Dollars & Sense: Does Cowboys Jerry Care More About Winning Than Fans Think?
WHITT'S END 1.26.24:
Whether you’re at the end of your coffee, your day, your week or even your rope, welcome to Whitt’s End …
*Today’s sermon: Dollars and Sense.
In the currency of time, a million seconds is 11 days. A billion seconds? 32 years.
There’s a point in magnifying the startling discrepancy, even from a lowly sportswriter who measures his net worth in relative milliseconds. Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones is worth $14.5 billion. He is also 81 years old. Therefore …
Despite the irrational criticism from frustrated fans, no, Jerry never ever never wakes up in the morning thinking about ways to make more money. Conversely, he never ever never goes to sleep at night before exhausting every way possible to improve his football team.
Why? Because he could spend $1 million a day – every day – and not run out of money for 38 years. And because he hasn’t been to the NFC Championship Game in 28 years. Ask yourself, in his life what’s more pressing: More wealth to outlive, or more wins for his legacy?
In the wake of the Cowboys’ shocking playoff loss to the Packers, the armchair critics dusted off their most tattered of tropes: “Jerry doesn’t do anything … because he doesn’t care as long as he’s making money.”
Since Dallas’ last appearance in the NFC title game in 1996, Jerry has …
Fired coach Chan Gailey after consecutive playoff seasons.
Relinquished organizational control to hire Bill Parcells.
Signed baggage-burdened stars like Terrell Owens and Pacman Jones.
Traded up in the draft to select Morris Claiborne and Dez Bryant.
Orchestrated a forward-thinking deal to acquire Trey Lance.
Fired Wade Phillips in midseason, 10 months after a playoff victory.
Awarded franchise-record contracts to Brandon Carr and Dak Prescott.
And just a year ago, traded for Stephon Gilmore and Brandin Cooks.
You can accuse Jerry of not being successful, but not of being stagnant. You can blame him for failing, but not for not trying. You can scream “nothing’s ever gonna change!”, but he’s going to run it back in 2024 with the coach, quarterback and core that has won or hosted a playoff game for three consecutive seasons.
If you think Jerry Jones is still motivated by money - or, at least, by money only - you simply haven’t been paying attention.
*Serious question: How can a basketball team featuring one of the five best players on the planet be this boring? The Dallas Mavericks win some, but almost always lose to teams with better records. Our fascination with Luka Doncic’s nightly “he becomes the youngest player to ever … ” has officially worn off. Yawn.
*11 players who were Texas Rangers are immortalized in baseball’s Hall of Fame. Only two of them – Pudge Rodriguez and Nolan Ryan – were inducted as Rangers, wearing the bold Texas T on their bronzed caps. Should Adrian Beltre be No. 3?
Pudge was raised a Ranger, winning MVP and leading the team to its first postseason berths during his first 13 years. Nolan played his final five of 27 seasons in Arlington, recording his 300th win and 5,000th strikeout. The others –managers Ted Williams and Whitey Herzog to pitchers Fergie Jenkins, Gaylord Perry, Bert Blyleven and Goose Gossage, and sluggers Vladmir Guerrero and Harold Baines – amassed the bulk of their legacy with other teams.
Beltre’s case is tricky. During this week’s press conference after being voted in, he played coy when asked if he would be enshrined as a Ranger.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Do you know?”
Though players have input, the official cap designation comes from voting members in Cooperstown.
It feels like Beltre’s highlights came in Texas. But, alas, so did only 40 percent of his career production.
He produced like a robot and personalized like a human being. He was not only one of baseball’s greatest players, but also one of its goofiest. He and Elvis Andrus made pop-ups entertaining. He danced at the plate after taking close pitches. He hit home runs from one knee, and threw out base-runners from the Six Flags Shock Wave.
He turned his noggin’ into sacred ground, once interrupting a pitching change at Yankee Stadium to throw his glove at Andrus after the shortstop dared to tap his cap during the mound meeting. He was a legendary fielder, a prolific hitter, a loyal teammate, a gutsy gamer and, yes, a big kid who sprayed a cool, refreshing mist onto the dog days of summer by playing with unfiltered joy and unprecedented passion.
Beltre spent seven seasons in L.A. with the Dodgers, five with the Mariners and one with the Red Sox before playing his final eight in Arlington. He’s one of baseball’s greatest third basemen – only Brooks Robinson started more games at the hot corner and no one that played the position produced more hits. One of the most respected players during his era, Beltre played through ankle sprains and torn thumb ligaments and those consistently balky hamstrings.
Of all his impressive stats, this one stands out: He is one of only four players to have 3,000 hits, 400 homers and five Gold Gloves. The others: Willie Mays, Carl Yastrzemski and Dave Winfield.
Not bad for an acquisition some bemoaned as a consolation prize when the Rangers signed him in January 2011 only after losing out on pitching ace Cliff Lee.
This is not to suggest Beltre was overrated, more that he simply didn’t produce the majority of his greatness in Arlington. Only 1,277 of his 3,166 hits (40 percent). Only 199 of his 477 homers (41 percent). Not all of his Gold Gloves. Not all of his All-Star appearances. Nor all of his cycles.
Like Ryan, Beltre achieved his individual milestones – hit No. 3,000 – but never the ultimate team success as a Ranger.
He hit .300 with two homers in the 2011 World Series, but as the Rangers coughed up Games 6 and 7 in St. Louis he went only 1 for 9 at the plate with three strikeouts.
Beltre was a leader on that 2011 team that got within one strike of the trophy, and the following season he finished third in the AL MVP voting. Among his highlights: the three-homer performance in a 4-3 win over the Rays at Tropicana Field that propelled Texas into its second consecutive ALCS. There was also the two-run homer that helped the Rangers blast the Angels in Game No. 162 and hang onto the AL West title in 2015.
In his final two seasons, four muscle strains limited him to 134 games in the field. The ding of his durability. The lack of the championship. The proportionate slice of his career production.
Among offensive leaders, Beltre doesn’t rank among the Top 5 Rangers in at-bats, average, slugging, runs, hits or RBI. And his three Gold Gloves at third base? Impressive, until you remember that Buddy Bell won five consecutive for the Rangers ’79-84.
Beltre is obviously an all-time great player. What’s not so clear: Is he a Ranger?
*I’ve often – okay not often, but maybe once or twice – wondered why we humans take drinks of liquid in between eating food, while animals fully separate the two actions. Eat-drink-done. Along those same lines, my Big Brothers Big Sisters lil’ bro Ja stunned me with a brilliant consumption theory last week. “I eat all my fries first, because the sandwich will be good heated up later but they wouldn’t be.” He didn’t even as much look at his chicken until his fries were woofed. Mind. Blown.
*Last week I compared Dak to Dirk Nowitzki. Can’t remember a column prompting as much feedback, most of it negative.
Again, at similar points in their careers – Dirk after his ninth season in 2007; Dak currently in the wake of his eighth – they are on parallel paths. Individual success: Dirk won an MVP; Dak will be Top 5 in voting announced Feb. 8. Team failure: Dirk’s Mavs lost as a No. 1 seed to the Warriors in 2007; Dak’s second-seeded Cowboys to the Packers two weeks ago.
Most critics of my column simply knee-jerked to the finished product. “Dirk’s a winner; Dak’s a choker.”
Once upon a time that wasn’t the case for Dirk. And I predict the label won’t stick forever for Dak. I suggested patience. I recommended Prescott go off, like Nowitzki did after 2007, to the middle of nowhere.
But don’t take it from me. Consider a very similar message from none other than Troy Aikman.
On his big-picture opinion of Dak: “I am a big fan of Dak. I still believe his best days are ahead of him.”
On Dak dealing with haters: “Until you do it, there’s always those criticisms. I know Peyton Manning went through that his first three years: he didn’t win a playoff game. When you look back on it now, you can’t imagine that anybody questioned whether or not he could win a playoff game.”
On Dak’s immediate plan: “Get away! Get away from everybody and regroup.”
I rest my case.
*Hot.
*Not.
Clutchpoints
*Put me down for the Cowboys to “Run It Back” over “Blow It Up.” Allow me to explain.
*We know Luka – in the words of Mavs coach Jason Kidd – tends to “run hot.” But now the team is taking on the identity of its superstar leader. In demoralizing home losses to the Celtics and Suns this week, Dallas got off to healthy leads only to get distracted – and ultimately derailed – by officiating. Asked how to rein in Doncic’s outbursts, Kidd shrugged. “I don’t have that answer,” he said. “He has to be better about it. We’re not going to get good calls every time down the floor.” It’s troubling that two of our biggest stars – Luka and Micah – are also two of the biggest whiners.
*Was at the gym this week and it hit me: We’ve forgotten how telephones work. There’s an epidemic of folks who no longer hold their phones up to their ear to talk and listen, but instead put them on speaker and place them inches from their mouths as they walk and talk. Maybe it’s just me, but I’d rather the whole world not know exactly what the person on the other end of the line is saying.
Can’t decide if this trend is a form of laziness or some quirky flex.
*With the recent unemployment of Bill Belichick and Pete Carroll, Mike McCarthy’s 167 regular-season wins are third-most among active coaches behind only Andy Reid and Mike Tomlin. Who knows, those two might retire after the season to leave the Cowboys coach No. 1.
*Stalking is an important issue that deserves to be addressed. But so is grammar. And, in turn, math. If we’re to believe this social media post from an elected state representative from Georgia, only four women and seven men will “experience stalking in their lifetime.” Here’s betting Mesha Mainor – who boasts “20 years of experience in education” – holds walk-’n-talk phone conversations on speaker. We are doomed.
*I know Mark Cuban sold his majority stake to a casino magnate family with a grand plan to build a new destination resort/arena in DFW. But a part of me fears new owner Miriam Adelson might get fed up with Texas’ Bible-Belt politics and just up and move the Mavs to Las Vegas.
*Sometimes you go down a rabbit hole and waste precious hours of your short life. But every now and then, you come up with a delicious carrot. Not exactly sure how I stumbled on them, but I’m transfixed these days with the DJ duo Sabo & Goldcap. If you’re the least bit intrigued by an innovative, eclectic mix that mashes house and electronica with Arabic roots and desert downbeats, I highly recommend. If not, no worries, carry on. Not for everyone.
*With the Lions playing in Sunday’s title game, only Washington has a longer absence from the NFC Championship Game than the Cowboys. It last made the game before the game on Jan. 12, 1992, so long ago that former Fort Worth Star-Telegram co-worker Gil LeBreton and I took a “Metro” train to chronicle Barry Sanders’ loss to the Redskins, 41-10, at RFK Stadium. Been a minute.
*These days everyone’s seeking “mindfulness.” A cherished moment or two filled with deep breaths and a void of thoughts. But when I was a kid, mindfulness was the default. And we tried like the dickens to avoid simply breathing with shallow thoughts, better known as “boredom.” In 2024, life has evolved into a series of screens. During the workday we alternate looking at the tiny one (phone) and the medium one (computer), so we can afford to buy a bigger one (TV) to stare at all night. And if those three conk, we always have another intermediate one (iPad) at the ready.
*This Weekend? Friday let’s hang out with an old friend. Saturday let’s hang out with a different old friend. Sunday let’s watch NFL conference championship games and try to remember what it was like when the Cowboys were involved. As always, don’t be a stranger.
