For long-time Washington football fans like myself, Sunday’s season-ending loss to the Dallas Cowboys was wrenching to watch. It’s one thing that Washington’s eighth straight loss secured a 4-13 mark on the season. The .235 winning percentage was one of the franchise’s worst and thankfully marked the end of the painful 26-40-1 Ron Rivera era in D.C.
The loss also reinforced the reality that the Washington-Dallas rivalry is no more. What was once the premier rivalry in the NFL—and among the fiercest in all of pro sports—has dissolved into a one-sided affair. The Cowboys have won five of the last six games and 37 of the last 50 dating back to 1997. Dallas won the two games this season by a combined score of 83-20, including a 45-10 Thanksgiving Day win when the Cowboys humiliated their foes by eating turkey on the sidelines in the waning minutes.
Plus, the tidal wave of blue and silver at FedExField was nauseating. The Cowboys have a national following and draw exceptionally well for out-of-town games, but it was ridiculous that the stadium was at least 80% Cowboys fans at kickoff, a percentage that heightened as Dallas pulled away starting late in the first half. This was one of too many times in recent years that FedExField has become a “home field” for the opposing team. While filing out of the stadium, Dallas fans chanted “let’s go Cowboys.”
Which leads me to George Allen, the subject of my newly released biography, George Allen: A Football Life. Given how the rivalry has deteriorated into a one-sided affair, he’s probably rolling over in his grave.
Allen intensified the rivalry to meteoric levels when he coached the Redskins in the 1970s. He whipped his players into a fury by stressing his loathing of Dallas and its pompous reputation, while the Cowboys accused the coach and his staff of spying on practices. He also believed that the Cowboys earned favoritism in scheduling and calls from league officials because Cowboys President Tex Schramm had ties to NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle. The two worked together with the Los Angeles Rams in the 1950s.
Amid this mutual feeling of hostility, the rivalry produced a series of indelible moments:
- Washington’s 26-3 win over the Cowboys in the 1972 NFC Championship game, Allen’s crowning moment in his Hall of Fame coaching career.
- Kenny Houston tackling Walt Garrison at the goal line to preserve a Redskins Monday night victory in 1973, perhaps the greatest regular-season defensive play in Redskins history.
- Obscure Cowboys rookie quarterback Clint Longley throwing a 50-yard touchdown pass to Drew Pearson in the last seconds to bite the Redskins on Thanksgiving Day in 1974.
“The intensity when we played Dallas was unbelievable,” Houston, a Hall of Fame safety who played in Washington from 1973 to 1980, said in an interview. “If you came out of the game, and you weren’t bleeding or could barely walk, you hadn’t played. They really felt like that. I wish we could have played them every game during the year. We just loved to play them. It was always the perfect setting: Monday night, Thanksgiving Day, a 4 o’clock start, RFK. Those kinds of games still give you (goose) bumps.”
Cowboys Hall of Fame quarterback Roger Staubach, who played during the same era, told me: “It was a bitter rivalry, and both teams were really intense. We didn’t like them, they didn’t like us. But there was a lot of respect.”
Those fun days seem so long ago, now assigned to the dustbin of history. Currently, there’s no respect around the NFL for the Washington football team, which has become a doormat for the rest of the league. In the 31 seasons since Joe Gibbs resigned for the first time after the 1992 campaign, Washington has posted a .412 regular season winning percentage (204-292-3), with only four NFC East titles and six playoff seasons resulting in a 2-6 postseason record.
So what where do we go from here to rebuild this squad in the new ownership era led by Josh Harris? The rebuilding will start with the hiring of a new general manager and head coach. Who should that coach be? A young, untested assistant coach or maybe Bill Belichick? In the draft, the Commanders are now guaranteed the No. 2 pick, but what should they do with it? Sam Howell struggled mightily down the stretch this season and did nothing secure his spot as the team’s starting quarterback going forward. If USC’s Caleb Williams is available at No. 2, should Washington take him?
Or should the Commanders focus first on rebuilding their woeful offensive line, which allowed 65 sacks this season, one of the top figures in the NFL? Wouldn’t it be nice to see a return to the capability of the HOGS O-line from the past? That line with now-iconic names like Russ Grimm, Joe Jacoby, Jeff Bostic, Mark May, Raleigh McKenzie, Jim Lachey and Don Warren was a constant throughout the Joe Gibbs-1 era, when the Redskins won three Super Bowls with three different quarterbacks, none of whom will ever make the Hall of Fame. The latter fact is a way to say that it doesn’t matter who’s playing quarterback if the line can’t pass protect and open holes on running plays.
What about an edge rusher to compensate for the departures this season of Chase Young and Montez Sweat?
We’ll know more in the coming days about which direction this franchise is taking, starting with the hiring of a new general manager and head coach.
