I have been a fan of the Dallas Cowboys since birth. Indeed,
I think my first words were “Tom” and “Landry” in that order. Growing up in New
York in the 1970s, being a Dallas Cowboys fan was not that uncommon. They were
known as “America’s Team” and went to five Super Bowls during that decade,
winning two of them. In fact, in those ten years they amassed more regular
season wins than any other team – 105. By contrast the two New York teams—the
Giants and the Jets—combined for 103 wins during the same span. So it’s easy to
see how a young, impressionable lad, just learning about football, would cast
off the hometown teams in favor of a more winning prospect. The “America’s
Team” tag even let you rationalize that you really were rooting for the home
team—just one that was national in scope.
The 1980s were not as kind to Cowboys fans. They saw their team have a few good
seasons early in the decade, but never make it to a Super Bowl. Then, in 1989,
the unthinkable happened—a 1-15 season. America’s Team had hit rock bottom.
While I was still loyal to my team, I was also disgusted. I was in my junior
year of college, so I stopped paying so much attention to football and turned
my attention to what was really important to me at the time—rock music and
beer.
Somehow, when I wasn’t paying attention, the Cowboys got good again. They were
dominant in the mid-90s and it was in the midst of their dominance that I moved
from New York to Arizona. (My move had nothing to do with the Dallas Cowboys’
dominance, so hopefully you didn’t accidentally infer that from the preceding
sentence. If so, I apologize for any confusion or mental distress this may have
caused.)
I moved to Arizona in July of 1995, and on Christmas night of that year I had a
“bucket list” type of experience. I got to go to a Monday Night Football game
between the Dallas Cowboys and the Arizona Cardinals. It was the last game of
the regular season and not only did I get to see the Cowboys win 37 – 13, but I
also got to see Emmitt Smith break the record for rushing touchdowns in a
single season, when he scored his 25th of the year in the fourth
quarter. (FYI- his record has since been broken.)
That night was a Cowboys fan’s dream. And I was certainly not the only Cowboys
fan who got to experience that live at Sun Devil Stadium. I would estimate that
Cowboys fans outnumbered Cardinals fans on a scale of 8 to 1 at that game. My
section was particularly blue. In fact there was only one (not exaggerating)
person in the entire section wearing Cardinals red. He was sitting about ten
rows in front of me and after the Cowboys scored their first touchdown and the
crowd erupted, he turned around and looked at the sea of blue behind him and
sadly shook his head like a little boy who lost his puppy. It wasn’t a Cowboys
home game, but it sure felt that way.
About a month later the Cowboys were back at Sun Devil Stadium where they won
their third Super Bowl in a span of four years. That 27 – 17 victory over the Pittsburgh
Steelers was the last great moment for the Cowboys, with lots of mediocrity and
occasional okay-ness ever since.
***
When I first moved to Arizona, I hated the Cardinals. I didn’t hate them as
much as I hated the Giants, Redskins, Eagles, Steelers, or 49ers, but I hated
them nonetheless. This irrational animosity was borne of the fact that at that
time, in 1995, the Cardinals and the Cowboys were in the same division, and
diehard football fans are conditioned to hate their team’s division rivals.
(Side note: Whenever I say I hate a particular sports team, my eight-year-old
son says, “Dad, you shouldn’t hate them. They’re just doing their job.”
Rational little bugger.)
Then, in 2002, the NFL realigned the league and the Cardinals and the Cowboys
were no longer in the same division. I didn’t have a specific reason to hate
the Cardinals anymore, but I still did so out of habit. Mostly I just ignored
them, though, since they were just as irrelevant as the Cowboys during that
timeframe.
Four years later a sequence of events began that would cause my fan loyalties
to evolve in unexpected and unsettling ways. Late in 2006 my wife and I became
parents. While the arrival of a child is a major life change, it brings with it
a thousand different smaller life changes. One seemingly innocuous, but
ultimately crucial, thing that changed was how I occupied my time during my
daily commute.
For several years prior to the birth of our son, my wife and I carpooled to
work every day. While driving we would either talk or listen to music on the
radio. But a few months after our son was born, my wife and I figured out a way
to work it out so she could be a stay-at-home mom and I was now driving to work
alone. This meant: 1) I could no longer use the carpool lane, which practically
drove me to tears as I watched the carpoolers whizzing past in the diamond lane
while I sat in gridlock traffic; and 2) I could listen to whatever ever I
wanted to on the radio.
After years of listening to the same two or three music stations, I started to
turn the dial. I still listened to music, but sometimes I would listen to NPR
instead. Soon enough, I started to prefer listening to talk radio instead of
music in the mornings. Then one day NPR had a pledge drive. As those of you who
listen to NPR know, their pledge drives, while well-intentioned, are about as
exciting as listening to paint dry. And listening
to paint dry is infinitely less exciting than watching paint dry. So I started to turn the dial again and I soon
stumbled upon a sports show called the Doug & Wolf show.
Up until that moment I had never listened to sports radio. Even though I am an
avid sports fan, I always wrote off sports radio as nothing more than mindless
jocks shilling for the hometown teams. But somehow the gravelly voice of Ron
Wolfley (a former Pro Bowl fullback for the Cardinals) quickly wormed its way
into my consciousness and I couldn’t seem to turn the dial. The banter seemed
more intelligent than I would have expected and they were talking about a topic
I enjoyed, so I kept on listening. The only problem was 90% of their chatter
was about Arizona sports teams, which I didn’t have a specific interest in at
the time.
Once I stumbled across Doug & Wolf I began to listen to them occasionally,
when I had my fill of NPR in the morning. During football season I would
chuckle to myself while they talked about the woes of the Cardinals and hope
they would mention the Cowboys, which they would from time to time. Then, in
2008, the Cardinals got good enough to win their division and shockingly, win
all their playoff games to make it to the Super Bowl. I started to listen to
Doug & Wolf much more frequently during that season and soon knew way more
about the Cardinals than I did about the Cowboys. When the Cardinals made it to
the Super Bowl I didn’t know how to feel or who to root for. I intrinsically
hated them, but they were playing the Pittsburgh Steelers who I intrinsically
hated even more. So I ended up rooting for the Cardinals, and was genuinely
upset when the Steelers took the lead and won in the final minute of the game.
With that Super Bowl I let my hatred for the Cardinals fade away. I found it
easier than I imagined to root for them, especially with the exceedingly
likeable Larry Fitzgerald and Kurt Warner leading the way. I was still a
Cowboys fan first and foremost, but I didn’t mind if the Cardinals did well.
And I started listening to Doug & Wolf more regularly and learned more and
more about the hometown football team.
In the meantime, the Cowboys have been mediocrity personified. Prior to this
year they went 8 – 8 for three straight seasons and bungled their chances to
make the playoffs in the final game of the season each of those years. I’ve
still rooted for them, but they certainly haven’t made it easy or particularly
fun. That is until this year.
This year has seriously tested my loyalties. Both the Cowboys and Cardinals
have been very good and in Week 9, they faced off. My son asked me who I was
rooting for and I said the Cowboys, but as I watched the game I wasn’t even
sure myself. Instead of cheering for either team, I found myself staring at the
screen blankly, feeling lost and confused. Who did I really want to win? It was
tough to say. But at the end of the game I found myself both upset that the
Cowboys lost and pleased that the Cardinals won. That sort of made my head
hurt.
A few days later my friend Mike contacted me and said he had an extra ticket to
the Cardinals – Rams game if I wanted to go with him. I gladly took him up on
it. So last Sunday I found myself at the first regular season football game I’ve
been to since Christmas Night 1995. And things had changed a bit over the
course of 19 years. No longer were Cardinals fans in the minority. Indeed, the
place was a sea of red. Every time the Cardinals scored, the place exploded,
and I was right in the thick of it, screaming myself hoarse by the end of the
game.
As we left the stadium, with the Cardinals victorious and in possession of the
best record in football, I felt something that I hadn’t felt for a football
team in a very long time—proud. And then I suddenly got scared, because I
realized I may have become an Arizona Cardinals fan when I wasn’t looking. Sorry,
Tom Landry.
