right?
[47:15] Speaker 2: And they be into stuff.
[47:17] Speaker 1: College football is all about the good teams also being
[47:20] Speaker 1: into stuff.
[47:21] Speaker 2: They was into stuff.
[47:23] Speaker 5: It's interesting you make that point because it felt like
[47:26] Speaker 5: for those Cowboys teams, there was a different set of
[47:27] Speaker 5: rules for the Cowboys than there were other teams in
[47:30] Speaker 5: the NFL.
[47:30] Speaker 3: It's like you're allowing these guys to get away with.
[47:33] Speaker 5: Stuff, some on the field, but mostly off the field that, hey,
[47:37] Speaker 5: it would be frowned upon with other teams. The concept
[47:41] Speaker 5: and idea of having a White House in itself You
[47:45] Speaker 5: wouldn't fathom that happening in a Green Bay, Wisconsin, or
[47:50] Speaker 5: the 49ers with their culture.
[47:51] Speaker 3: But for Dallas, hey, that was accepted.
[47:53] Speaker 5: It was very much like you still had a lot
[47:56] Speaker 5: of the remnants of the outlaw, renegade vibes of those
[48:01] Speaker 5: University of Miami teams, which goes back to our point
[48:03] Speaker 5: earlier of the micro-urban influence.
[48:07] Speaker 1: The White House, which, by the way, is the name
[48:11] Speaker 1: of Michael Irvin's new podcast. Did you see where he
[48:20] Speaker 1: was like, I ain't done cocaine in 20 years, but
[48:22] Speaker 1: it ain't no five-hour cocaine. If you got some five-hour cocaine,
[48:25] Speaker 1: let me know. I'm like, partner, I don't know nothing
[48:28] Speaker 1: about this.
[48:30] Speaker 3: Right? Like, I ain't.
[48:31] Speaker 2: Know nothing at all.
[48:32] Speaker 1: Because here's the thing about Michael Irvin when it comes
[48:35] Speaker 1: to something like cocaine, right? The thing about Michael Irvin
[48:38] Speaker 1: and the cocaine is, only problem cocaine caused Michael Irvin,
[48:42] Speaker 1: as far as we know, was getting arrested. Like he
[48:45] Speaker 1: was still coming to work all time. He was still
[48:47] Speaker 1: on his grind. He was like, I see no reason
[48:49] Speaker 1: to change anything about my lifestyle. But after that Super Bowl,
[48:54] Speaker 1: the last one, Super Bowl 30 in Arizona over the Steelers. Honestly,
[49:01] Speaker 1: the part that's interesting in that is that they didn't
[49:03] Speaker 1: play the 49ers in the conference championship game that year.
[49:05] Speaker 2: Instead, they played the Green Bay Packers.
[49:07] Speaker 1: And it becomes a very interesting point of comparison because
[49:09] Speaker 1: the Packers had Brett Favre on one side, Reggie White
[49:12] Speaker 1: on the other. They had an argument that they had
[49:13] Speaker 1: the two best players in the NFL at that point.
[49:16] Speaker 1: And they had a nice run after this, right? Couple
[49:18] Speaker 1: Super Bowls, all that. man it paled in comparison to
[49:22] Speaker 1: what we're talking about here with these Dallas Cowboys and
[49:24] Speaker 1: the Packers are a pretty big deal around the country
[49:27] Speaker 1: it was nothing like this but 96 is when Michael
[49:29] Speaker 1: Irvin gets arrested and you remember they had to picture
[49:33] Speaker 1: that big old rock that they found in the hotel
[49:37] Speaker 1: and rot was like this big. I'm not exaggerating. Like
[49:41] Speaker 1: rot don't even feel like the right word. It felt
[49:44] Speaker 1: like a boulder looking.
[49:45] Speaker 2: Like a pebble.
[49:47] Speaker 1: Like this giant ass rot that he had that they
[49:50] Speaker 1: busted him with. And you watched the Netflix doc, right?
[49:54] Speaker 1: The part where Michael Irvin explains, and I need you
[49:57] Speaker 1: guys to understand this. This trial was in Dallas. It's
[50:01] Speaker 1: in March. Michael Irvin is making an appearance for the
[50:05] Speaker 1: grand jury. He shows up in a full length mink.
[50:12] Speaker 1: Michael Irvin lives in Dallas. Michael Irvin is from Miami.
[50:17] Speaker 1: Why does Michael Irvin have a mink? Apparently, just in
[50:21] Speaker 1: case he had to go before.
[50:22] Speaker 2: The grand jury.
[50:24] Speaker 1: And he explained in that documentary that he did that
[50:27] Speaker 1: because the district attorney came to him and told Michael
[50:30] Speaker 1: Irvin that he felt like Michael Irvin was taking these
[50:33] Speaker 1: white girls and getting them on this dope and corrupting them.
[50:37] Speaker 1: And therefore, this white man was going to put him
[50:40] Speaker 1: in jail. And Michael Irvin told him that after this
[50:43] Speaker 1: was over, somebody was still going to pay him a
[50:46] Speaker 1: million dollars to catch a football. And your little short
[50:49] Speaker 1: ass is still going to be, I can't even remember
[50:52] Speaker 1: the rest. But Michael Irvin said that about that mink,
[50:56] Speaker 1: and I quote, it was necessary.
[51:02] Speaker 3: Very much like that too and i believe him 100.
[51:08] Speaker 1: It was that's let me tell you something it was
[51:10] Speaker 1: absolutely necessary and by the way michael lerman is an
[51:14] Speaker 1: articulate enunciating motherfucker right he's like absolutely yes to see
[51:19] Speaker 1: he gets every he gets everything out of every syllable
[51:22] Speaker 1: it was necessary That was what the Cowboys were at
[51:30] Speaker 1: this point because now they're Barry Switzer's Cowboys. This is
[51:32] Speaker 1: when Barry Switzer gets caught at the airport with the
[51:34] Speaker 1: tool in the bag. This is around this time. This
[51:39] Speaker 1: is who they were at this point. This is the
[51:42] Speaker 1: part behind the music where now the records, they sell
[51:46] Speaker 1: it like they used to.
[51:51] Speaker 5: They reached their heights and then you start seeing the
[51:54] Speaker 5: signs where it's starting to turn.
[51:57] Speaker 2: Rob Markman Right.
[51:58] Speaker 1: Well, like in 96, they put out a top five record,
[52:01] Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying?
[52:02] Speaker 2: But it didn't get to number one.
[52:03] Speaker 3: Rob Markman It was cool. It felt like them, but
[52:06] Speaker 3: it wasn't really the same. I mean, it's cool. I mean,
[52:09] Speaker 3: it's home again. It ain't really any heartbreak. It's cool.
[52:13] Speaker 2: You got to hit me off.
[52:14] Speaker 3: It's cool.
[52:15] Speaker 2: Rob Markman It ain't getting back to the top, right?
[52:17] Speaker 3: They....
[52:19] Speaker 2: It has some jams on it, right?
[52:21] Speaker 1: There's no question. It has some songs. But it ain't
[52:24] Speaker 1: get back to the top. And then 97, basically, it's over. 97,
[52:28] Speaker 1: they missed the playoffs.
[52:29] Speaker 3: Yeah.
[52:30] Speaker 2: Like, it's a wrap. Barry Switzer's fired. Like, what's Changeli, yo, Coach, man?
[52:35] Speaker 3: You know. It felt very white flag-ish.
[52:39] Speaker 2: Just what it is.
[52:39] Speaker 3: I think the full end is in 99.
[52:40] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[52:41] Speaker 3: Yeah.
[52:42] Speaker 1: Yeah, I think, I mean, the full end, to me, truly, like, honestly,
[52:46] Speaker 1: as a dynasty, it had been over. But the true
[52:48] Speaker 1: end is when Michael Irvin, you know, hurts his neck
[52:50] Speaker 1: in Philadelphia. Like, that's where we're like, we're not even
[52:53] Speaker 1: talking about this really anymore. Aikman retired in 2000. So
[52:58] Speaker 1: Irvin gets hurt in 99, Aikman retires in 2000. It's
[53:00] Speaker 1: just like, no, this is a wrap.
[53:02] Speaker 3: And you had Deion dealing with the turf toe at
[53:04] Speaker 3: the same time, too. That's right. And you had Deion
[53:07] Speaker 3: not really being what Deion is. Deion was.
[53:10] Speaker 5: Offensive line, as we talked about, wasn't the same offensive
[53:13] Speaker 5: line that they had in the early 90s. So you
[53:16] Speaker 5: saw the decline from not only the top tier players
[53:19] Speaker 5: and what happened there, obviously with Irving and Deion was injury,
[53:25] Speaker 5: but also you didn't see the depth and the talent
[53:27] Speaker 5: anymore as well.
[53:28] Speaker 1: Yeah, and you know, we ain't talked that much about
[53:31] Speaker 1: Troy Aikman in this, and that's no shade to Troy Aikman.
[53:34] Speaker 1: Troy Aikman was a very good quarterback on a very
[53:37] Speaker 1: good team, and We'll never know just how good Troy
[53:40] Speaker 1: Aikman was because it never came up. But I will
[53:42] Speaker 1: say once again, Troy Aikman threw 20 touchdowns once. I'm
[53:50] Speaker 1: not making this number up, guys.
[53:52] Speaker 3: Right. All right.
[53:53] Speaker 5: Well, so here we talk. We talk about other flints
[53:55] Speaker 5: in Rome. We didn't get to Aikman, but the biggest
[53:57] Speaker 5: elephant we got it. We got to address when it
[54:00] Speaker 5: comes to Dallas Cowboys. They really have it like the
[54:03] Speaker 5: Jerry factor in all of this.
[54:04] Speaker 4: Yeah.
[54:05] Speaker 3: Like the Jerry, the Jerry factor. The P.T.
[54:08] Speaker 5: Barnum style that was Jerry Jones in all of this,
[54:13] Speaker 5: I think on the field aside, I think all of that,
[54:17] Speaker 5: the extra stuff is what separated the Cowboys and why
[54:21] Speaker 5: their dynasty, that 90s run is looked at so differently
[54:25] Speaker 5: compared to some of the other dynastic runs that we've
[54:27] Speaker 5: seen over time. because it was so different. It really
[54:31] Speaker 5: was like it, it made people care about the Cowboys
[54:34] Speaker 5: in a way that had absolutely nothing to do with
[54:37] Speaker 5: the on field performance, whether it was the more spotlight,
[54:42] Speaker 5: the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders. It was like I mentioned, the
[54:44] Speaker 5: Nike deal, the Pepsi deal, the commercials, the personalities, the riffs,
[54:49] Speaker 5: like all of that stuff. It goes back to a
[54:52] Speaker 5: lot of it with the branding goes back to Jerry Jones.
[54:57] Speaker 1: The moment I will never forget is in 94, Jerry debuted,
[55:05] Speaker 1: they had these double star jerseys. Because the Cowboys have
[55:09] Speaker 1: basically worn the same jerseys since, as long as I
[55:12] Speaker 1: can remember, right? And you'll see they wear these throwback
[55:16] Speaker 1: jerseys now, but these were different. This is the throwback
[55:18] Speaker 1: year where everybody was wearing their throwbacks, but they broke
[55:21] Speaker 1: out a whole new jersey, right? It had a star here,
[55:24] Speaker 1: it had a star there. It was like the double
[55:26] Speaker 1: star jersey. And when it was time to break and
[55:28] Speaker 1: debut those jerseys, I'll never forget. Modeling that jersey was
[55:33] Speaker 1: Jerry Jones. Jerry Jones was in a full uniform, pads
[55:38] Speaker 1: and all. And he pulled up on NBC or Fox,
[55:42] Speaker 1: one of those, in the jersey as the model for it.
[55:46] Speaker 1: He was a football player. He played on a national
[55:49] Speaker 1: championship football team. He saw himself as a football man.
[55:54] Speaker 1: His inspiration is Al Davis, right? Who was a football
[55:58] Speaker 1: man who was very involved in football in that way.
[56:00] Speaker 1: And Jerry wanted to feel like, or believe that he
[56:03] Speaker 1: should be involved in the football of it all. But
[56:07] Speaker 1: also he decided we're going to make this thing really big.
[56:13] Speaker 3: Yeah.
[56:14] Speaker 2: And he did make it really big.
[56:16] Speaker 1: Now the question of course, for people is, did he
[56:19] Speaker 1: make it big at the expense of the football?
[56:21] Speaker 2: I don't know.
[56:22] Speaker 1: It seems easy to make that connection, but I can't
[56:28] Speaker 1: even say he changed the gang because nobody else has
[56:31] Speaker 1: tried to do it like him. George Steinbrenner was living
[56:34] Speaker 1: a very similar sort of life, except Jerry never seemed unhinged.
[56:40] Speaker 5: Steinbrenner with the military background was very much regimented, obviously,
[56:44] Speaker 5: with the facial hair policy, and that's some of the
[56:46] Speaker 5: thing where he had respect for the past, but It
[56:48] Speaker 5: was really with Steinbrenner, it was a little too traditional
[56:51] Speaker 5: when it came to that team. Where Jerry was like, hey,
[56:53] Speaker 5: nobody else is doing this.
[56:54] Speaker 3: Let's try this.
[56:55] Speaker 1: Well, also, yeah, Jerry's not a bad guy. Like, Jerry
[57:00] Speaker 1: didn't put a P.I. on any of his players to
[57:03] Speaker 1: try to take them down.
[57:06] Speaker 2: Like Steinbrenner, you know? Like, you know? But you're right.
[57:12] Speaker 2: He is no agent. And it's funny, no owner anywhere.
[57:17] Speaker 1: Decided to kick it like jerry like nobody ever really
[57:19] Speaker 1: kicked it like al davis i mean i'm a big
[57:23] Speaker 1: i mean al hung on a little bit too long
[57:25] Speaker 1: with what he was doing but i don't god i
[57:27] Speaker 1: love al there's the idea of al davis is amazing
[57:31] Speaker 1: to me and i mean i mean al.
[57:33] Speaker 3: Davis had the overhead projection presentation when he did he
[57:36] Speaker 3: did and.
[57:38] Speaker 1: He was right everything he said was right The thing
[57:42] Speaker 1: with Al Davis though, I see what makes Al interesting
[57:45] Speaker 1: or different to me than Jerry is I, I believe
[57:48] Speaker 1: Al Davis was a genius. I do not believe that
[57:51] Speaker 1: Jerry Jones was like, I think that Al Davis had
[57:53] Speaker 1: a vision for his franchise.
[57:56] Speaker 2: Like when you think about all the things.
[57:57] Speaker 1: That Al Davis did, like Al Davis was, Al Davis
[58:00] Speaker 1: had a hand in the football. Al Davis came up
[58:02] Speaker 1: with all those slogans and sayings that would be around
[58:04] Speaker 1: the field. He changed the colors of the jerseys to
[58:07] Speaker 1: silver and black, um, not just involving the football, a
[58:11] Speaker 1: very clear philosophy. I talked to somebody who worked at
[58:13] Speaker 1: like the Raiders store in the mall in Sacramento and
[58:15] Speaker 1: Al was coming in looking at the merchandise and set
[58:18] Speaker 1: up and all of that stuff, right? Like Jerry, I
[58:21] Speaker 1: felt like is a great promoter. And his thing was
[58:28] Speaker 1: the NFL has a set of rules that are about
[58:31] Speaker 1: sharing the wealth, but we drive more wealth than anybody else.
[58:35] Speaker 1: So we should get more wealth than everybody else, which is, Honestly,
[58:38] Speaker 1: a violation of the principles that they had tried to enact.
[58:42] Speaker 1: And like Al Davis, he decided to challenge it and
[58:45] Speaker 1: get the money that there was for the Cowboys because
[58:47] Speaker 1: he knew the Cowboys were different. He knew the Cowboys
[58:50] Speaker 1: were special. And for the Cowboys to be that girl,
[58:53] Speaker 1: sometimes that girl got to act like that girl now,
[58:55] Speaker 1: don't she? You know, but he's it. And the truth is,
[59:02] Speaker 1: he's the only common thread from the dynasty to now
[59:06] Speaker 1: but he's also the only common thread from the Dynasty
[59:08] Speaker 1: ending to now. He'll always be the person that we
[59:12] Speaker 1: associate what goes wrong with, right? And look, everybody's been
[59:16] Speaker 1: to the conference final, a conference championship game, except for what,
[59:20] Speaker 1: them and the Texans?
[59:23] Speaker 3: Sounds about right.
[59:24] Speaker 2: Like pick a team out ahead.
[59:25] Speaker 3: Yeah, because even Jacksonville's made it.
[59:28] Speaker 2: Jacksonville's made it twice.
[59:30] Speaker 3: Twice, yeah.
[59:31] Speaker 2: The Jets have made it twice.
[59:33] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[59:34] Speaker 2: The Lions have made it. Everybody done got, the Cardinals
[59:39] Speaker 2: have been to a Super Bowl. Oh, hold on, hold on.
[59:43] Speaker 2: Forgot about the Browns. That's on me. That's on me.
[59:47] Speaker 3: Thanks. One day, one day.
[59:49] Speaker 2: By the way, you see, they're.
[59:50] Speaker 1: Going to send the Saints and the Browns over to
[59:54] Speaker 1: Paris to play. And aside from the fact that that
[59:57] Speaker 1: football ain't going to be it, I was hoping it
[59:59] Speaker 1: would be the Falcons and the Saints so that Newt
[1:00:04] Speaker 1: could go. You understand what I'm saying? We could make
[1:00:07] Speaker 1: that trip.
[1:00:07] Speaker 4: No, no.
[1:00:09] Speaker 3: You can't have the Falcons in the Saints. You can't
[1:00:14] Speaker 3: have that in front of company.
[1:00:15] Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah.
[1:00:18] Speaker 3: With the Falcons in the Saints, you can't have that.
[1:00:20] Speaker 2: Yeah, I tell you this, though. Instead, you're going to
[1:00:25] Speaker 2: get a bunch of people from Cleveland.
[1:00:27] Speaker 3: Well, yeah.
[1:00:28] Speaker 1: It's going to be fun for New Orleans folks to
[1:00:31] Speaker 1: go there because I went to Paris and finally New
[1:00:33] Speaker 1: Orleans made sense.
[1:00:35] Speaker 3: That's what I was going to say. It I'm sure
[1:00:37] Speaker 3: they picked the Saints because of the whole French, you know.
[1:00:41] Speaker 1: Yeah, the Saints had been pushing for that. Like they
[1:00:45] Speaker 1: had been trying to get that. I don't know how
[1:00:48] Speaker 1: we wound up there, but oh well, it happens.
[1:00:50] Speaker 5: All right, there's one more factor too I had to
[1:00:53] Speaker 5: bring up with the Cowboys. And a lot of this
[1:00:55] Speaker 5: is because of Jerry Jones and the promotion to P.T. Barnum,
[1:00:58] Speaker 5: as I mentioned before. It's Cowboys fans. Like, I know
[1:01:03] Speaker 5: I'm one to talk as a Knick fan.
[1:01:04] Speaker 3: Like, I get it. I get it.
[1:01:06] Speaker 5: But Cowboy fans, and that's part of it, too, when
[1:01:08] Speaker 5: we go back to the 90s that made them insufferable.
[1:01:11] Speaker 5: But Cowboy fans, like, they all... Cowboys fans insist upon themselves,
[1:01:16] Speaker 5: to borrow a term from Peter Griffin. Like, this got
[1:01:20] Speaker 5: nothing to do with y'all, but y'all somehow, someway still
[1:01:22] Speaker 5: find yourself trying.
[1:01:23] Speaker 3: To put yourselves in these conversations. This ain't got nothing
[1:01:26] Speaker 3: to do with you.
[1:01:26] Speaker 2: What is this in this case?
[1:01:29] Speaker 3: Everything. Everything in life.
[1:01:32] Speaker 5: Like, dog, next year's going to be our year. Dog,
[1:01:36] Speaker 5: the only way we're going to see your Super Bowl
[1:01:37] Speaker 5: winners on VHS. somehow you're still inserting yourselves. Like, honestly,
[1:01:42] Speaker 5: it still feels like a celebratory moment on social media
[1:01:45] Speaker 5: when the Cowboys lose. It still has that feel. And
[1:01:48] Speaker 5: we are 30 years removed from them winning the Super Bowl.
[1:01:51] Speaker 5: It's like Cowboy fans always, I don't know if it's
[1:01:54] Speaker 5: worse now because they're delusional now or the 90s when
[1:01:57] Speaker 5: they were actually good. Like, for me, it's just Cowboy
[1:02:00] Speaker 5: fans still to this day. Maybe they've been humbled a
[1:02:03] Speaker 5: little bit.
[1:02:03] Speaker 3: I doubt it. But Cowboy fans is probably the worst
[1:02:06] Speaker 3: part of all of this. All of it.
[1:02:08] Speaker 2: I think they get a bad rap, man.
[1:02:12] Speaker 1: They've been loyal and they've been dedicated to this sad
[1:02:16] Speaker 1: sack outfit. They don't get no payoff from it. They
[1:02:19] Speaker 1: keep coming back. They are Knicks fans now.
[1:02:22] Speaker 2: Y'all are the same.
[1:02:24] Speaker 3: And that's the thing. They used to make the joke, well,
[1:02:26] Speaker 3: you know, we've won champ. Well, it's been 30 years. Like,
[1:02:28] Speaker 3: I get it. The Knicks have been 50 plus.
[1:02:30] Speaker 2: Yeah, but that might as well be the same.
[1:02:32] Speaker 3: It's the same. Like, right. That's the thing.
[1:02:34] Speaker 5: If I can't watch your Super Bowl or your championship
[1:02:37] Speaker 5: highlights in HD, then you're all in the same.
[1:02:40] Speaker 3: We're grouping y'all in the same boat. If it ain't
[1:02:42] Speaker 3: in 4K, then we ain't the same.
[1:02:49] Speaker 2: I knew you just wanted to get that in, so
[1:02:50] Speaker 2: I'm going to let you have it.
[1:02:51] Speaker 1: I had to.
[1:02:51] Speaker 3: Oh, my God. You know what I'm saying? Oh, my gosh.
[1:02:53] Speaker 3: I had to.
[1:02:54] Speaker 2: Hey, that is Shannon Pitt. Check out Freddie and Harry, Afternoons,
[1:02:59] Speaker 2: ESPN Radio. My brother, I appreciate you.
[1:03:02] Speaker 3: Yes, sir.
[1:03:02] Speaker 1: Hey, and ladies and gentlemen, thanks so much for joining
[1:03:04] Speaker 1: us here on The Right Time. We do this three,
[1:03:07] Speaker 1: four times a week. Ryan Brumley handles everything behind the scenes.
[1:03:10] Speaker 2: Thank you, sir.
[1:03:11] Speaker 1: Hit the voicemail.
[1:03:14] Speaker 2: Line, 323-596-7767.
[1:03:14] Speaker 1: By the way, Shannon Wright Fass, who the funniest name
[1:03:16] Speaker 1: that you could imagine in the Epstein Files?
[1:03:19] Speaker 3: Oh, my gosh.
[1:03:22] Speaker 5: Well, there were some reports that said it was a
[1:03:25] Speaker 5: couple of rappers, but I don't know how.
[1:03:26] Speaker 3: True that was.
[1:03:27] Speaker 2: Yeah, I say Tim Tebow.
[1:03:31] Speaker 3: Nah, he was just praying, you know?
[1:03:33] Speaker 2: Yeah, just saying. But if he turned up in there,
[1:03:35] Speaker 2: that would be funny. That would be funny.
[1:03:37] Speaker 3: He was just praying for him. That's all that was.
[1:03:39] Speaker 2: Yeah, that's why he was on that one knee. Follow
[1:03:42] Speaker 2: the right time. Subscribe.
[1:03:44] Speaker 1: Like.
[1:03:45] Speaker 2: Rate us. Review us. Give us five stars. Two knees
[1:03:47] Speaker 2: for Jesus. Only give us four stars. I'm inclined to
[1:03:50] Speaker 2: believe you are a hater. We'll talk to you guys
[1:03:52] Speaker 2: in a couple of days. Take it easy.

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