Texas Stadium implosion end of beginning of Dallas Cowboys

Watching the video of the implosion of Texas Stadium is a hard thing for this blogger because it marks the end of the beginning of The Dallas Cowboys as America's Team, and the end of a period in American Culture where Dallas, Texas was new and all things seemed possible. The Texas Stadium implosion also sadly marked the end of one major tactile memory of my teenage and college years.

I was a huge Dallas Cowboys fan. Not the typical fan, though. I was attracted to the Dallas Cowboys because my Mom had befriended Oakland Raiders Defensive End Otis Sistrunk. Otis was a large and very nice man who announcers joked was from The University of Mars. Sistrunk came over for a visit in 1976; I was underwhelmed. At the time, football had no place in my life.

I saw football as a major part of an American cultural problem. When I was six, my late grandfather said I should play football; But I said all the blacks played; I wanted to coach. I thought it was weird that the all the players on TV were black but all the coaches were white. That was why I paid no attention to football; I was into science fiction and Star Trek.

But when I figured my Mom was going to be friends with this guy, Otis Sistrunk, who I'd never heard of, I'd better read something about the game. So I found and bought - well, had bought for me at the time - a big thick book called An Encyclopedic History of Pro Football.

The book had different sections and Otis was in it. But nothing interested me except a chapter at the back called "A Strategic History of Pro Football". This part of the book had diagrams of plays that were ran through the history of the game. And it had a special area on Dallas Cowboys Head Coach Tom Landry.

The segment explained that Landry used multiple offense and "pre-shifting" and brought "engineering concepts of feedback and control theory" to the development of The Flex Defense. As one who was interested in engineering, I found a reason to be interested in football and a fan of The Dallas Cowboys.

I subscribed to The Dallas Cowboys Weekly, and yes kept my issues for the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader centerfolds. But my dream was to visit Texas Stadium. On August 21st, 1979, I got my wish.

My Mom took me to Dallas and Texas Stadium as a one-day birthday gift. It was The Dallas Cowboys v. The Pittsburgh Steelers in a preseason rematch of their epic Super BowlXIII. What struck me at the time was how simple Texas Stadium was. The corridors were wide, but all concrete. I guessed the luxury I expected to see was reserved for the famous luxury boxes. I read that Dallas Cowboys Marketing Director Tex Schramm sold them to pay a private bond issue to build the stadium. In fact, that was how I learned what bond issues were.

After the game, I was hooked on the Cowboys and their defensive strategy. That led to a letter I wrote to then Dallas Cowboys Defensive Coordinator and NFL Hall of Famer Ernie Stautner. In the letter, I asked what "keys" Bob Breunig, then the Cowboys middle linebacker, looked for while running the "Flex Defense."  To my surprise, the letter he wrote back invited me to the Dallas Cowboys offices! So in July of 1980, I went back to Dallas.

I was allowed to see six reals of film: Dallas Defense v. The I Formation One, Dallas Defense v. The I Formation Two, Flex Strong: Quality Control, Flex Weak Quality Control, Flex Strong, and Flex Weak. What I noticed was that because the defensive lineman in the Flex started over the offensive player, then moved to a gap, an offensive lineman could actually block a defender before that person moved to their gap position.

That happened to Dallas Cowboys Defensive Tackle Randy White, who was head up on New England Patriots Guard John Hannah. The Patriots were in what the Cowboys called at that time "Brown Right" formation. In that, the tight end was on the right, the fullback behind the quarterback and the halfback behind the weakside offensive tackle. The fullback at the time was Sam "Bam" Cunningham. The Cowboys were in "Flex Strong", which is why White was head up on Hannah; White's assignment was the gap between Hannah and the Pats center. He never got there.

John Hannah blocked Randy White so hard and fast that the gap opened because the other defenders were flowing to their positions but not White, and Cunningham flew through the truck-sized hole and raced 56 yards for a touchdown.

When Ernie Stautner came in to check on me, I asked him about that, and he gave me a chalk talk on where White should have been. But with all of that, my love for The Cowboys and for Dallas and Texas Stadium was cemented. I found The University of Texas at Arlington because I wanted to study city planning in Dallas.

Dallas, Texas was growing at the time and basking in the glow provided by the success of the Cowboys and the TV show Dallas. I lived in Oakland; Dallas was everything the Bay Area was not: hot weather, steel and glass buildings, cranes all over and new. Everything seemed shiny new.

Of course, then I went to college and while I enjoyed my four years at UTA and the friends I met and still have today, I felt that Dallas and "The Metroplex" was 15 years behind the Bay Area socially, so I worked to come back. I was accepted at at graduate school and The City Planning Program at Cal Berkeley in 1985.  But before I left, I got a chance to go to a number of games at Texas Stadium.

The one I will remember isn't a Dallas Cowboys game; it's an SMU game.  SMU played Texas-Arlington at Texas Stadium and SMU, which had Eric Dickerson and Craig James, ran all over us.

They called Craig and Eric, "Dicker-James" and I think it was KRLD's radio announcer Brad Sham who came up with the name.  What I remember was my friend at UTA Shelly Gruwell saying "Look at them go" in that Texanese drawl of hers, over and over again.

My love for the Dallas Cowboys never diminished until a man named Bill Walsh came along with an innovative passing game - that's another story for another time. But part of that reason too was how new Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones handled the late Coach Tom Landry; by announcing on radio that he fired him. That was how Landry learned of his ouster.

Gil Brandt was the Cowboys Director of Player Personnel and the architect of the great Cowboys teams as well as the pioneer of using computers in the player scouting process. Gil was locked out of the Cowboys Headquarters.

It took me a long time to get over that. I've since met Jerry Jones and really admire him as a business man. But the "Landry issue" will always stick with me. Texas Stadium was a symbol of that. But also of a certain hubris and free-spending era, too.

In defense of Jerry Jones, Jones discovered a lot of fiscal overspending by the Cowboys management when he took over the organization. Jones cut the fat and caused the Cowboys to turn a profit.

One can say the new Cowboys Stadium is Jerry Jones way of saying "The Cowboys were OK then, but this is what they should be. An example for the sports World."

I'll miss Texas Stadium. May it rest in peace.

Watch The Masters and Tiger Woods online live here

Related searches: watch masters online, watch masters live, watch the masters live, masters odds, 2010 masters favorites

Thanks to ESPN and a some simple coding by this blogger, you can watch the 2010 Masters live online below. All you have to do is click on the image of Tiger Woods at The Masters Press Conference and since this post goes to Facebook, it should work there as well:






As of this writing, 67-year-old Tom Watson heads the leaderboard at The Masters. Watson is followed by Lee Westerwood and Phil Mickelson. Tiger Woods, once even, then 2 under par a moment ago, is now 3 under par and just 7 shots back of Watson with 9 holes to go. Here's the leaderboard (you need a frames capable browser to see this, otherwise click here).



Stay tuned. And let me know what you think; I'm trying to make my blog posts more multimedia.

Georgia Aquarium Planet Shark Tour in Atlanta, GA

The Georgia Aquarium and the Planet Shark exhibit are a must see if you're visiting Atlanta, GA. With the exception of the giant fish-shaped "G" that's visible from a distance in downtown Atlanta, The Georgia Aquarium is rather unremarkable in its exterior design, but the interior more than makes up for it, as well as the story of how it came to be.

Now, what's this blogger doing at The Georgia Aquarium? Simple. Atlanta, Georgia has become a second home because my mother lives their and one of the obligations of being an only child is going back to keep my widowed mother company and give help around the house. Given the time spent in Atlanta, getting involved in the local culture was logical.

An internet marketer working with the Georgia Aquarium happened to issue a tweet from the Georgia Aquarium twitter account that a "Planet Shark blogger day" was to be held. I happened to see the tweet, signed up and asked permission to use my camcorder to make the video blog that's part of this blog entry.

Frankly, the Georgia Aquarium Planet Shark Tour video was coming out to be rather boring until Hanna literally happened by, but I'll get to that in a moment.

The experience started with a host in the video who at first didn't seem familiar with the idea of being video-blogger. The gentleman was trying to talk around the camcorder rather than to it. But after he realized it was a serious production, the host explained that The Georgia Aquarium was started via a $250 million investment by Atlanta resident Bernie Marcus, who established the Home Depot store chain.

The Georgia Aquarium is the World's largest with over 8.1 million gallons of water, and a perfect example of how well-heeled residents of The South have literally spent cities like Atlanta and Dallas into World-class status. With Dallas, it was the totally-privately-financed Dallas Arts District and the Dallas Symphony Hall at its center. With Atlanta, it was the creation of CNN by Ted Turner, the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, and now the Georgia Aquarium.

The Georgia Aquarium's promoting Planet Shark, a special exhibit built by Shark expert Rodney Fox. While you can read more about it at its website, what was interesting was the use of giant "website-like" display panels to show shark physiology. The best information was on how few humans were killed by sharks versus the large number of sharks killed by people - no word about the famous shark attacks on the crew of the USS Indianapolis. The overall set of displays, designed to combat the idea that sharks are dangerous man-eating monsters, is effective and entertaining.

Video use was restricted to a degree, so that curtained much of the story I wanted to tell, until I met Hanna.

Hanna's a volunteer tour guide at The Georgia Aquarium who was waiting for an elevator as I was leaving. I happened to ask her how much time I had until closing and she told me. Frankly, her voice was so clear and perfect for a video I asked her if I could film her and she agreed. The result was what one of my constant video watchers Alan Molsted called one of the best videos I've ever done.

Hanna led a journey into a must see part of The Georgia Aquarium: the tube-like glased-in walkway that travels through a 6.3 million water tank. During our tour we saw divers above us who, Hanna informed, were "our visitors." One can pay between $200 and $300 to be part of a guided scuba dive tour and swim with, but not touch, the whale sharks. All one has to do is visit the Georgia Aquarium website and sign up.

Our tour ended at another giant water tank that's visible via an equally giant glass wall that must be two-stories high. As the video shows, its a breath-taking site. It would have been unseen here were it not for Hanna. Moreover, whoever's in charge of marketing for The Georgia Aquarium should make Hanna the paid star of a video tour series. She's that good on camera. Additionally, there should be a blogger day for the whole facility, not just Planet Shark.

In closing, the Georgia Aquarium's an incredible place to visit, either alone, with friends, or especially with kids, who just get pure joy out of the experience. Most of the visitors were families with young children, and all well-behaved and having fun.

Check it out.