It’s the night of Jan. 30, 1994. The Georgia Dome is electric. Jimmy Johnson, trophy in hand, grins beside Jerry Jones. The two college teammates turned NFL power duo have just led the Cowboys to back-to-back Super Bowl victories.
Two months later, they had a tumultuous split.
Streaming on Netflix now, America’s Team: The Gambler and His Cowboys tells the tale of Jerry Jones and his assembly of the ’90s Dallas Cowboys, one of the most iconic teams in the history of sports.
It’s a saga that began with a bold purchase and led to one of the most successful runs in the NFL: a decade-plus-long journey that reshaped the league and delivered three Super Bowl championships. Over eight episodes, the series explores the franchise’s trials and triumphs through first-hand interviews and never-before-seen footage, featuring Michael Irvin, Emmitt Smith, Troy Aikman, Deion Sanders, former Head Coaches Jimmy Johnson and Barry Switzer and, of course, the man himself: Jerry Jones.
Jerry Jones and Jimmy Johnson had a friendship marked by back-to-back championships, and set the stage for one of football’s most infamous splits.
It was Johnson and Jones’ friendship that spawned the Dallas Cowboys’ remarkable ’90s run — and, as shown in this exclusive clip from the series, their falling out marked a turning point in Cowboys’ history.
Chapman Way, who co-directed America’s Team: The Gambler and His Cowboys along with his brother, Maclain Way, believes the unique dynamic of Jones and Johnson’s relationship makes their story special.
“They met when they were 18 years old at the University of Arkansas playing football, and they won a National Championship together,” he tells Tudum. “Then, Jerry strikes liquid gold [oil], makes $100 million, buys the Dallas Cowboys, and takes this massive risk in hiring his college buddy who had never coached a game in the NFL to come join him on this ride.”
Jones bought the Cowboys on Feb. 25, 1989 and hired Johnson the very next day. Success didn’t come immediately. Maclain recalls Johnson’s first year as head coach of the Dallas Cowboys.
“They went 1-15. They only got one win. In addition to that, when they were 0-6, Jerry and Jimmy decided to do the most radical thing, which is trade their best player [Herschel Walker].”
The following season, in 1990, Dallas had a 7-9 campaign. But, by 1991, the Cowboys were in the playoffs, and in 1992-93, they won Super Bowl XXVII, kicking off their legendary run.
In the final minutes of Episode 4, Johnson and Jones are riding a high, fresh off a Super Bowl XXVIII victory — their second since joining forces.
“I think everybody’s kind of gotten a kick out of Jimmy and Jerry and thinking that we were at each other’s throat,” Johnson tells a reporter during a post-game interview, Vince Lombardi Trophy in hand. “But when you win these kinds of things, the only thing you’re going to do at each other’s throats is hug it.” Moments later, the two embrace on the championship stage.
Jimmy Johnson on the sidelines during a game during the early ‘90s.
But just two months later, something had changed. At an NFL owners meeting in Orlando, Florida, former Cowboys defensive coordinator Dave Wannstedt recalls a dinner where Jones raised a glass to toast their latest title. Everyone joined in — except Johnson, who sat back with folded arms.
Reporters Ed Werder and Rick Gosselin remember Jones pulling Werder aside later that night and saying, “Don’t leave now. You’ll miss the story of the year. I’m going to fire that motherfucker Jimmy Johnson, that disloyal son of a bitch.”
So how did a decades-old friendship and a partnership at the peak of on-field success sour so quickly?
That depends on who you ask. Regardless, the Way brothers emphasize the importance of featuring Jones and Johnson’s respective sides of the story. Chapman says, “It was very apparent from the beginning that we needed to hear from both of them, and they needed to be able to speak openly and honestly about what happened. I think they’re still, even to this day, kind of making sense of what went wrong.”
The infamous split spawned a lot of what-ifs, leaving fans and the media speculating about a world in which the duo stuck together. On the topic of Jones and Johnson’s separate journeys post-breakup, Chapman recalls a comparison from sports journalist Skip Bayless to sum things up.
“Bayless said they had a Lennon-McCartney relationship where they were kind of better together than they were individually. That’s what I found fascinating …There’s been a lot of conversation about their clash being over ego, about who deserves credit, but I kind of found it more profound to really focus on what made them so special together.”
Watch America’s Team: The Gambler and His Cowboys on Netflix now.
