lifetimes.
Jones is bringing the first Super Bowl to North Texas, an experience every region should be lucky enough to experience, and one that would never have been awarded to our fair cities (plural, mind you) had he not reached for the stars when first negotiating for a deal to plant this 100,000-seat monstrosity and then funding $650 million of this $1 billion project himself.
For without this sort of stadium, and one sans the fabled hole in the roof, the NFL would not have come. Trust me on that. Never, and that would have been a shame if the franchise that currently has played in more Super Bowls than any other, that is tied with San Francisco and Pittsburgh for most Super Bowl victories (five), that is as visible as any other in the league and possibly the most visible world wide, would never have played host to the NFL's premier game.
That would not have been right.
So love him, hate him, but thank him.
Now it was a tad surprising, but very fitting that during his bid-celebration press conference Jones invoked the name of the late Tex Schramm, for 29 years the first only president the Dallas Cowboys ever had. Jones and the late Schramm didn't exactly part on the greatest of terms, but then what would you expect from two very stubborn, success-oriented men.
Jerry saw fit to quote Tex, and that would make Tex very happy, because the one fear in life for a guy who so cherished history was that he wouldn't have done enough in his lifetime to be remembered for years to come. Silly Tex, though never an owner, he grew into an NFL institution.
So Jerry was talking about how Tex preached against allowing the NFL to become some sort of studio game, meaning selling out to the huge revenues television generates for the league. Tex understood this game still needed fans in the stands, that the experience of attending an NFL game what with all it's "pageantry" could not be minimized or compromised.
That the game needed people, meaning you the fan, to touch this game beyond your remote control.
Well, in less than four years North Texans will be allowed to touch this game - with or without tickets to Super Bowl XLV and with or without the Cowboys participating in Super Bowl XLV. Obviously not all will be able to attend since few stadiums can accommodate a multi-million DFW population.
But with all the events surrounding the Super Bowl, with all the new jobs created, with all the volunteers needed, this event, arguably the biggest sporting event to land in the history of DFW, will easily touch hundreds of thousands of people, probably even make new fans.
And guarantee you, somewhere Tex is smiling.
