F*ck the Dallas Cowboys

The Dallas Cowboys are the wealthiest football team in the world. They were the first franchise in NFL history to win three Super Bowls in four years. They call themselves “America’s Team.” Their heroic blue and silver colors, the jiggly cheerleaders, the unapologetic Texas swagger. As a little kid, riveted each week to Monday Night Football — I hated the Cowboys.

They seemed squeaky-clean, and elitist. If they were winning a game, they would purposely play even harder, to humiliate their opponent. Even as a child, I just knew they were Christians.

And behind me on the sofa, laughing and cheering, was my dad, who grew up in Texas and was loving every minute of it. I was too young to argue. I bit my lip and suffered through each season. Sometime in high school, sports and I parted ways, in favor of beer, cars, girls, drugs, music, books. It was a mutual decision.

Twenty five years later, I find myself stepping out of a taxi in front of a football stadium. A magazine has sent me here to write about luxury suites, of which this stadium has the most, and the largest. I’m 36 years old, this will be the first professional sports game of my life. In Dallas.

Texas Stadium stretches up to the sky like the Colisseum, a concrete shrine to the only deity that matters. 65,000 rabid fans stream into the building, laughing and hooting, full of excitement and memorized statistics. It’s totally overwhelming. What is it about football in this part of the country? Is it the heat? A residual bitterness because they lost the Civil War? Or the opportunity for white millionaires to pretend they still own slaves?

I navigate through the parking lot parties, past the Hooters restaurant. Children in the gift shop are pleading their parents to buy them authentic Cowboys gear. 175 bucks, for a jersey. For a kid.

After a number of wrong turns I finally arrive at Suite 418, luxury box of the Cowboys publicity department, located behind the goal posts. The hallways smell of delicious meat.

There are larger suites, but this one is already bigger than my apartment: 27 feet square, with beveled glass walls, marble counters, and full bar. Serving trays glisten with beans, potato salad, and hunks of simmering baked ham. The Boston cream pie is yet to come.

The room soon fills up with pious Cowboys fanatics. Everyone grabs a cocktail, and slips into conversations about rushing yardage and point spreads. Today Dallas defends its Super Bowl title against Philadelphia. The rivalry is explained to me with great passion, a long and hostile struggle between two cities I’ve never visited, until today.

Although video monitors dangle from the ceiling, and others occupy an entire wall, everyone has attached themselves to a set of binoculars. Church is now in session. The congregation is about to jump out of its skin.

Cowboys get the ball on the kickoff, drive down the field and immediately score a quick touchdown. One guest rises to refresh his cocktail, slaps me on the back and announces, “Welcome to Dallas, Jay-ack!” By the end of the game, he will be in tears.

At halftime, someone takes me on a tour of more breathtaking luxury suites. We head down a labyrinth of hallways, squeezing past a noisy mob of moms and babies, who are waiting to go down to the 50-yard-line for an intermission show sponsored by Huggies diapers, a series of races called the “Baby Derby.” The fastest infant gets a new pickup.

After inspecting more luxury boxes, which are luxurious, we end up back at our suite, where the Boston cream pie is long demolished. The Baby Derby is now in progress. Cameras detail the action in close-up, as well-coiffed Texas mommies kneel down on the field, cooing and jingling car keys, coaxing their drooling little thoroughbreds to crawl ten yards to win a truck.

One guy watches the monitor, sipping a whiskey, then turns to me with a big mushy smile and says, “Y’all have keeds, Jack?”

Standing there in my 15-dollar sportcoat, childless and sarcastic, without a girlfriend, I feel like an emissary of Satan. I reply that no, I don’t.

“Well — they’re a lot of fun!”

What is not turning out to be fun is the second half of this game. I’ve never in my life been surrounded by such stress. The Eagles are holding their own against the NFL champions, with the score constantly flipping back and forth. Chitchat is over. All eyes are staring at the field, fingers tightening around cocktails, too nervous to even sip from them.

With a little over three minutes left, America’s Team drives downfield. They’re down by three points. Quarterback Troy Aikman completes a pass to the Eagles’ three-yard-line and the stadium erupts into a frightening snarl.

The Cowboys could easily kick a field goal to tie it up, but Coach Barry Switzer refuses. I get the sensation that here in Texas, that would somehow be a pussy move. With less than a minute remaining, Dallas prepares to go for the touchdown.

At this point the entire southern United States is gnawing on its knuckles. People in our suite are pacing like jungle cats at the zoo. All of Texas Stadium, from the Platinum Suites down to the lowly bleachers, is vibrating. I even sense concern from the Hooters girls.

On third down, with seconds left, Aikman fades back, looking for receivers. Through my binoculars it looks like he could easily run for the touchdown himself. But he doesn’t. He whips the ball into the end zone – directly into the arms of Eagles linebacker James Willis, who sprints about 30 yards, then laterals to teammate Troy Vincent, who speeds the length of the field for a touchdown that seals the game.

An awful, instantaneous silence washes over the horde of 65,000. I’ve never heard this many people shut their mouths at once. Our suite is quiet as a tomb, save for the low volume of TV monitors, heartlessly replaying the action, and then the final insult:

“The extra point brought to you by the all-wheel drive Subaru Outback! For extra safety — see your local Subaru dealer.”

Nobody south of Oklahoma is going to buy a Subaru today. The clock ticks to zero and I stand around dumbly, as grown men hug each other. Several are actually crying. At this very moment, somewhere in front of a TV, a dog is kicked.

People quietly trudge out of the stadium with heads bowed, as if walking to a refugee camp. Three drunk guys in Eagles jerseys taunt them from an upper deck: “A HUNDRED AND FOUR YARDS, BABY — WE KICKED YOUR ASS!” Not one person has the strength to yell back.

I quickly find a taxi and get the hell out of there, shocked at the emotion of the experience. In all honesty, I actually did get off on the ancient appeal of bloodshed in the arena. Humans squirming under insane pressure, the sudden and dramatic peak that explodes everyone’s brains. And buried deep in my lizard-skull, a small tingling sensation, almost orgasmic, at the well-deserved humiliation of the Dallas fucking Cowboys.