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As we head into the summer doldrums, BTB introduces its own form of March Madness to get you through the slow period until training camp: a 64-player "Best Cowboy of all time" tournament! Today’s first round match-up features top seed Tom Landry facing off against sixteen seed John Fitzgerald
With three regional brackets complete, we turn to the Roger Goodell Regional's first match-up. Its another player-management face-off: top seeded Tom Landry, the early favorite to win the whole shebang, goes against one of his many solid, durable offensive linemen, sixteenth-seeded John Fitzgerald. Can Fitzgerald keep it close? Heck, will the former center avoid a shutout? Read the bios and hit the poll, good people!
Wanna keep tabs on the state of the bracket or look ahead to future contests? All the Midsummer Madness info you could ever want can be found right here.
Player: Tom Landry
Position: head coach
Seed: 1
Essentials:
Name Years Career AV Pro Bowls All-Pro RoH HoF
Thomas Wade Landry 1960-88 -NA- -NA- -NA- yes yes
Bio: In 1960, Landry was hired to be the expansion Cowboys first head coach. The expansion team started inauspiciously, sporting an 0–11–1 record during their first season and five or fewer wins in each year from 1961-64. Despite the team's early struggles, owner Clint Murchison Jr. gave Landry a 10-year extension in 1964 - a move that proved to be inspired. The Cowboys improved to a 7–7 record in 1965 and, in 1966, they surprised the NFL by posting 10 wins and making it all the way to the NFL Championship game, where they fell to the Packers. The 1966 season began a streak of 20 consecutive winning seasons, an NFL record.
Landry proceeded to coach the Cowboys for 29 consecutive years, an NFL record. In that time frame, Landry compiled a 270-178-6 record, the third-most all-time, and led the Cowboys to thirteen division titles, five NFC titles and two Super Bowl wins. From 1966-'82, a span of 17 years, Dallas played in 12 NFL or NFC Championship games; in the 13-year span from 1970 to 1982, Landry's teams played in 10 NFC Championship games. As these number suggest, his 20 career playoff victories are the second most of any coach in NFL history. Landry was named the NFL Coach of the Year in 1966 and the NFC Coach of the Year in 1975.
As impressive as his record is the long list of his innovations. Landry invented the 4-3 defense, along with the use of "keys" for players to react to the flow of a play. To stop the Packers' famed power sweep, he later refined the 4-3 defense by "flexing" two of the four linemen off the line of scrimmage to improve pursuit angles. In Landry's "Flex" defense, each defender was responsible for a given gap area, and was told to stay in that area before he knew where the play was going. On offense, he revived old single-wing concepts like motion, the shotgun, and multiple pre-snap shifts, including the famed "up-and-down" offensive line shift designed to make it more difficult for defenders to see where the backs were shifting, thus cutting down on recognition time.
He also was the first coach to develop a strength and conditioning program and to introduce the notion of "quality control"; watching extensive film to chart opponent's tendencies so that the Cowboys could be better prepared. Working closely with Tex Schramm and Gil Brandt, Landry helped to revolutionize scouting, both in terms of how players were evaluated and graded and where they looked for talent. The Cowboys were one of the first teams to draft players from small schools and HBCUs and to target athletes from other sports. He was elected into the Hall of Fame in 1990 and inducted into the Ring of Honor in 1993.
Selected by Dallas in first round (17th player overall), 1990 … Won rushing crowns in 1991, 1992, 1993, 1995 … Led NFL in rushing touchdowns three times … Major contributor to Cowboys Super Bowl XXVII, XXVIII, XXX victories … Named first-team All-Pro 1992-95 … In 1993, named NFL’s MVP and MVP in Super Bowl XXVIII … 11 straight 1,000-yard seasons … Became NFL’s all-time rushing leader in 2002 … Career totals: 18,355 yards and 164 touchdowns rushing; also had 515 receptions … Born May 15, 1969 in Pensacola, Florida. - See more at: http://www.profootballhof.com/hof/member.aspx?PlayerId=291#sthash.i2MiaRqc.dpuf
Player: John Fitzgerald
Position: center
Seed: 16
Essentials:
Name Years Career AV Pro Bowls All-Pro RoH HoF
John Robert Fitzgerald 1970-80 66 0 0 no no
Bio: Fitzgerald was selected by the Cowboys in the fourth round of the 1970 Draft. For two years, the Cowboys tried him as a defensive lineman (he had played both offensive and defensive tackle as a collegian) before finally converting him to center during the 1972 training camp. The following season, he took over the starting role, and manned the pivot for the next eight years.
Although Fitzgerald never appeared in a Pro Bowl, he was an integral member of two distinct offensive line eras: the first, with Ralph Neely, John Niland, Blaine Nye and Rayfield Wright, gave way in the late 70s, to the next, dubbed "Four Irishmen and a Scott" (the five linemen were Fitzgerald, Pat Donovan, Tom Rafferty and Jim Cooper, and left guard Herb Scott). In this capacity, Fitzgerald and his linemates helped the Cowboys to playoff berths all but one of his eleven seasons. In his time in Dallas, the Cowboys went to to four Super Bowls, winning two. He played in 138 games over 10 NFL seasons.
Alright, BTBers, which man advances to the next round?
Poll
Who is the "better" Cowboy?
- Tom Landry
- John Fitzgerald
14 votes | Results
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