Re-evaluating Jimmy Johnson

[Whyjerry]

I used to be one of those fans who believe that had Jimmy stayed we would have won more Super Bowls.

Not anymore.

I now realize that things ended the way they did because it couldn't have gone any other way. Jimmy Johnson's act as a tough-minded psych genius was getting old and Jimmy recognized it. He figured it was better to go out on top vs. sticking around for the downside. Much easier to build a young, fast team and to do it from the perspective as the most recent best college football coach with the most cutting edge knowledge of the young players of that era. Much more difficult to maintain a team that had already peaked, was already starting to lose players and to babysit a team full of spoiled superstars.

In fact, I'm actually more impressed with what Barry Switzer did. There may have been no other coach that could have stepped into that situation and keep it together long enough to win another championship.

Your thoughts?

Is this parody? Listen to Aikman and he will tell you Barry was a clown. He installed a lack of discipline that has festered for decades. No way Dallas loses that SF playoff game with Jimmy as coach.

 

[Whyjerry]

Not sure we could have done much worse but I guess Jerry could have hired me lol

I can almost guarantee you’d be better than Garrett.

 

[Alexander]

I used to be one of those fans who believe that had Jimmy stayed we would have won more Super Bowls.

Not anymore.

I now realize that things ended the way they did because it couldn't have gone any other way. Jimmy Johnson's act as a tough-minded psych genius was getting old and Jimmy recognized it. He figured it was better to go out on top vs. sticking around for the downside. Much easier to build a young, fast team and to do it from the perspective as the most recent best college football coach with the most cutting edge knowledge of the young players of that era.

You had me until here.

Much more difficult to maintain a team that had already peaked, was already starting to lose players and to babysit a team full of spoiled superstars.

Clearly, Coach Johnson wanted out. Primarily because of the side show barker owner.

He wanted where he would have the organizational stroke and I do not see how any intelligent person would question why he wanted to do that.

Plus, he just wanted to be by the beach and drink his Heinken's with ice cubes.

In fact, I'm actually more impressed with what Barry Switzer did. There may have been no other coach that could have stepped into that situation and keep it together long enough to win another championship.

Your thoughts?

I am sorry. I cannot read this and accept it as sane.

 

[PA Cowboy Fan]

I think Jimmy leaving cost us at least one more title.

 

[TwoDeep3]

Switzer cost us at least 1 championship in 94. The lack of discipline we lost after Jimmy left was a huge difference as Troy often eluded to.

1996 is another season we could have made a deeper run. More discipline issues off the field that year. We still had our core talent to make another run.

And Jimmy leaving will always be on Jethro’s hand . You bow down to a back to back HC not buck heads with him. Our franchise has never fully recovered. It’s been a dysfunctional mess ever since .

And yet the discipline issues you assign as why the team lost ignores the behavior of the players during their winning streak of SB's, which was clearly being acted out at that time.

 

[erod]

Oklahoma State for 5 years. Univ of Miami for 5 years. Cowboys for 5 years. Dolphins for 5 years.

That's just what Jimmy does.

But I do think he wanted to go for that 3rd in Dallas. Jerry was in a drunken power trip though.

 

[tunahelper]

Yes I too remember Aikman wildly complaining about Switzer as he was hoisting the SB XXX Lombardi.

Aikman has stated if Jimmy stayed he thought 4 or 5 SB wins could have been possible.

 

[JonesBoys]

More championships? That's tough to say, and probably not.

However, if you take a look at the players he drafted in the later rounds in Miami (Madison, Surtain, Taylor, Thomas, etc), if several of them were in Dallas, we may not have been as bad as we were there for a while, and the 98 and 99 teams would have had much more of a chance.

Exactly, I highly doubt Dallas would have drafted as bad as they did if Jimmy didn't leave. 94 draft was all Larry Allen an absolutely nothing else. 95 draft was atrocious. Same in 96 with only Godfrey being decent. Same in 97 with only Coakley and maybe a serviceable Lefleur. 4 straight years of horrible drafting. Only 1 hall of famer in Allen and maybe 3 good to decent players after him in four years! The rest were never even serviceable NFL players. Maybe Shiver but that's a stretch. The player personal dropped big time after Jimmy because of bad drafting. You can't lose players with the salary cap and draft that bad.

 

[visionary]

I used to be one of those fans who believe that had Jimmy stayed we would have won more Super Bowls.

Not anymore.

I now realize that things ended the way they did because it couldn't have gone any other way. Jimmy Johnson's act as a tough-minded psych genius was getting old and Jimmy recognized it. He figured it was better to go out on top vs. sticking around for the downside. Much easier to build a young, fast team and to do it from the perspective as the most recent best college football coach with the most cutting edge knowledge of the young players of that era. Much more difficult to maintain a team that had already peaked, was already starting to lose players and to babysit a team full of spoiled superstars.

In fact, I'm actually more impressed with what Barry Switzer did. There may have been no other coach that could have stepped into that situation and keep it together long enough to win another championship.

Your thoughts?

my thought is that anyone impressed by that boob Switzer is an idiot

 

[Zekeats]

BS. Ungrateful drunken owner got in the way.

 

[tyke1doe]

If Jimmy had stayed, I believe we win five straight Super Bowls.

Jimmy's teams were virtually mistake-free; they were disciplined, and Jimmy's team knew how to defeat Steve Young and Brett Favre.
I doubt we would have committed three turnovers in the 94-95 NFC Championship Game giving the Niners a 21-0 lead, which prove to be insurmountable.

However, I don't blame Jerry Jones for Jimmy's early departure. Jimmy orchestrated the whole insult of Jerry at the restaurant because he wanted to leave to coach a team closer to the Florida Keys. So, he purposely snubbed Jerry because he wanted out of his contract but wanted to take the cash also. He knew Jerry wouldn't fire him and wasn't going to let him go willingly. So, Jimmy had to make the atmosphere toxic.

Granted, Jerry was meddlesome, but Jimmy knew that. What did he think Jerry meant by he's going to be involved in everything from "socks to jocks." I think Jimmy overreacted to Jerry's ubiquity on purpose. He wanted out. And he knew what buttons of Jerry's to push.

Let's just be honest, guys and gals.
Three Super Bowl championships were the most we were going to get out of this team.
The dynamics between Jerry and Jimmy just didn't lend itself to a long-term marriage.
I was hoping we'd get four to tie the Steelers and 49ers in their dynastic decades.
But we may have been lucky to win three, especially Super Bowl 30, the most unsatisfying of all the Cowboys' Super Bowl wins. That team won by sheer talent and by the brain farts of the man I call an honorary Dallas Cowboy - Neil O'Donnell.

 

[fivetwos]

Exactly, I highly doubt Dallas would have drafted as bad as they did if Jimmy didn't leave. 94 draft was all Larry Allen an absolutely nothing else. 95 draft was atrocious. Same in 96 with only Godfrey being decent. Same in 97 with only Coakley and maybe a serviceable Lefleur. 4 straight years of horrible drafting. Only 1 hall of famer in Allen and maybe 3 good to decent players after him in four years! The rest were never even serviceable NFL players. Maybe Shiver but that's a stretch. The player personal dropped big time after Jimmy because of bad drafting. You can't lose players with the salary cap and draft that bad.

Jerry figured it was easy and he could do it all himself.

 

[john van brocklin]

In Jimmy's A Football Life , he stated that he didn't plan to stay long, basically saying he didn't leave because of Jerry.

I think he could have kept the winning going, had he chosen to stay, at least for a couple more years. I think we would have had 4 in a row.

For sure!
4 sb in a row
Rueing!!!!

 

[john van brocklin]

Switzer cost us at least 1 championship in 94. The lack of discipline we lost after Jimmy left was a huge difference as Troy often eluded to.

1996 is another season we could have made a deeper run. More discipline issues off the field that year. We still had our core talent to make another run.

And Jimmy leaving will always be on Jethro’s hand . You bow down to a back to back HC not buck heads with him. Our franchise has never fully recovered. It’s been a dysfunctional mess ever since .

1994 was the one that got away
Ugh!!!!

 

[basel90]

Switzer took too much blame for Jerry’s decisions and meddling . He at least win a SB and with some luck at the 49ers and better refereeing would have win 2 . I believe the cowboy stars played hard for him as he was players coach . Feel bad for how he was treated . He was not fully prepared to the NFL transition but did what he could .
The game was changing and Jerry was and still is clueless . Johnson is a special HOF coach regardless , and Jerry has been exposed since .

 

[DandyDon52]

Then what's their beef with each other? Or at least Jerry's beef, Jimmy has seemed to move on

Jerry saw it as a betrayal, because he apologized for the 500 coach remark, but jimmy still left town.
Jimmy was mad at jerry and his antics, which took him years to let go of, but jerry never has let go of his anger over that period.
Jerry also hates that jimmy gets all the credit for that team.

 

[DandyDon52]

Its hilarious to me how some people don't give Switzer his credit. That whole "it was Jimmy's team" thing has some validity to it, but it wasn't ALL him.

If that was the case he would have take the Dolphins to 2 or 3 Superbowls. Like you said, Switzer did a great job too!!

Jimmy built the team assembled the coaches, trained the players, created a winning culture , and rode that to 2 SB's in a row!
then switzer all he had to do was ride that championship horse, which is much easier that building all that.

Same thing for gruden and his TB superbowl, he didnt build that team and it was in the nfc conf champ game the year before and barely lost.
The real credit there goes to dungy not gruden.

 

[Jake]

I used to be one of those fans who believe that had Jimmy stayed we would have won more Super Bowls.

Not anymore.

I now realize that things ended the way they did because it couldn't have gone any other way. Jimmy Johnson's act as a tough-minded psych genius was getting old and Jimmy recognized it. He figured it was better to go out on top vs. sticking around for the downside. Much easier to build a young, fast team and to do it from the perspective as the most recent best college football coach with the most cutting edge knowledge of the young players of that era. Much more difficult to maintain a team that had already peaked, was already starting to lose players and to babysit a team full of spoiled superstars.

In fact, I'm actually more impressed with what Barry Switzer did. There may have been no other coach that could have stepped into that situation and keep it together long enough to win another championship.

Your thoughts?

My thoughts?

If Jimmy stayed two more years the Cowboys would've won four SBs in a row. Switzer's SB win was a happy accident, courtesy of Jimmy's leftovers.

 

[BourbonBalz]

I used to be one of those fans who believe that had Jimmy stayed we would have won more Super Bowls.

Not anymore.

I now realize that things ended the way they did because it couldn't have gone any other way. Jimmy Johnson's act as a tough-minded psych genius was getting old and Jimmy recognized it. He figured it was better to go out on top vs. sticking around for the downside. Much easier to build a young, fast team and to do it from the perspective as the most recent best college football coach with the most cutting edge knowledge of the young players of that era. Much more difficult to maintain a team that had already peaked, was already starting to lose players and to babysit a team full of spoiled superstars.

In fact, I'm actually more impressed with what Barry Switzer did. There may have been no other coach that could have stepped into that situation and keep it together long enough to win another championship.

Your thoughts?

My thoughts? You wouldn’t want to hear them.

 

[Hawkeye0202]

My bad, it wasn't a dinner:

On March 21, management and staff from each NFL team were attending the league meetings in Orlando. ABC was throwing a party at Disney’s Pleasure Island to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Monday Night Football. Johnson and a table full of Cowboy employees and spouses were tipping back drinks and swapping work stories when Jones himself suddenly approached.

Unbeknownst to Jones, he was the subject of conversation before he arrived tableside.

An awkward hush fell amongst the group. With scouting director Larry Lacewell by his side and his own drink in hand, Jones banged the table and made a loud, boisterous, self-serving toast.

“Here’s to the Dallas Cowboys, and here’s to the people who made it possible to win two Super Bowls!”

Johnson was with Wannstedt, by then head coach in Chicago, offensive coordinator Norv Turner, who had just been named head coach in Washington, their wives, and several other team staffers, more than one of whom were now ex-staffers after being fired by Jones.

Not one person joined Jones in his toast and the silence was deafening.

Johnson glared at Jones. The billionaire and his ego-enhancing praise were not welcome with this bunch. Jones slammed down his glass, offered a few choice profanities, and retreated back to the hotel bar at the Hyatt Grand Cypress.

I know I'm a minority of this but I disagree with those who think we would have another Super Bowl had Jimmy stayed. I don't fans realize how bad Jerry and Jimmy's partnership/relationship or whatever you wanna call it, had deteriorated. It's obvious a lot of issues/emotions between the two happen behind closed doors but they kept sweeping under the rub. Orlando was just the boiling point where it all can to a head. Think about the dynamics of what happened. Jimmy openly dishing Jerry in the presence of several people, Jerry walks up and Jimmy apparently made no effort to hide his hate or play the political game. With his feelings being that strong about Jerry, how in hell would they have made it through an entire season without clawing and fighting?

In other words, IMO the impact of their relationship ( in a bad way ) would have been too much distraction for another Super Bowl run. Kinda like a married couple sweeping major issues under the rub for the sake of kids but at some point, it reaches a head and you know it's over.