What Rivalry?

In the NFL, there might not be two franchises put in a brighter spotlight by their respective cities than the Redskins and the Cowboys. Washington D.C. and Dallas worship the Redskins and Cowboys and often live and die by the teams’ successes and failures. These two teams are a couple of the most storied in football history and make up what is considered the greatest rivalry in the NFL. And according to forbes.com, they are the two most profitable franchises in the NFL (Cowboys 1 Skins 2). So everything should be going fine for these teams right? Not at all..

Right now the Skins and Boys find themselves at a crossroads. They’ve built a reputation around success and have fan bases so reliant on achievement that the teams can no longer meet the fans’ expectations. The Redskins now are tied with the Lions for the longest drought without an NFC Championship appearance. They haven’t been there since they played the Lions in the 1992 NFC Championship game on their way to a Super Bowl victory. The Skins have only won three playoff games in that span.

The Cowboys infamous streak without a playoff win (now at 12 seasons) has became a giant storm cloud looming over the franchise and there’s no sign that the sun is going to shine anytime soon. Especially with the way Tony Romo seems to fold under pressure.

This season, both teams have gotten off to perplexing starts. Both are at 2-2 but have disgusted their fans with some lackluster performances. The Skins’ two wins came against the two worst teams in the league (Rams, Bucs), one of which they won without an offensive touchdown. Washington has totaled just four offensive TDs all season, placing head coach Jim Zorn in the middle of a frenzy of disgruntled fans and harsh critics for his questionable (at best) play calling. The Cowboys’ wins came against two winless teams (Bucs, Panthers) and have shown that when the game is on the line that they can’t come up with the big plays. Romo looks completely out of sync with his receivers, the defense gives up big plays and the team continues to make costly mental errors.

Let’s take a look at the two franchises at a deeper level. It all starts at the top. Both are led by media-seeking, trigger-happy and shall I say ridiculously greedy owners: Daniel Snyder and Jerry Jones. And maybe that’s where the problems start. Ever since buying the Redskins, Daniel Snyder has been quick to make changes. He wasn’t satisfied with the personnel, so over the years he’s brought in big-name players like Deion Sanders, Mark Brunell, Dana Stubblefield, Dan Wilkinson and now Albert Haynesworth. All of these players were brought in past their primes (we’re yet to see about Haynesworth but it isn’t looking good) and were completely overpaid. Snyder changed coaches too often, most notably dumping Marty Schottenheimer for Steve Spurrier. How did that one turn out again? He even switched the name of the Redskins stadium from Jack Kent Cooke (previous Skins owner) field to Fedex Field very shortly after taking over as owner! He couldn’t even honor the Cooke family that was responsible for establishing the Redskins tradition! Of course this was done to make the $207 million offered by Fedex to put their name on the stadium.

It’s always been about money with Snyder. Ticket prices, concessions and parking have gone up.  He pays some of his coordinators more than other head coaches in this league. This team was built around tradition, loyalty and consistency. It was defined by players like Darrell Green, John Riggins, and Art Monk who played all or most of their careers in Washington. There aren’t any players on this year’s team that Skins fans can relate to like the aforementioned legends. This is partly because most of the players haven’t been there long enough to develop the true “Redskin” identity. Fans are disgusted with the constant change that has yet to bring success. Their vociferous outcry is evident at home games where they hold signs and make public displays of their dissatisfaction. I heard of one fan wearing a shirt that said, “Daniel Snyder…making Jack Kent Cooke roll over in his grave since 1999.”

Similar to the Skins, Jones and the Cowboys have gone out and brought in high-profile players to numerous positions. Bringing in guys with character issues like Terrell Owens and Adam “Pacman” makes Jones remind me of Al Davis. Then they’ve had to deal with other big-name, high-ego guys like Tony Romo, Flozell Adams and Roy Williams (the safety). Then of course Jones made the ultimate mistake of bringing in Wade Phillips who I think just isn’t tough enough to be a head coach.

Now Jones goes out and gets the Buckingham palace of football stadiums to bring in even more revenue to the NFL’s most profitable franchise. The real question is how is that going to help the team win?

Jerry Jones hasn’t received anywhere near the criticism that Snyder gets on a daily basis. Overall, the city of Dallas has a favorable view of Jones. Of course he has three Super Bowls to show for his work. But as I’ve said many times, this is a “what have you done for me lately?” league. And lately the Cowboys have flat out underachieved with teams talented enough to win Super Bowls. I think the pressure of playing for a guy like Jones is getting to the coaches and players. And the billion dollars spent on the stadium can only add to that. I know Jones found a way to win in the 90s, but he was given the gift of maybe the best QB/RB/WR trio of all-time in Troy Aikman, Emmitt Smith and Michael Irvin. I don’t think he’s going to be able to do it soon with this cast of players that has no definitive leader and all the pressure of the Jones’ eyes on them at all times.

Jones and Snyder have both taken the George Steinbrenner approach to running a team. But what they both don’t realize is that in the NFL, this can’t work. You can’t have a big-name player at every starting position. Football isn’t like baseball where everyone does their own thing and you don’t always have to interact with your teammates. Football is more of a team sport than any other sport and to have a successful team you need a core of role players that don’t have the individualistic mindset. You need players that put the team above themselves. This is what the Patriots, Steelers, Ravens, and Giants did on their respective championship teams. Notice how the Patriots haven’t been able to win since bringing in all the big names (Moss, Welker, Adalius Thomas, etc). When you have an overload of star players, there are just too many egos and contrasting interests that distract the team from the common interest of winning a championship. The symptoms on the field are miscommunication, bad penalties, and turnovers. Hey Skins and Cowboys fans, any of this seem familiar to you?

Snyder seems like winning isn’t even on his agenda and has left Skins fans as hopeless as Orioles fans when dealing with Peter Angelos. But unlike Angelos, Snyder actually makes moves, just all the wrong ones. You can tell that Jerry Jones wants to win, but he makes his decisions completely based on talent, not on the character or work ethic of a player. And I don’t think that coming down on the sidelines in the fourth quarter of games helps anybody. I don’t care how long he’s been doing it.

The way I see it, the Cowboys and the Redskins are in real trouble. The fans are fed up, the media is firing at them from every direction, and the locker rooms are filled with tension. It might not be long before we see both these teams completely implode before our eyes. After the teams’ performances in the past decade or so, this rivalry is to the NFL what the Army-Navy rivalry is to the college football, meaningless to everyone but the teams and fans involved.