Photo by Victoria Ramirez for ATG.
A visit to an enormous, expensive football stadium.
Don't look now but the Dallas Cowboys have a home-field advantage
worthy of their dizzying media saturation; a wondrous tribute to
capitalism; an intimidating blueprint for 21st century event-planning;
a poisonous venture for opposing teams who face both harsh, dense
dissonance and distractingly luxurious surroundings; turned their swag
on.
Cowboys Stadium, with all the bells and whistles you've been reading about, is at its heart a suffocating thunderdome that recalls an airport, a state fair, Babylon.
The cheap parking, and somehow $40 feels cheap and perfectly reasonable, is tailgate friendly and leaves you a breezy, 12-minute walk from the entrance. Whereas Irving's Texas Stadium was an isolated mass of concrete we were better off busing to, the Arlington successor feels downright homey: Six Flags and Rangers Ballpark in Arlington lovingly linger in the background as you walk by nondescript office buildings, apartment complexes, pedicabs, a Jack in the Box...and the villainous saucer from "Independence Day."
It's a surreal approach and it's only the beginning.
A swarm of privileged children hurl infinite footballs across the street. Massive, high-definition screens tuned to NFL Network's genius "Red Zone" Channel light the way. There's a gorgeous, useless, lengthy pond. There's live country. If you buy beer from respective beer men and women, it's $6 versus the $8 you'll have to pay at proper stands. Here, $6 Miller Lite plastic bottles feel like a bargain.
Once inside, the Jones Manor caste system is in full effect. Luxury boxes are buried beneath the field and line the pro talent like a dugout. I can't imagine a better private viewing area in sports. There's swanky, vodka-sponsored lounges. There's perfect seating for those who can afford to be near the field, itself a ditch carved well below street level.
For blue collar supporters, one can pay $29 to stand on a deck and watch the big TVs. Each "party pad" is sponsored by big brands, each is worth seeing. Ford's is adorned with stationary new cars and a pretty fountain. Dr. Pepper's pad is home to colossal Dr. Pepper cans and hulking images of Bradie James and Felix Jones holding Dr. Pepper cans. Miller Lite's pad has go-go dancers.
Come December, when Dallas is in hot pursuit of postseason life and hosts Philadelphia and San Diego, these party pads should be emphasized by stoic color commentators as keys to victory.
Writers have been chronicling the death of home field advantage in the NFL for a hot minute, citing network stoppages in play which lead to buzzkills in rhythm and emotion, seats filled by rich quiet types and lifeless new stadiums named after financial institutions as damaging end games to fandom. Why scream your head off from the nose bleeds when, for what a day at the NFL costs, you can just spring for the flatscreen with free HD from your monopolized cable provider?
Well, because this venue's inherent design is loud. The sound system is loud. 20,000 grizzly, drunk alpha dogs crammed together like a Tool concert adding to 80,000 supporters in proper seats is loud. Buzzing stands wrapping around a sunken field are loud enough to interfere with snap counts and clock management; loud enough to force throws into coverage.
Cowboys Stadium is loud enough to make a difference.
Three games in, one expensive, under coached team finally gets it.
On Sunday, the Atlanta Falcons started off flawlessly, marching 80 yards on the opening drive for an easy touchdown. The Cowboys retaliated with false starts and broken routes. Roy Williams grabbed his sides, shook his head; body language exonerating Williams from the fact that an on-target pass had just bounced off his facemask's visor.
The mothership grew hostile. The Dallas defense then found its spine and netted good field position for its coworkers. The Dallas offense only mustered a field goal. The mothership considered disposing of these unworthy gladiators and waiting another year as its patrons jeered. The Dallas offense got the message, Tony Romo's bomb led to a Miles Austin touchdown. Bedlam.
America's Team looked it. Cowboys Stadium is diverse and unified, its spaces filled in with delicate shades of brown, white, black. An unheralded prospect from Eastern Illinois played catch with an unheralded prospect from Monmouth. These are schools best known as sacrificial lambs for North Carolina during the opening rounds of March Madness. Romo and Austin, two racially ambiguous, new money party crashers, stole the show.
Pink regalia celebrating and commemorating breast cancer awareness month was everywhere. Full, booming Lil Wayne, Kanye West, Jay-Z, Montell Jordan songs rattled and thumped. The cheerleaders performed for awkwardly long chunks of time, roughly 25 total minutes of cheerleaders gyrating in full HD on the world's biggest jumbotron. Every first down meant either Trick Daddy's "Take It To Da House" or Limp Bizkit's "Rollin'." The offensive lineman engaged in a pre-recorded lawnmower race.
When the pinball machine stopped flashing, after the Cowboys secured a 37-21 win, I'm watching Wade Phillips' postgame conference on the 20-to-20 yard line-long screen, reconsidering the Republican Party and the fall-guy decision to lose Terrell Owens. I'm scanning for left-behind commemorative hologram cups, repeatedly posing the same enduring questions of our age: what was it all for? How would I be reacting had we come up short? How 'bout them Cowboys?
- Ramon Ramirez
Cowboys Stadium, with all the bells and whistles you've been reading about, is at its heart a suffocating thunderdome that recalls an airport, a state fair, Babylon.
The cheap parking, and somehow $40 feels cheap and perfectly reasonable, is tailgate friendly and leaves you a breezy, 12-minute walk from the entrance. Whereas Irving's Texas Stadium was an isolated mass of concrete we were better off busing to, the Arlington successor feels downright homey: Six Flags and Rangers Ballpark in Arlington lovingly linger in the background as you walk by nondescript office buildings, apartment complexes, pedicabs, a Jack in the Box...and the villainous saucer from "Independence Day."
It's a surreal approach and it's only the beginning.
A swarm of privileged children hurl infinite footballs across the street. Massive, high-definition screens tuned to NFL Network's genius "Red Zone" Channel light the way. There's a gorgeous, useless, lengthy pond. There's live country. If you buy beer from respective beer men and women, it's $6 versus the $8 you'll have to pay at proper stands. Here, $6 Miller Lite plastic bottles feel like a bargain.
Once inside, the Jones Manor caste system is in full effect. Luxury boxes are buried beneath the field and line the pro talent like a dugout. I can't imagine a better private viewing area in sports. There's swanky, vodka-sponsored lounges. There's perfect seating for those who can afford to be near the field, itself a ditch carved well below street level.
For blue collar supporters, one can pay $29 to stand on a deck and watch the big TVs. Each "party pad" is sponsored by big brands, each is worth seeing. Ford's is adorned with stationary new cars and a pretty fountain. Dr. Pepper's pad is home to colossal Dr. Pepper cans and hulking images of Bradie James and Felix Jones holding Dr. Pepper cans. Miller Lite's pad has go-go dancers.
Come December, when Dallas is in hot pursuit of postseason life and hosts Philadelphia and San Diego, these party pads should be emphasized by stoic color commentators as keys to victory.
Writers have been chronicling the death of home field advantage in the NFL for a hot minute, citing network stoppages in play which lead to buzzkills in rhythm and emotion, seats filled by rich quiet types and lifeless new stadiums named after financial institutions as damaging end games to fandom. Why scream your head off from the nose bleeds when, for what a day at the NFL costs, you can just spring for the flatscreen with free HD from your monopolized cable provider?
Well, because this venue's inherent design is loud. The sound system is loud. 20,000 grizzly, drunk alpha dogs crammed together like a Tool concert adding to 80,000 supporters in proper seats is loud. Buzzing stands wrapping around a sunken field are loud enough to interfere with snap counts and clock management; loud enough to force throws into coverage.
Cowboys Stadium is loud enough to make a difference.
Three games in, one expensive, under coached team finally gets it.
On Sunday, the Atlanta Falcons started off flawlessly, marching 80 yards on the opening drive for an easy touchdown. The Cowboys retaliated with false starts and broken routes. Roy Williams grabbed his sides, shook his head; body language exonerating Williams from the fact that an on-target pass had just bounced off his facemask's visor.
The mothership grew hostile. The Dallas defense then found its spine and netted good field position for its coworkers. The Dallas offense only mustered a field goal. The mothership considered disposing of these unworthy gladiators and waiting another year as its patrons jeered. The Dallas offense got the message, Tony Romo's bomb led to a Miles Austin touchdown. Bedlam.
America's Team looked it. Cowboys Stadium is diverse and unified, its spaces filled in with delicate shades of brown, white, black. An unheralded prospect from Eastern Illinois played catch with an unheralded prospect from Monmouth. These are schools best known as sacrificial lambs for North Carolina during the opening rounds of March Madness. Romo and Austin, two racially ambiguous, new money party crashers, stole the show.
Pink regalia celebrating and commemorating breast cancer awareness month was everywhere. Full, booming Lil Wayne, Kanye West, Jay-Z, Montell Jordan songs rattled and thumped. The cheerleaders performed for awkwardly long chunks of time, roughly 25 total minutes of cheerleaders gyrating in full HD on the world's biggest jumbotron. Every first down meant either Trick Daddy's "Take It To Da House" or Limp Bizkit's "Rollin'." The offensive lineman engaged in a pre-recorded lawnmower race.
When the pinball machine stopped flashing, after the Cowboys secured a 37-21 win, I'm watching Wade Phillips' postgame conference on the 20-to-20 yard line-long screen, reconsidering the Republican Party and the fall-guy decision to lose Terrell Owens. I'm scanning for left-behind commemorative hologram cups, repeatedly posing the same enduring questions of our age: what was it all for? How would I be reacting had we come up short? How 'bout them Cowboys?
- Ramon Ramirez
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