I will admit there is a nice bit of NFL history attached to Packers-Lions Thursday. Detroit hosted Green Bay 13 straight Thanksgivings from 1951-63, encompassing both the Lions’ own era of NFL greatness (three titles in the ‘50s) and the rise of the Lombardi era (champions in ‘61 and ‘62).
It’s only the warm-up act.
And the return of Joe Burrow adds a little spice to Bengals-Ravens later Thursday evening, for sure. It’s still the equivalent of a “lights out” match if you know your old wrestling vernacular.
The main event at 3:30 p.m. at AT&T Stadium — Kansas City Chiefs vs. Dallas Cowboys — is where the most millions of eyeballs will land and stick. And it’s not because these are two teams battling their way back into the wild-card picture in each conference.
Cowboys
This is nothing less than the fight for “America’s Team” rights. And, where this writer is concerned, the Chiefs wrestled that away from Dallas two years ago.
In case you missed it — and I hope you didn’t because I don’t intend to replay the entire thing here — three weeks into the 2023 season I wrote a column that stated the Chiefs had clearly grabbed the rights to the mythical “America’s Team” crown. For nearly half a century after leaving Dallas as the Texans and moving to KC, the Chiefs were as irrelevant as they come, save for a Super Bowl IV win over Minnesota. The Cowboys, meanwhile, owned the ‘70s — at least the portion that didn’t belong to Pittsburgh — and gained the dubious honor of being named “America‘s Team” by NFL Films, largely a product of the national appeal of Roger Staubach and Tom Landry and the team’s virtual ownership of the 3 o’clock kickoff for CBS.
You would have assumed any debate about whether the right team left Dallas in 1963 had ended by the time the Cowboys won their second Super Bowl in 1977 or played in their fifth in 1978. Or played in their 16th NFC championship game in 30 years in 1995 while grabbing that fifth Lombardi Trophy.
Careful what you assume.
When I wrote this column in Sept. 2023, Patrick Mahomes had won two Super Bowls and played in three. Andy Reid was closing in on Tom Landry on the all-time win’s list. And let’s get right to the heart of the matter, Taylor Swift had just started showing up at Chiefs’ games, drawing millions more to NFL football by her mere presence.
The Cowboys had Mike McCarthy on the sidelines. They had Chris Christie in Jerry Jones‘ owners’ box. It was a mismatch of massive proportions.
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So what has happened in the two years, two months since I penned my thoughts and handed the virtual “AT” crown to the Chiefs? The Cowboys have gone 22-19-1 in the regular season, 0-1 in the playoffs. They have made a coaching change. The Chiefs have gone 30-12 in the regular season, 6-1 in the playoffs, winning another Super Bowl, playing in two more.
The Chiefs have played in four of the last five Super Bowls, not to mention five of the last six. The Cowboys never did either of those things. The Chiefs have played in seven straight AFC championship games. Dallas’ longest streak is four.
Andy Reid is now 29 wins past Landry despite having coached two fewer seasons. Yes, they play more games now, but Landry has more defeats so his .607 mark is certainly overshadowed by Reid’s .648. And Reid has the extra Super Bowl ring now, too.
I hopped on a News’ conference call a few weeks back to discuss what the paper might do if Swift shows up for Thursday’s game. There were more editors than I could count, more ideas than I could listen to and my mind wandered back to the Cowboys’ Cotton Bowl days, thinking of a newspaper office across town where Blackie might say to Luksa, “What should we do if Bubbles Cash walks down the steps at the 50-yard line again and turns all those heads?”
And Luksa would say, “Pay careful attention.”
Swift appeared on Travis and Jason Kelce’s podcast in August, promoting the release of her new album. It has 20 million views and is still climbing. This is just to hear her talk, not sing. The Cowboys traded their best podcaster to Green Bay. Chris Christie has been replaced in the owner’s box (at least at the Arizona Monday night game) by Stephen A. Smith.
The mismatch grows magnificently.
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However, there is a saving grace for Cowboys’ fans today. They are now coached by the son of the long-time successful but not quite Super Bowl-bound Chiefs (and Browns) coach Marty Schottenheimer. He has his team scoring points, playing hard, rallying from nearly impossible deficits. These particular Cowboys are 5-5-1, just a shade worse than Reid’s Chiefs stand at 6-5.
This may not be a Super year for either club, although ruling out the Chiefs at this point, given the fuzzy nature of the teams with the best records in the AFC — Bo Nix and Daniel Jones are the quarterbacks — seems awfully risky. For now, Dallas and Kansas City have remarkable appeal. The Cowboys still generate the crazy TV ratings and the Chiefs have come up right behind while grabbing trophy after trophy in February.
I don’t see any way the Chiefs leave town Thursday night having lost the “America‘s Team” trophy of this decade. But the game might be another matter, for those interested in such things.
Find more Cowboys coverage from The Dallas Morning News here.