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On paper, Jerry Jones’ tenure as the owner as the Dallas Cowboys doesn’t look too shabby.
Jones has owned the team for just over three decades and has three Super Bowl victories in that time. That’s more than 23 teams all-time in the 32-team league and fewer than just six, including the Cowboys.
But that resume doesn’t exactly hold up under scrutiny.
Jones won the first two of those three Lombardi Trophies with head coach Jimmy Johnson. Johnson was the architect of the Herschel Wallker trade that help the Cowboys build their 1990s dynasty. But Jones, as he’s wont to do, grew tired of Johnson and fired him after a second-consecutive Super Bowl victory in 1993.
The Cowboys won it all again in 1995 under coach Barry Switzer. But they haven’t even reached a conference title game in the years since.
It’s safe to say Johnson was a huge reason for Jones’ success. And the two have had a notoriously frosty relationship since that time.
So when Jones spoke up recently and made some puzzling comments about the NFC Champion Philadelphia Eagles, Johnson couldn’t help but weigh in.
Jones stated that the Eagles have sacrificed their future for immediate success. But the facts don’t really support that claim.
Johnson spoke with the Philadelphia Inquirer about the comments prior to Sunday’s Super Bowl and divulged a conversation he had with Eagles’ owner Jeffrey Lurie about them.
Johnson said the comments were so laughably off-the-mark that he received a call from Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie, asking what Jones was talking about.
“I said, ‘I have no idea,’” Johnson told The Inquirer at a Fox media event in Phoenix Tuesday afternoon. “Philadelphia has a couple of first-round picks in the [upcoming] NFL draft. They’ve got extra picks down the road. They’ve got some very talented players. They’ve got some talented young players.”
Jerry Jones being laughably out of touch is nothing new. Cowboys fans will tell you that’s the norm. But getting dunked on by Johnson 30 years after firing him is impressive even for the colorful Dallas owner.