The Cap, Fandom, and Loyalty

[12+88=7]

The team has an owner/GM that I am absolutely disgusted with at this point. So I can't abide by your "rule".

I have rooted for the team since '68, so hopefully I will see another owner or GM. Just waiting for the next bus to come by.

People come and go, but the team is there forever.

 

[12+88=7]

The players ARE THE TEAM.
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But when all 53 are no longer on the team, I'll still be rooting for Dallas.

 

[12+88=7]

I root for the players on my team.

I have favorite players, but when it's time to cut the cord you just do.

 

[JoeKing]

I have rooted for the team since '68, so hopefully I will see another owner or GM. Just waiting for the next bus to come by.

People come and go, but the team is there forever.

The Jones family is perpetually stupid at football as well.

 

[12+88=7]

It's the bizaare thing about Pro Sports these days
It's almost comical.

You're saying you could take your favorite Dallas team (pick a year.) vs the team you most hated in that era....flip the rosters so all the players from your most hated team are now Cowboys and vice-versa.....and now you love them because of the color of their uniform.

Take college teams for example, in years past. People either went to that college or it was a college that they pulled for, usually, from their home state full of high school players from their home state.
So an actual, real, reason to have loyalty.

Or even the old pro teams where the players stayed much longer. Because of that, you built fan loyalty because the top players were often there for their entire careers--or close to it.
Again...a bond formed and there was loyalty both ways. Not just because of the players, but at least partly so.

Now its just so random.

I don’t have to love the players to root for my team.

I hated Deion with a passion, but I rooted for him to play well.

 

[gjkoeppen]

But when all 53 are no longer on the team, I'll still be rooting for Dallas.

I will too but then there will be new favorite players then also.
..
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[DFWJC]

I don’t have to love the players to root for my team.

I hated Deion with a passion, but I rooted for him to play well.

One player out of 45.
I'm saying, what if you swapped all 45....say 1993 Cowboys for 1993 Commanders (or pick any team you maybe hated)

I get it that NBA is infinitely worse because there are only 5 starters. Move 1 and that's 20% of your team.
Take LeBron for instance. Just pick a loaded roster and go get a title. To me, it devalues the actual franchise.

 

[CouchCoach]

The only owner with more money that Jones is Jody Allen and unless she is completely different than her dead husband when there was no cap and he didn't spend a lot of money in free agency, there really aren't any other owners that could out spend Jones for players if there was no cap. The players fought for and got free agency which is what later caused the league to start the cap. You are right that the cap was supposed to keep a reign on player's salaries but now it's turned into a class system with the super stars salaries rising faster than other's salaries and it's lost control of keeping salaries down. The biggest reason for the cap was because of 2 teams who couldn't keep up in the free agent market, the packers and browns. They convinced enough owners to not let the Cowboys and a couple other teams continue to buy Super Bowls by out bidding other teams for the best free agents.
.
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David Tepper, CAR, 13B and climbing.

I know you like to try and correct me but you really need to do your research.

How much money any owner has isn't the point, it is how much they are willing to spend and I know some really rich people and they won't spend what I do on top shelf hooch. Ask folks that have worked in the service industry about rich people tipping.

All things being equal in the money market, they still have to pick the players and money isn't why he's, at best, average at it. He's a poor judge of talent and and even poorer judge of employees.

 

[CouchCoach]

Gee he bought THREE Super Bowls with the free agents he got by out bidding other teams.
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You couldn't be more wrong. Those teams were built through the draft and trades.

 

[buybuydandavis]

What would you do to "fix" this? I'd allow teams to designate 10 players as salary cap exempt. Let them pay whomever whatever they want to retain them. Then subject the remaining 43 players to the cap. Or, I would let teams have the cap plus 15% of their overall merchandise sales. You want them to sign Dak? Go buy some jerseys. Again, I understand the need for the cap but I think the league should try to find a way to let teams retain more than just 3-5 players long-term.

The owners wanted to end bidding wars between each other for top players. That's why there is a cap.10 players exempt from the cap is basically no meaningful cap. The top 10 probably cost more cap than the rest of the team already.

Note that *despite* the advantages Jerry still has in a capped league, between lower state taxes and the marketing opportunities he provides, he still hasn't been able to win without Jimmy to build a team for him.

 

[CouchCoach]

I get that, but all I can say is I am thankful I got to see the NFL before FA when teams were like family and the rivalries were personal with these guys which made from some major slug feast games. I don't see that today. They are out there hugging and getting each others autographs at the end of the game.

Just can't Like this enough.

Every player knows he might end up on that team so rivalries are a thing of the past. No more going over to the other team's locker room and throwing a funeral wreath in. That's the kind of thing that made me a rabid fan.

The game left the fans behind many years ago. It's all about the owners making more money.

 

[Aviano90]

I tried to play arm chair GM and realized I am not an NFL GM regardless of how many times I can claim I have been right. Predict failure 100% of the time and you will be right almost 100% of the time and you look like a genius.

I quit doing it. I just want the team to win. I get more frustrated with people pushing biased agendas looking for a cookie than I do the team losing and even people with agendas barely register on my radar anymore.

Honestly the league folding would probably bring me more joy at this point than any other outcome.

 

[ICP]

I've been watching sports since I was a kid and there have always been players on the teams I root for that I have disliked, A-Fraud, Kobe, Owens, Zeke, Clemens, and others but I've always rooted for the team. The problem with Dallas at this point is the ownership, they don't know how to run an NFL franchise. They have turned it in to a family thing where the mystic of 'Americas Team' means more than winning now. That culture combined with a lack of how to actually build a team that can be relevant for a period of more than a year or two has pretty much caused me to give up hope. But..... I'm still a fan

 

[Ranching]

I have favorite players, but when it's time to cut the cord you just do.

I agree with that.

 

[Paradox]

There is this misconception that Booger would rule the NFL with no cap and I really don't get what that is based on as he does not have the deepest pockets. Which is why he was so strong on the cap from the beginning, his bout with Emmitt taught him a lesson of things to come.

He was the richest, now has the 2nd deepest pockets and the most profitable team. You're right though, after he bought the Cowboys he was deeply in debt for a few years.

 

[RustyBourneHorse]

We need the luxury tax like the NBA. Spend it all Jerry...

I'd like it if the NFL switched to that.

 

[RustyBourneHorse]

(Disclaimer: this is a long and somewhat pointless rant. I'm just in the ranting mood today.)

I'm 33 and was 7 the last time the Cowboys were in an NFC Championship game. I grew up about 2 hours east of Dallas and absolutely loved Troy, Emmitt, Michael, Moose, Newton, Tueni, et (yes, even as a 7 year old my dad made sure I knew about the linemen), etc. To me, those players were The Cowboys. The closest I've come to that as an adult was rooting for Romo, Witten, and Dez, and now Dak, Zeke, and Amari. As much as I root for the star I root for the players I love who have invested in the star. I'd much rather Dak stay here, continue to grow/improve, and win a Super Bowl than I would somehow acquire a QB like, say, Russell Wilson, even though I know Russell is better than Dak right now, and win a ring. And that's simply because Dak has earned my love and loyalty as the QB for the team I love. These days it feels like many fans would be fine if we cut every player on the team and an entirely different group of players won a SB wearing the star that year, and then half of those players move on the next year. In fact, many fans advocate for that. How is that fun? Wouldn't you rather root for the players on the roster to grow, bounce back, become elite, etc., instead of constantly trying to replace them?

I hate that the cap and the way the markets are now is forcing teams to keep players for shorter windows. I also hate that it's turned almost every fan into an armchair GM and makes us over-critical of players because of how tight the cap is to where many fans seem to root for them to fail so that they can justify moving on from them. It's also, IMO, made it where many players don't have the seething hatred for opposing teams they used to because everyone is so focused on being professional and getting paid in the current system that they are willing to play for any team that will pay them. I'm not saying that's wrong but my point is that it feels like a lot of players and fans have lost sight of what it is to root for a team and to have loyalty to a franchise. And yes, I know the teams are as cutthroat with the players as the players are with the teams, so I'm in no way blaming players. But rivalries are what make sports great, and those feel rarer and rarer. I'm not saying rivalries don't exist and I'm not saying fans don't still root for players but it just feels watered down compared to what it used to be. Maybe it's the internet, maybe it's because I'm an adult, or maybe Risen Star and Ranching have finally broken my spirit, lol.

I completely understand the purpose of the cap. I'm probably just complaining because it would be better for the Cowboys if Jerry could just throw money at everything instead of having to make calculated and correct decisions to build a winning team under the current confines of the league since he'll never hire a GM.

What would you do to "fix" this? I'd allow teams to designate 10 players as salary cap exempt. Let them pay whomever whatever they want to retain them. Then subject the remaining 43 players to the cap. Or, I would let teams have the cap plus 15% of their overall merchandise sales. You want them to sign Dak? Go buy some jerseys. Again, I understand the need for the cap but I think the league should try to find a way to let teams retain more than just 3-5 players long-term.

As a fellow young fan, I like your ideas alot!

 

[RustyBourneHorse]

But surely being able to build a winning team is part of the challenge these days?

The salary cap in the NFL is actually what makes it more appealing to me than say football over in England/Europe as you just have the same teams spending the most money winning all the trophies. What's the point for the other teams competing every season?

Well, even in English football, you occasionally see smaller clubs in the running for the title and finishing top 4 or 5. Leicester City is a good example of this.

 

[LACowboysFan1]

We stink. I want to see special rules put in place so that the Cowboys can actually complete against other real franchises.

I assume that's a tongue-in-cheek statement, and I feel your pain.

Though there's precedent in a somewhat related way here in Louisiana. Recently the high school football ruling body separated some of the championships into two divisions - one for public schools and one for private schools. Because you had the private or "church" schools winning the championship over the public schools nearly always, as they could "recruit" the best players to play for them, the public schools only had access to kids who actually lived in the district.

One school, John Curtis Christian, in 43 years from 1975 thru 2018 (when the schools were separated in the playoffs) won the title 27 times and was runner up another 10 times, with the team that beat them yet another "church" school. Essentially all other schools knew going into the playoffs they had about a zero percent chance to win it all.

But this is the NFL, even if the special rules were seriously considered, I wouldn't want to win the SB because the Cowboys got "help", in my mind it invalidates the win...

 

[cowboyblue22]

what the cowboys need more than any thing is a competent gm and front office idiot jerry and his son need ot be gone