Is There a Huge Curse on the Dallas Cowboys? Check Out These Theories
Cowboys had a pretty good 2023 Draft this year but is it enough to get them to the Super Bowl this upcoming season? So that got me thinking: Could the Cowboys be cursed? Well, here are a few theories that say they are.
Theories of teams being cursed have gone back a century in some cases, such as the "Curse of the Bambino," which is the supposed curse when Babe Ruth was sold to the New York Yankees by the Boston Red Sox and caused an 86-year championship drought which was finally broken in 2004 when the Red Sox won their first World Series Championship since 1918.
Some theories surrounding the Cowboys have come to the forefront after another great season was cut short in the Divisional Round last season, so here are the top 5 possible curses:
5. The Curse of "Rowdy"
This could be something because "Rowdy" was not introduced until 1996 after the Cowboys won Super Bowl XXX against the Steelers. Now a mascot causing a 27-year drought from the Super Bowl is kinda crazy, but is it? Dez Bryant's catch that was called a non-catch by officials in the 2014 NFC Divisional Game against the Green Bay Packers, and Tony Romo's botched hold on a field goal against the Seattle Seahawks in the NFC Wild Card Game in 2006, cursed by "Rowdy?" What about the ankle injury of Tony Pollard in the Divisional Round last season after he was set to rush for maybe 200-plus yards? It is all a bit fishy to me, but we will have to wait till this year to see if the curse manifests itself yet again.
4. The Curse of AT&T Stadium
Maybe the 34 people on the construction crew that died during the building of the stadium, before they stopped reporting the number that is, or the neighborhoods of Arlington that were bull-dosed against the will of the families that grew up there could be a good reason for this curse.
3. The Curse of Tom Landry
Most would dismiss this theory because after Landry was unceremoniously fired by Jerry Jones in 1989, Dallas won three Super Bowls in four years, but what gives this curse some legs is that the Cowboys have not been to the Super Bowl since Tom Landry passed away in 2000. Could Landry have put a curse on the team that was only activated upon his passing? It is possible.
2. The Curse of Texas Stadium
The story of this curse goes back to 1996 when the Washington Redskins requested that the Dallas Cowboys be their final game in RFK Stadium. The Redskins wanted to give the Cowboys one last chance to beat them in RFK, but that did not happen. The Cowboys were blown out by the Redskins in a 37-10 game as their last meeting in RFK. Fast forward to 2008 when the Cowboys were playing their final season in Texas Stadium, the Cowboys had the chance to have their final game that year be against their division rival the Redskins, but they did not, they chose the Baltimore Ravens to be that team. The Ravens had posted a 5-11 record the season before so it is speculated that Jerry Jones thought the lowly Ravens would be a great final game in Texas Stadium when they could blow them out. That did not happen and the Cowboys lost 33-24 to the Ravens. That is when the curse began, on December 20, 2008, when Texas Stadium cursed the Cowboys to never win another Super Bowl until the team hosts the Washington Commanders now in the final game in AT&T Stadium, many years from now.
1. The Curse of Jimmy Johnson
Jimmy Johnson totally reenvisioned the Cowboys when he made the Herschel Walker trade that landed the Cowboys with all of their biggest players from the 90s Super Bowl teams. The return to glory was awesome after an entire decade of missing the Super Bowl in the 80s but it was also short-lived because of these 14 words spoken by a drunk Jerry Jones within earshot of the Dallas media:
"There are 500 coaches who could have won the Super Bowl with our team."
That sparked an ego-charged feud between the two which ended in Jimmy Johnson deciding to quit being the Cowboys' head coach after the 1994 season. But he did kinda prove those words right after Barry Switzer won Super Bowl XXX, but it was with the team Jimmy Johnson had built. Fast forward to now, 30 years after the first Super Bowl win that Jerry and Jimmy celebrated and Jimmy is still not in the Cowboys' Ring of Honor. Could this refusal to honor Jimmy Johnson be the curse that haunts the Cowboys? Could Jones' reluctance to honor Jimmy be a universal grudge that keeps the Cowboys from advancing past the Divisional round of the playoffs? Could it possibly be that Jerry needs to step away from decisions on the football team and give it over to a separate President and General Manager? Maybe if Jimmy is put in the Ring of Honor that will be the thing that snaps the drought of NFC Championships and Super Bowls for the Dallas Cowboys.
Whether you believe in curses or not, it does make one wonder why the Cowboys can't seem to get past the Divisional round of the playoffs no matter how good the team is.