As a Cowboys fan, I like Wade Phillips.  Honestly, I do.  He has a chummy, down-home air about him that is sorely needed after the abrasive interactions of Bill Parcells.  Parcells had the pedigree, but his Northeastern accent and attitude never quite endeared himself to the Cowboys fan.  It also didn't help that Parcells is a coaching mercenary who bounces around from team to team whenever he feels that urge to coach again.  It's tough to get excited about a coach who you know is going to leave you within five years.  I think Wade Phillips will stay in Dallas as long as he has a key to the front door at Valley Ranch.In short, he's a nice change from the Tuna.

Still, there is this gnawing sensation in my sports-stomach that began as soon as Phillips was announced as the next head coach of the Cowboys.  My reservations have little to do with Coach Phillips.  He is a decent guy with head coaching experience who has fielded a tough defense no matter where he has gone.  I think he can be successful in Dallas provided he has the right personnel on the field.

It is at this point where I stop and shudder because the words "correct personnel" have not been used in the same sentence as the Dallas Cowboys since Jimmy Johnson left in 1994.  I call it the beginning of the dark ages.  Owner Jerry Jones knocked back a few drinks at an NFL meeting one night and belligerently announced that any one of 500 coaches could take his Cowboys to the Super Bowl.  Johnson promptly quit as coach and walked away.

Johnson had collected enough talent on that Dallas team that they indeed won another Super Bowl in 1995 with Barry Switzer at the helm.  Everyone in Dallas, however, knew that was a fluke.  Yes, the team won the Super Bowl, but they had an idiot for a coach.  They were so loaded with prior talent that a monkey probably would have won a title coaching them.  In fact, one Dallas journalist referred to Switzer as I.S.P., or Insignificant Sideline Personnel.  The team belonged to Jerry Jones.  Jones and his cronies ran the drafts and Jones had final say on any trades or free-agent signings.

The problem was that Jones apparently had no earthly idea what he was doing.  He may have watched Jimmy Johnson intently as Johnson built the Cowboys up, but times had changed.  First of all, Jones didn't have a certain Herschel Walker trade to give him an obscene amount of draft picks to play with.  Second, and more importantly, free-agency was now a major force in the NFL market.