It started with an email to the man who is about to be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame after waiting patiently and then impatiently for 33 years to get his moment of football immortality.
https://theathletic.com/2716252/2021/07/31/watching-history-unfold-with-drew-pearson-cowboys-hall-of-fame-receiver-details-the-catch-vs-the-vikings/
The Cowboys had not even played a single play in 2020 when their depth was tested. Given the weirdness of the entire preseason — one that included the Cowboys having an “open practice” where no players wore numbers on their uniforms to protect any secrets that might have existed — the pregame reports left many scrambling for information right before kickoff. In pregame, it was revealed that the starter at right tackle was a player who was a longshot to even make the roster, Terence Steele. Steele was an undrafted rookie from Texas Tech who surely had a chance to be one of many developmental kids on the practice squad, but now he would be starting in place of right tackle La’el Collins in his first NFL game without the benefit of even one preseason game to simulate live fire.
https://theathletic.com/2738875/2021/07/30/depth-decides-and-destroys-seasons-the-cowboys-have-addressed-this-roster-issue-well/
On Aug. 7, Jimmy Johnson will be properly inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. I have written plenty over the years about his credentials and his clear-cut case for football immortality with a bust in Canton.
https://theathletic.com/2696024/2021/07/27/that-was-just-jimmy-those-who-know-jimmy-johnson-best-tell-stories-about-the-hall-of-fame-coach/
DATELINE: Seat 29F of flight to Santa Barbara. It is time to dust off the laptop, let the sunburn heal a bit and finally get to work. It has been 204 days since the Cowboys were last involved in a real live football game in Week 17 against the Giants at MetLife Stadium. That game was the final frustrating chapter in a thoroughly frustrating 2020 season that involved propped-up expectations of success and the thud of incredible underachievement.
https://theathletic.com/2730402/2021/07/26/sturms-state-of-the-cowboys-we-are-back-and-off-to-oxnard-2021/
It’s time for me to knock out the last moments of vacation, then we are scheduled to make our triumphant return to Oxnard/Ventura, Calif., for the start of the all new and hopefully improved Dallas Cowboys training camp. It is my mission to attend my first NBA Finals game since the Mavericks’ glorious run in 2011 with a Game 6 appearance in the Deer District on Tuesday. I will report back, but I am definitely thinking the best way to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the only Milwaukee Bucks title (and the 49th anniversary of this Bucks fan’s birth) in their modest history is to do it again in 2021. We shall see.
https://theathletic.com/2710362/2021/07/16/dallas-next-champion-who-starts-on-o-line-for-cowboys-dfw-sports-mailbag/
As we race through the final few weeks before training camp, I thought we should address the last few names who have not received much analysis since they were brought in by the Cowboys during the unrestricted-free-agent signing period.
https://theathletic.com/2702250/2021/07/13/what-should-be-expected-of-cowboys-2021-free-agency-class-history-says-not-much/
