Product Description

Cowboys Essential is for fans who think they know everything about the Dallas Cowboys. It’s also for fans who know they don’t but want to discover as much as they can about America’s Team in a fun and entertaining way. Amusing anecdotes, compelling stories, and rich details about pivotal games and players all make Cowboys Essential the one book every Cowboys fan should own.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #51773 in Books
• Published on: 2006-09
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 180 pages

From the Publisher
"The Cowboys Essential approach is different from reviews devoted too often to dull play-by-play. All key games are here, from Super Bowl to Ice Bowl and Hail Mary, to be sure. But the emphasis is on what those involved said and thought. That’s what makes this book different. It’s about people. "It unfolds as personal anecdotes from players, coaches, and opponents that range from high humor to lowbrow drama. There’s as much fun as facts in these pages." —from the foreword by Roger Staubach

From the Inside Flap
Any football fan can tell you who America’s Team is. But how many know the origin of the Dallas Cowboys’ famous nickname? Or what the temperature was at the start of the famous Ice Bowl, how much Clint Murchison Jr. paid for the Cowboys in 1960, or which Cowboy was first to be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame? If you know the answers to all of these questions, then you’re probably a die-hard Cowboys fan, and you will certainly enjoy the engaging stories and anecdotes featured in Cowboys Essential. If you stumbled over most or all of the questions, this book is your chance to learn about the rich and colorful history of the Dallas Cowboys—and to upgrade your status to that of a real fan. The Dallas Cowboys, consistently voted the most popular team in professional sports, have been blessed with more marvelous players and moments in their 45-year history than most pro teams with histories twice as long. Cowboys Essential delivers fascinating, useful, and informative nuggets of Cowboys’ history and lore in an easy, accessible format that allows you to browse at your convenience. From Too Tall Jones to Jerry Jones, this handy reference includes everything you ever wanted to know about America’s Team—and then some. The Super Bowls. The 0–11–1 maiden season. The Kicking Karavan. The CCC. The Ring of Honor. It’s all here. Tom Landry, Bob Lilly, Roger Staubach, Emmitt Smith, and Troy Aikman are here, too, along with the oddballs, flakes, and one-hit wonders. And there’s trivia, special top-10 lists, dozens of archival photos, and much more, all contained in this handy reference that tells the story of football’s flashiest franchise.

Customer Reviews

Easy read -- covers the essentials of Cowboys history (Sep 3, 2008)
Review: Cowboys Essential by Frank Luksa

Luksa, Frank. Cowboys Essential: Everything You Need to Know to be a Real Fan, Chicago: Triumph Books. 2006. HB, 180p, illus. list: 19.95, ISBN: 978-1-57243-861-3

Like the title says, this book covers just about everything the true Cowboy fan needs to know about America's Team, like (for example) how that nickname came about (no, it wasn't coined by the late GM Tex Schramm). This is Luksa's latest book about the Cowboys (Time Enough to Win, In Control, Hail Mary), but his first that isn't a player biography.

The book begins with the founding of the franchise, and the start of the rivalry between the Cowboys and Redskins. It ends with the arrival of WR Terrell Owens.

In between, Luksa covers everything from the career of Mr. Cowboy, DT Bob Lilly, the "man in the funny hat", longtime coach Tom Landry, rivalries with the Redskins, Packers, Steelers, and `Niners, the trade for Tony Dorsett, how the Cowboys became "America's Team", the retirement of "Captain America" QB Roger Staubach, their fall from grace, the arrival of Jerry Jones and Jimmy Johnson, the team of the `90s, and decline into mediocrity in the latter `90s and early 2000s.

It's a lot of ground to cover in 180 pages, but Luksa does so in a conversational style that is very easy to read. Unlike so many sports reporters-turned-author, Luksa does not overdo his use of metaphor and simile. He sticks to the facts, but weaves them in such a way that his chapters read more like locker-room stories (without the R-rated language).

It is hard to fault this book, but as a long-time fan, I got the feeling, especially in the first 23 chapters (the Schramm-Landry era), that I had heard all of these stories before. With so many books having been written about the Cowboys, it is hard to find fresh material to write about. So while it is true that I knew most of these stories by heart, it was also fun to read them again.

Even the last nine chapters (which cover the Jones era) basically repeat stories that most Cowboys fans will be familiar with. But new fans, those who were not around during the Landry or Jimmy Johnson eras, will appreciate this compilation of facts, personalities and stories. The book ends with the all-time Cowboys roster as of 2005.

An interesting feature of the book is the use of trivia facts and questions every few pages. It would have been nice if the answer section repeated the question, rather than making you turn back to see what the question was.

A bigger fault is that Luksa gives no references or citations. It's possible Luksa can recall every fact in his book directly from memory, but it's more likely that he drew from other sources like newspaper articles, books, magazines, interviews, etc. Without a bibliography, its hard to know the sources for his facts.

That minor issue aside, I recommend this book to both new and longtime Cowboy fans.

© Copyright Sept. 3, 2008 by Fred Goodwin, americas_team@hotmail.com

Cowboys Essential
A must for any true Cowboy fan! It is brought out often in many conversations.