There is a circa 1950’s photo in David Maraniss’ book, “When Pride Still Mattered”, of New York Giants head coach Jim Lee Howell flanked by Vince Lombardi and Tom Landry, his offensive and defensive coordinators, respectively. One of the tenets of leadership is the ability to surround oneself with talented people and empower them to do their jobs. If that were the only measure of leadership, Howell might be the greatest ever. How’s that for a coaching staff? Lombardi is widely recognized as the NFL’s greatest coach and the Super Bowl trophy bears his name. However, one could argue, quite legitimately, that Tom Landry was just as good.
Landry, along with his trademark game-day fedora, was hired as head coach of the expansion Dallas Cowboys in 1960. In his 29 years at the helm, he won 250 games, led the Cowboys to 5 Super Bowls and won 2 championships (pause for a moment to think about that…by comparison, Joe Gibbs won 154 games over 16 years). During his tenure, he turned a fledging franchise into a perennial playoff participant, “America’s Team” and the NFL’s signature franchise. He was the architect Dallas’ “Doomsday Defense” and coached too dang many Hall of Famers to recall (even if we wanted to). Despite his accomplishment, and unlike Jimmy Johnson and Bill “The Tuna” Parcells, two of his successors on the Dallas sidelines, he neither desired nor absorbed a ray of the spotlight. Landry led with a steely resolve and a quiet confidence. His expressionless face rarely changed. Whether genuine or not, it served as a symbol of the inevitable for his teams and its opponents: a Dallas victory, no matter the ebbs and flows of a particular circumstance.
For all his accomplishments, Tom Landry should have been easy to hate in D.C. Instead, through his irreproachable class and respect shown his opponents and the game, Landry completely squelched the bitterness of the NFL’s greatest rivalry. To be frank, not a negative word could be fairly uttered about Landry – not from ‘Skins fans or otherwise. Indeed, Big D hardly deserved a man of Landry’s substance; without him, though, this wonderful rivalry may never have been born. For that, ‘Skins nation offers a rare and heartfelt tip of our fedoras to the Dallas Cowboys.
Hail…Sons of Washington!
Check back often as the “best” and “worst” Cowboys countdown continues through Super Bowl week.
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