Lonely Days In Dallas Thanks To Cowboys Owner Jerry Jones, There’s No News Out Of Dallas Until Draft Time

As a concerned citizen, I checked Valley Ranch the other day for, first, signs of life, and, then, of course, for possible gag-order violations.

The Cowboys’ compound is a lonely outpost these days. Communication to the outside world has been cut off. Here’s a team, from the top of the organization all the way down to Barry Switzer, that has become a nonexistent sports story in Dallas.

Meaning nothing is different with Barry.

Jerry Jones placed an off-season tongue clamp on everyone except himself. And then the media haven’t exactly been beating down the door to talk to Jerry, or really, vice-versa.

The media obviously are happy to ignore Jones and the Cowboys. Jones and the Cowboys seem happy to be ignored. About the only publicity the team receives these days is when pseudo-baseball player Deion Sanders says something stupid in Florida - which is almost daily. Or when Erik Williams sues for defamation of character, leading to speculation that the overuse of baby oil led him to believe we actually thought he had character.

In the old days at Valley Ranch, meaning every other off-season for years, the place was usually alive with minicams, microphones and notebooks. The Cowboys were a year-round big story. Even once you trudged through the drug problems and police problems of the Switzer era, late February and March were always ripe with football, football, football stories. The draft, free agency, whatever.

At the moment, tumbleweeds blow through the parking lot.

The Cowboys are dead as media kings, at least temporarily.

And according to the reports coming out of some local TV station newsrooms, a drastic cutback in Cowboys’ air time also will come in the Austin training camp this summer.

“Part of what we’ve done was deliberate, but with this news slowdown, I think we also can get our feet under us again and then come back roaring to go,” said Jones, who will swing open the Valley Ranch doors to media after the late April draft when he says he will un-gag his coaches.

“Believe me, I have a big appreciation for what the media does to generate interest and build our sport and our team,” added Jones. “That won’t change.

“Just let us get into the mini-camps and the quarterback schools, and it will be business as usual.”

One little tidbit that was back-page news last week (any other off-season, it was a front-page story in the sports section) concerned Jones’ total overhaul of training camp.

Gone is the fifth exhibition game trip to a foreign country. Gone are side trips to El Paso for middle-of-the-week scrimmages. Instead, there will be an extra week in Austin and practice, practice and more practice under the St. Ed’s sun.

That sounded to me like a Troy Aikman demand was met, which Jones denied. “But Troy and I are certainly on the same page with this,” he said.

The training camp schedule is a major change for the Cowboys.

“And I can promise you there will be more changes to come,” added Jones.

“I said it would be different around here, and it will be. I’m not going to talk about those changes. I’m going to do them first, and then talk about them.”

Then he laughed and said, “Speaking of a major change, that’s one for me right there.”

So it is, even as life barely goes on at a dead Valley Ranch.