Tom Landry

Former Dallas Cowboys owner H. R. (Bum) Bright says he wanted to sack Tom Landry in 1987 but couldn't talk Tex Schramm into doing it. A year after selling the Cowboys to Jerry Jones, Bright said his one regret is that he didn't fire Landry himself. He didn't because Schramm, the team's general manager at the time, told him he didn't have a replacement ready.

The identity of the Dallas Cowboys is a work in progress. Are the Cowboys the gutsy team that won in overtime at San Francisco, handing the 49ers their only loss, or the wobbly one that collapsed down the stretch against the New York Jets and Detroit Lions? Is Tony Romo an asset, a liability, or both? Is Jason Garrett the right coach to lead them where they want to go? Exactly 40 years ago Monday, Halloween of 1971, the Cowboys were at a different crossroads, one detailed in the just-released book "Breakthrough 'Boys," which chronicles the pivotal 1971 season that ended with Dallas winning its first Super Bowl.

Cal Lutheran University will pay tribute to late Dallas Cowboys coach Tom Landry at a special event June 22. Under Landry, the football team trained for 26 summers at the Thousand Oaks campus, and players were housed in its dorms. Local residents were often invited to watch the team practice, and kids assisted players and staff on the sidelines.

When the Pittsburgh Steelers play host to the New York Jets in today's AFC divisional game, it will mark the seventh time since 1970 that former teammates-turned-coaches have opposed each other in the playoffs. Steeler Coach Bill Cowher and Jet Coach Herman Edwards were teammates on the 1983-84 Philadelphia Eagle teams under head coach Marion Campbell. Cowher was a linebacker and Edwards was a defensive back. Other former teammates who coached against each other in the playoffs: Source: NFL.

Outside the Dallas Cowboys' locker room in RFK Stadium, you could hear the players chanting, "T.L., T.L." Inside, Tom Landry could hear the words of center Tom Rafferty, who was speaking for every one of them. "I said, 'This man has taken a lot of grief and unfair criticism. But he's stuck by us. And he's the guy who's going to get us back on top,' " said Rafferty, a Cowboy for 13 seasons including a chunk of the glory days of America's Team. "And then I gave him the ball."

Former Dallas Cowboys coach Tom Landry could be the new anti-drug czar of Texas, if Gov. Bill Clements has his way. Clements reportedly is pursuing Landry for a newly created, senior Administration job to coordinate the state's anti-drug efforts through all state agencies dealing with drug problems. "Governor Clements has a longtime friendship with Tom Landry," Clements' top aide, Reggie Bashur, told the Dallas Times Herald on Sunday.

Dallas' Monday night victory over the New York Giants two weeks ago might have brought the Cowboy fans back, but the subsequent loss to Detroit sent the north Texas entry back into a funk. Cowboy President Tex Schramm hinted on his weekly radio show that Tom Landry and the coaching staff might be part of the team's problems, and Landry said veteran quarterback Danny White might lose his starting job.

Jerry Jones, new owner of the Dallas Cowboys, told Arkansas legislators that he has received two telephoned death threats since he fired veteran coach Tom Landry last weekend.

Postseason records of seven NFL coaches: Vince Lombardi: 9-1 John Madden: 9-7 Tom Landry: 20-16 Chuck Noll: 16-8 Bill Walsh: 10-4 George Halas: 6-3 Don Shula: 19-17 Source: World Features Syndicate

NFL Hall of Fame coaches with nonwinning records in first seasons: 1. Tom Landry (Cowboys, 1960) 0-11-1 2. Chuck Noll (Steelers, 1969) 1-13-0 3. Bud Grant (Vikings, 1967) 3-8-3 4. Weeb Ewbank (Colts, 1954) 3-9-0 5. Joe Gibbs (Redskins, 1981) 8-8-0 * Source: World Features Syndicate

A consumer's guide to the best and worst of sports media and merchandise. Ground rules: If it can be read, heard, observed, viewed, dialed or downloaded, it's in play here. One exception: No products will be endorsed. * What: "I Remember Tom Landry" Authors: Denne H. Freeman and Jaime Aron Publisher: Sports Publishing L.L.C. Price: $17.95 When owner Clint Murchison Jr.

When the Dallas Cowboys first considered training at Cal Lutheran in the summer of 1963, Bob Shoup and others had one tough assignment. They had to convince Tom Landry the place was suitable for an NFL team, even a relatively new and struggling one. "We started bragging about the weather," said Shoup, a former longtime football coach at Cal Lutheran. "We literally had no locker rooms, no place to put equipment, no offices for the coaches.

Cal Lutheran University will pay tribute to late Dallas Cowboys coach Tom Landry at a special event June 22. Under Landry, the football team trained for 26 summers at the Thousand Oaks campus, and players were housed in its dorms. Local residents were often invited to watch the team practice, and kids assisted players and staff on the sidelines.

F-16s flew over and Pro Football Hall of Famers sat in mourning Wednesday as former Dallas Cowboy coach Tom Landry was buried in a private ceremony. At the request of the Landry family, the time of the funeral wasn't made public. Landry died Saturday at 75 after suffering from leukemia for nine months. The guest list of about 400 friends and family members included former Cowboys Tony Dorsett, Roger Staubach, Harvey Martin and Dan Reeves.

The cartoonist and the coach: Both beloved, they died on the same day. It was a coincidence that didn't strike anyone other than a few people around Thousand Oaks as a little odd. After all, so little appeared to link Charles Schulz and Tom Landry. Over the decades, Schulz's art was taped to countless American refrigerators. Over the decades, Tom Landry's art flashed across countless American TV screens. Millions of fans knew Landry's face the way they knew the face of their sternest teacher.

In the small Texas town where I grew up, our preacher at the First Baptist church ended sermons about 15 minutes earlier than usual on fall Sundays. He knew that if he spoke longer, most of his congregation couldn't concentrate. We'd start fidgeting and looking at our watches, fearing we might miss the start of the Cowboy game. Not that the Rev. Gerald Perry minded.

The person who spends $19.95, plus tax, in order to become enlightened about Tom Landry's life with the Dallas Cowboys ("God's Coach," Sept. 9) and get in on the "dirty laundry" just is not very bright. PAUL FREDRICKSON MONTEREY PARK

Tom Landry, the stoic man in the fedora who coached the Dallas Cowboys from lowly expansion team to two-time Super Bowl winners, died Saturday evening at Baylor University Medical Center. He was 75. Landry was surrounded by his family as he succumbed to myelogenous leukemia, a disease he had been fighting since May. Through their first 29 years in the NFL, the Cowboys were 270-178-6 under Landry and came to be known as "America's Team."