I lived about a half a mile from where they had their practice facility (off Forest and Abrams near LBJ for anyone else reading from or familiar with Dallas). As a result, I grew up with the players kids (the Liscio;s, Mel Renfros, Robert Newhouse, etc, etc), and several players lived on my street). We could go knock on their door and the wives were always nice and had signed photographs of the players ready to give out (kicking myself for not holding onto these).
We used to go watch the team practice from the balcony of a hotel next to the practice field or when the hotel ran us off, we'd stand on egg crates so we could look over the fence. We'd dig through the dumpster and find used pads, shirts and all kinds of stuff, then hang around outside to try and talk to or get autographs from the players on their way home.
The practice facilities have come a LONG way from this:
Landry coached and pretty much won every season from the time I started being a fan at 5 years old until I graduated from high school. Everyone I grew up with were rabid Cowboy fans and Landry, et al spoiled us rotten. The team was like an extended family and they'll always have my heart, I'll never be a fan of any other team and no other team in any other sport comes remotely close to the ridiculous level of attachment I have to the Cowboys, its really strange when I think about it.
