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Sunday, December 21, 1997

Jerry Jones' superstar plan hits rough spot

By Bart Hubbuch and Jean-Jacques Taylor / The Dallas Morning News

IRVING, Texas -- Having built his fortune drilling for gas and oil, Cowboys owner Jerry Jones knew something about risk when he gambled his team's future on a core of highly paid superstars.

Jones' unorthodox strategy -- engineered by the arrival of free agency and the salary cap -- produced a gusher two years ago when that core of talent brought the Cowboys an unprecedented third Super Bowl victory in a span of four seasons.

This season, all Jones has to show for his money is a dry hole.

Sunday's contest with the New York Giants at Texas Stadium is the final act in by far the most disappointing season in Jones' nine-year ownership of the Cowboys. After billing themselves as a Super Bowl contender in training camp, they are 6-9, losers of four consecutive games and will miss the playoffs for the first time since 1990. The Atlanta Falcons have a better record.

"With my mentality, you can see some big highs and some big lows," Jones said. "That comes from being in the oil and gas business. You'll go broke in the oil and gas business going down the middle of the road."

But playing the role of riverboat gambler blew up in Jones' face in 1997, and it's not hard to see why: The Cowboys' most expensive players didn't return much on their investment.

Of the 12 Cowboys with a salary-cap value of more than $1 million this season, only three (cornerback Deion Sanders, offensive tackle Erik Williams and safety Darren Woodson) made the Pro Bowl. Most others had sub-par seasons by the lofty standards they have established for themselves.

Troy Aikman, one of the NFL's highest-paid quarterbacks at $5.873 million this season, is completing just 57 percent of his passes, a drop of more than 5 percent from any season since 1990 and a drop of 12 percent from his career high in 1993. The offense is ranked 19th in the league and has produced one touchdown or none in nine of Aikman's 15 starts.

Running back Emmitt Smith, he of the $2.502 million salary, has failed to finish five games this season because of various injuries and illnesses. He has looked like a shadow of his once-great self, and Smith's rushing total most likely will be his lowest since his 1990 rookie season.

Want more? Penalties by Erik Williams ($2.397 million) cost the Cowboys dearly in losses to the Giants and San Francisco 49ers. Defensive end Tony Tolbert ($2.562 million) has been virtually invisible the second half of the season. And cornerback Kevin Smith ($1.26 million), when he isn't being penalized for pass interference, has been burned repeatedly for touchdowns.

"You had to do it that way if you wanted to keep the franchise intact," coach Barry Switzer said of the Cowboys' so-called superstar strategy. "You had to pay them the money. We would have been laughingstocks if we didn't. Some players produced but many didn't."

FALLING STARS

The Cowboys sent only four players to the Pro Bowl this season, their lowest figure since 1991. They had averaged better than 10 Pro Bowlers a year for the previous four years.

In Switzer's case, underachievement by the superstars this season may end up costing him his job. For Jones, it has produced an endless supply of disappointment and consternation.

"In order to get our money's worth, and we're talking strictly about money, the only real satisfaction is getting a Super Bowl win," Jones said.

It is no minor investment, either. Jones has shelled out more than $100 million in signing bonuses since 1993. As a result, the Cowboys find themselves strapped by several long-term contracts that will force them to renegotiate several contracts to get under the salary cap before next season.

Not only that, but players such as Aikman, Emmitt Smith, Tolbert and Williams have several years left on their contracts with high salary-cap figures that make it difficult to release or trade them. The Cowboys also are hindered by $1.7 million in salary-cap money allotted in 1998 to tight end Jay Novacek and defensive end Charles Haley, both of whom retired in July.

Banking on such a small-but-costly core was considered a necessity by Jones, who wanted to keep intact what he could from Cowboy teams that dominated the early 1990s, winning back-to-back Super Bowls before free agency and the salary cap altered the NFL's landscape.

Others around the league took a vastly different approach, choosing instead to maintain depth by keeping the number of huge salaries to a minimum. The Kansas City Chiefs are a compelling example, having produced the AFC's best record with a roster that features just one player with a salary-cap value of more than $2 million (cornerback Dale Carter). The Cowboys, by comparison, have seven players at $2 million or above.

Aikman, for one, understands the math. He realizes the considerable disparity between Jones' investment in his superstars and the limited rewards they brought him this season, and the nine-year veteran doesn't hide from his share of the blame.

"I think it has been OK," Aikman said of his performance this season. "I view it more as how we did offensively. As a quarterback, I take responsibility for that."

The same can't be said for Emmitt Smith. Coming off his second consecutive sub-par season, the former NFL Most Valuable Player points a finger at a supporting cast that has slowly withered in strength since the arrival of the cap.

Smith said the Cowboys must get better performances from their backups and non-Pro Bowl starters to return to elite status, even though his 10-year, nearly $49 million contract is a major reason why that cast isn't nearly as formidable as it once was.

"Me, Michael and Troy have to go out and perform, but the people who aren't the so-called stars also have to perform," Smith said. "If Troy is on his back, then Michael Irvin can't catch passes and I won't have anywhere to run."

JONES HAS NO REGRETS

Jones is neither fazed by Smith's blame game nor apologetic for a financial strategy that has backfired this season. Jones said he has no regrets over any of the huge, long-term contracts he awarded. In fact, Jones claims he would do the same thing over again because the superstar strategy earned him at least one world championship, when the Cowboys beat Pittsburgh in Super Bowl XXX two seasons ago.

But Jones can't quite shake the feeling that his team has wasted an opportunity that appears to be fading quickly.

Dallas' superstar strategy, Jones admits, could and possibly should have resulted with at least another Super Bowl. "It didn't have to stop in 1995," he said. "The two years after '95 could have produced another Super Bowl with our talent level."

An endless string of Super Bowls is what Jones saw in the Cowboys' future in 1993, when he decided to change his team's financial philosophy upon the arrival of true free agency. Forced into tough decisions about personnel, Jones decided he would rather have as many stars on his team as possible.

Jones also vowed that, if he was going to award huge signing bonuses, then the money would go for home-grown talent he could vouch for first-hand. That's why, among others, Aikman received an $8 million bonus and Emmitt Smith was handed a $10.5 million check to remain a Cowboy.

The league, Jones said, is littered with free agents who received big contracts from other teams and played poorly. The list starts with former Cowboys cornerback Larry Brown, who received a four-year, $13 million contract from Oakland, and Andre Rison, who lasted one year with the Cleveland Browns after signing a five-year, $17 million contract.

"We wanted not to just sign Hall of Fame players, but those close to it," Jones said.

The risk in those bonuses is that they essentially guaranteed the player's contract, and guaranteed deals are a rarity in the NFL. Jones always had been opposed to giving players guaranteed salaries because he felt it reduced their competitiveness.

As the Cowboys learned the hard way, injuries and off-the-field problems are magnified when they involve high-priced players, because the impact of long-term deals on the salary cap makes it difficult to trade or release those players.

A prime example for the Cowboys is Kevin Smith, who ruptured his right Achilles' tendon in the 1995 season-opener, a day after he signed a four-year, $12 million contract with a $4 million signing bonus. Tolbert's chronically sore knees make it unlikely he will fulfill the three years remaining on his contract.

Defensive tackle Leon Lett, meanwhile, is signed through 1999 but has missed portions of the past two seasons for violating the NFL's substance-abuse policy.

NO ROOM FOR ERROR

"What it boils down to is that I better be right because it's going to be costly," Jones said. "I better really have a player evaluated, because it's a decision that risks the future for right now. The surprise here is that we've had good luck the last two years with a healthy Troy Aikman. I always assumed we would have our down years when we lost our quarterback."

Jones figured wrong, and the result is that his team is at a crossroads. The Cowboys are wedded to the bulk of their most high-priced players until at least the turn of the century, so the draft and what few choices Dallas can afford in free agency become critical.

Even so, the Cowboys will leave a legacy of unfulfilled promise no matter where they go from here. Despite winning three of the past five Super Bowls, they will be remembered as a franchise that didn't get the most out of its talent.

"What happened this year is no fun at all," Jones said. "I don't have time to have a bad time. It's not in my schedule. We have to get it corrected now, and that urgency will influence the decisions you see around here in the next few weeks and months. This is not like 1989. We do not have a five-year plan. We have to get it turned around."

(c) 1997, The Dallas Morning News.

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