Y’all outta pocket!: This Cowboys team does not owe fans a Super Bowl win

If you’re reading this, you probably fall into one of three categories:

1.  A Cowboys fan who read the title and felt relieved to know you’re not the only one who feels that way.
2. A Cowboys fan already outraged at the title for challenging a belief that sits at the core of your fandom.
3. Neither 1 nor 2 but someone who is skimming through this in anticipation of what you expect to be an entertaining comments section. 

Regardless, all I ask is that you hear me out. Thanks in advance. 

“It’s been 26 years. It’s time.”

On January 28, 1996 at Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe Arizona, the Dallas Cowboys defeated the Pittsburgh Steelers with a score of 27-17 to win their third Super Bowl in four seasons. On that day, Dak Prescott was right at 30 months old. Ezekiel Elliott was just over six months old. Mike McCarthy was just finishing a season as a wide receivers coach at the University of Pittsburgh, and CeeDee Lamb had yet to bless the Earth with his presence. 

I mention those facts as the basis of my befuddlement by a statement I hear from a lot of Cowboys fans. The statement is usually something along the lines of, “It’s been 26 years. It’s time for another championship.”

The people I mentioned above were obviously not associated with the Dallas Cowboys at the time, and they were probably several years away from even imagining that they’d be a part of the organization. 

Yet, fans say, “It’s time,” and “It’s been too long,” as though Dak Prescott himself has spent the past 26 years taking snaps from Tyler Biadasz without anything to show for it. 

I know I’m relatively new here, but isn’t it a bit much to place the weight of 26 years of unfulfilled desires on a quarterback who has only been around since 2016 and a coach who took over just before an unprecedented global crisis? And that’s not to mention the facts that:

• No matter how good a team is, there can only be one champion at the end of the season.
• Of all quarterbacks who started in and/ or won a Super Bowl, a significant number of them were older than Dak Prescott is now. 
• Most NFL players never experience a Super Bowl anyway. 

“I lived through the Super Bowl wins of the 90s, so I may be spoiled, but…”

I already had the idea for this post in the back of my mind when a Twitter follower responded to one of my tweets with the above statement. It wasn’t the first time I’d heard it. I tried to be respectful in my response, and I still mean absolutely no harm or disrespect when I say this, but yes, a lot of fans were spoiled by that run. Not only that run of championships but also the superordinate position the Cowboys claimed in the world of sports at that time.  

Now, the ’92, ’93, and ’95 seasons should definitely be sources of pride and joyful memories for anyone who was an active fan then. One of the most fascinating aspects of fan psychology is the ability to feel like part of a team without even stepping foot inside their stadium. However, the thing that makes some fans spoiled is the inability to appreciate all the success that’s happening now because it doesn’t measure up to a historically unmatched time period in the history of the franchise.