Am I Really About to Say This?
I can't believe I'm about to say this, it hurts every bone in my body, every being of my soul wants to smack me in the face and say "what you talkin' about white boy," (i know its strange that I feel my soul is an old black guy), but I have come to the conclusion that..........
Tom Hicks is the best owner in Dallas right now.
I can barley type that with out my hands shaking worse than Michael J. Fox popping some no doze while coming off a two week crack binge.
Still, I think it's true. Let me try and explain it.
For the longest time, people have thought half of the ownership group of our fare mextroplex's sports teams, The Cowboys and Mavericks, have "do anything to win" owners who will......well, do anything to win.
While the Rangers and Stars have an old "money first" blue blooded shill as an owner. And Its been long thought of that this is the way it will always be. I can't count the times that I myself have said, "If only Tom Hicks(owner of the Rangers and Stars) would open his pocketbook and bring in players, this team could be something." It would take more than my and and feet to count, I will say.
But over the past two years, something has changed. Something has gone terribly wrong.
When you think of Jerry Jones, you think of the meddling owner with a desire to do anything in his power to win superbowls, yet this team hasn't won a playoff game in over a 10 years.
When you think of Mark Cuban, you think of a in your face owner who sits court side, loves his team, and will do anything he can to make the Mav's the best team in the NBA, yet they have gone in a span of 3 years from choking away(with a little help from the refs) a world title to losing in the first round of the playoffs the last two years, to now being not even guaranteed a playoff spot come may.
So what's the problem here? If these two coaches want so badly to win, and will do anything to win, why arn't they winning?
In the case of Jerry Jones, in his heart of hearts, it isn't about just winning, its about proving to everybody that he can win without anybody else getting the credit. If you were to ask Jerry Jones what he wants more, to be the GM of the Cowboys or win a Superbowl, he has proven though his actions its the former. If you look at his record, trades, drafts and over all running of the team over the past 15 years(since Jimmy left), the cowboys themselves haven't been any better than a team like the lowly Lions. They have been more often at the bottom of the standings than at the top, and have 2 good runs (bills first year, and last year), but have still failed to win a playoff game.
The only constant here is Jerry. If a restaurant has bad cook, It doesn't matter how good the ingredients are, or where the restaurant is, or how hot the staff is, if your cook is bad, the restaurant will fail. So Jerry can bring in more TO's, more Packman's and more first round draft picks, but until he realises the cook is why the food sucks, the Cowboys might be doomed for more years like this, than like last.
With Mark Cuban, the same problems are there, but for different reasons. Where Jerry it is pride and desire to prove that he can do it all by himself, Cuban's problem steams from how close he is to the team he owns. Its no secret that Cuban loves his team, and by loving the team he has developed personal relationships with his players, and thus, will over pay and over value them.
His latest statement, and I'm pretty sure I'm not messing this one up, is "I'm not trading Josh." Its not "I'm not trading Howard" or even "Josh Howard," but simply Josh. Josh has been here almost as long as Cuban, and was a big part of the Mav's return to glory, so its easy to see why Cuban would have an emotional attachment to him, but that isn't always the best thing when it come to running a team. Its that whole bit of you don't want to have your friends work underneath you, because it makes it hard to fire your friends, even when they deserve it, or in this case, is better for the company.
And This brings us to the other owner of sports teams in the Metroplex, the oft hatted Tome Hicks, the guy would if a poll was taken today, would be the least liked owner of a sports team in Dallas by a large margin.
But why?
Tom Hicks has made no secret that owning a sports team hardly anything more than a money making venture to him. He's not a big fan of the sports, or at least he doesn't seem to be. He won't knee jerk and make a big splash like signing TO, or get in front of a camera and bash the referees of last nights game.
What he will do is find a person who know the sport of the team he owns, put them in charge of player/personal, and let this person, or in the stars case persons, make the decisions that they feel are right and best for his teams. Now granted, he does this with a very strict budget in mind, and the end results that he wants isn't trophy's, but large bank accounts. Still, he finds smart baseball people like John Daniels and Nolan Ryan, and then steps away to let them work. If the team doesn't make any money, he gets rid of them and trys something else.
He has allowed John Daniels to make moves with the roster of the Rangers. At first they didn't look so good, (Young, Gonzalez) but now he has built one of the best farm system's in all of baseball.
He has allowed Brett Hull of the Stars come to him and say "we need to get nastier on the ice, so let go get Sean Avery," and they did.
AND THEN when it became obvious that Avery wasn't the answer, but a GIGANTIC locker room cancer, Hull told Hicks they had to cut him, and Hicks said yes.
Now, if any of these moves lead to the Ranger or Stars not making any money, believe it that Hicks will find replacements for everybody.
So Which owner is the truly the best?
The "I'll do anything to win as long as its my way, and I'm in charge" Jerry Jones.
The "I put so much into this team, i can't let go of the friends that I have made on it" Mark Cuban.
Or the "I'm going to find smart people, put them in charge, yet give them a tight budget to work with" Tom Hicks.
I'm giving (gulp!) the nod to Hicks.
Now I need to go take a shower to wash off all this shame.
