In the off-season, Emmitt Smith had surgery on his damaged shoulder. The doctors discovered that he was injured even more badly than they thought. His collarbone was no longer attached to his shoulder and had to be stabilized. The procedure went well, and he began to look forward to the 1994 season.
Like many other Cowboys, he was shocked when he learned that Dallas coach Jimmy Johnson had resigned. Smith liked Johnson and thought the coach was responsible for much of the team’s success.
But Johnson and Dallas owner Jerry Jones had quarreled. Jones believed that anyone could coach the Cowboys to the Super Bowl and had told the press just that. Johnson was offended by the statement and decided to give Jones the opportunity to find out whether he was right.
So Jones hired former University of Oklahoma coach Barry Switzer to take Johnson’s place. While Emmitt missed Johnson, he promised himself to play as well as he could for Coach Switzer.
He did, however, decide to make a few changes in his personal life. His big season and MVP trophies made him one of the best-known and most respected players in football. He wrote his autobiography, The Emmitt Zone, and began working as a spokesperson for several companies.
He also decided to expand his business interests. Emmitt Smith had learned more about the business world and, although he wanted to play another six or seven seasons, was beginning to think about life after football. Emmitt Incorporated branched out into marketing and promotions, and he formed a second firm, The Emmitt Zone, to handle the licensing of products using his name. He began looking into other businesses as well.
Even though he employs his own family, in the off-season Emmitt Smith plays an active role in his businesses. He helps negotiate his own contracts, and callers to his companies are often surprised when Emmitt answers his own phone.
The off-season also provides him with the opportunity to work with Emmitt Smith Charities, his own nonprofit foundation. The foundation provides support to more than a dozen organizations, from the Salvation Army to the Boys Club and a youth theater group. Every summer, he sponsors a charity golf tournament and an off-season football clinic that fund scholarship programs.
As if that weren’t enough, each spring and summer, he also kept making progress on the promise he made to his mother not to build a house until he graduated from college. Every off-season, Emmitt returned to school and kept working toward his degree. By 1994, he was only eighteen credits short of graduation and decided to accelerate his education. He was tired of living in apartments. He wanted to build his own house!
With such a busy schedule, training camp is almost a relief. And once the 1994 season began, he discovered that very little had changed for the Cowboys. The Cowboys’ offense was almost identical to the one installed by Jimmy Johnson. After all, Coach Switzer still had Troy Aikman at quarterback, Michael Irvin at wide receiver, and, most important, Emmitt Smith in the backfield. The Cowboys were expected to make another run at the Super Bowl.
Emmitt Smith started the season with a bang. In the first game of the year, at Pittsburgh, he pounded the Steelers for 170 rushing yards as Dallas won, 26–9. It looked as if the Cowboys were on their way to another Super Bowl.
But after opening the season with two wins, the Cowboys lost to the Detroit Lions, despite 149 yards rushing by Emmitt. Meanwhile, both the Giants and Eagles were playing well.
Fortunately for Dallas, both teams slumped badly in midseason. The Cowboys’ defense came through with the best performance in the league, and Dallas took control of the division.
But at the very end of the season, it was Dallas that stumbled. With several players out with injuries, they lost to Cleveland in Week Fourteen, 19–14. Although they defeated New Orleans one week later, in the third quarter Emmitt Smith went down with a badly pulled hamstring muscle in his leg.
The hamstring is the muscle that runs down the back of the thigh. A pulled hamstring muscle is extremely painful and usually slow to heal. Unless it is completely healed, it is easy to re-injure, often worse than before.
The Cowboys were cautious. They wanted Emmitt Smith to be healthy for the playoffs. Although he wanted to play, the team held him out of the last game. For the.first time in his professional career, he missed a game because of an injury.
The Cowboys needed him. They scored only ten points in the season finale, and the Giants won, 15–10. Entering the playoffs, the powerful Cowboys had lost two of three and were suddenly struggling.
Yet their 12–4 record was still good enough to earn a bye in the first round of the playoffs. The Green Bay Packers beat Detroit, 16–12, to earn the right to play the Cowboys.
Emmitt’s hamstring was still sore. But Dallas couldn’t afford to have him sit out. After all, if the Cowboys lost to the Packers, their season was over. The team trainers wrapped his thigh with tape to give him support and hoped for the best.
When the game began, Emmitt Smith was unsure how long he would be able to play. With each step, he felt a sharp tug on the back of his thigh.
But Emmitt Smith set the tone for the game. In the first quarter, he ran the ball on nearly every play, and Dallas drove down the field. He finally barged into the end zone from the 5-yard line to give Dallas a 7–0 lead.
Green Bay followed with a field goal, then kicked off deep. Dallas took over on its own 6.
The Packers remembered the Cowboys’ opening series. They expected to see Emmitt Smith running the football.
That’s just what Dallas hoped. Because when Troy Aikman faded back to pass, he saw the Packers’ secondary playing tight in anticipation of the run. He then lofted a perfect pass to receiver Alvin Harper streaking downfield. He caught the ball over his shoulder and raced to a 94-yard touchdown—14–3, Dallas.
The next time the Cowboys got the ball, Emmitt Smith re-injured his hamstring. But by that time, the damage was done. The Cowboys’ ground game was well established and Aikman was picking the Packers apart.
Dallas rolled to a big 35–9 win, setting up yet another showdown with San Francisco.
But the Cowboys were concerned about Emmitt Smith. As they feared, this hamstring pull was worse than the original injury suffered weeks before.
The doctors did what they could to help Emmitt heal. After applying ice for twenty-four hours, they attached electrodes to a battery pack that sent a small current into the thigh. They hoped the current would increase blood flow and speed the healing process.
As the Cowboys practiced, Emmitt rested his leg. The game was scheduled to be played in San Francisco, where a week of rain had turned the field into quicksand.
That was good news for Emmitt Smith. “I’m a pretty good mudder,” he told the press. “I’ll be out there.” He expected to play. That was his goal.
Still, most observers were surprised to see Emmitt Smith take the field against the 49ers, his thigh heavily taped. You just weren’t supposed to heal that quickly from a hamstring injury.
The Cowboys knew he wasn’t 100 percent. Perhaps that’s why they began the game looking to pass the ball.
After receiving the opening kickoff, the Cowboys immediately went to the air. On only the third play of the game, Troy Aiicman threw a pass downfield intended for receiver Kevin Williams.
The 49ers’ cornerback Eric Davis cut in front of Williams and raced 44 yards for a touchdown. Dallas trailed, 7–0.
Once again, Dallas took the kickoff and tried to move the ball downfield. This time, Michael Irvin fumbled. San Francisco recovered the ball and quickly scored to go ahead by two touchdowns.
For the third time in less than five minutes, the Cowboys received the kickoff. Things went from bad to worse. Kevin Williams fumbled the return; San Francisco scored again to lead 21–0 midway through the first quarter.
The Cowboys didn’t give up. They closed the gap to 24–14 on a touchdown pass to Michael Irvin and a 4-yard run by Emmitt Smith before San Francisco quarterback Steve Young threw a touchdown pass to receiver Jerry Rice on the final play of the first half. The game was all but over.
Emmitt contributed a third-quarter touchdown, then pulled the hamstring yet again and was forced from the game. San Francisco won, 38–28. For the first time in three seasons, Emmitt Smith and the Cowboys would not be at the Super Bowl.
While at home resting his hamstring, Emmitt tried to watch the game. “I couldn’t stand it,” he told a reporter later. “I watched only the first two or three plays and I turned the television off. I knew we should have been there a third time.” His goal had been to play in the game, not to watch it on television. And if he couldn’t play, he simply wasn’t interested.
His off-season was busier than ever. The injury to his hamstring had disturbed him. As he told one writer, “I honestly believe if a healthy Emmitt Smith had played against San Francisco last season, it would’ve been a different ball game.” He worked out harder than ever, focusing on strengthening his leg so the hamstring wouldn’t be a problem during the 1995 season.
Then, after spending several hours a day at the gym, he went to school. In a rush to get his degree, he took a full-time course load of fifteen credits. He also opened a new business, Emmitt Smith Communications, that sold phone cards, cellular phones, and beepers, and he began construction of his new house near Dallas.
That didn’t mean he had forgotten his promise to his mother. As he explained to a reporter, “My original promise was to get my education before I built the house. As it turns out, I’ll have the house before I actually graduate, but I’ll be done with my course work.” All he needed to do for his degree in health and resort management was to complete an internship.
Emmitt Smith managed his own health extremely well during the off-season and came to training camp in late July in the best shape of his career. He and his teammates knew they had something to prove.
They made that clear to the rest of the NFL in the very first game of the season, on a Monday night against the New York Giants. Dallas took the opening kickoff and returned the ball to its own 25-yard line.
On the first play, Aikman threw to Jay Novacek for 15 yards. Then he threw an incomplete pass. It was now second down and 10. Although this was normally a passing situation, the Cowboys decided to give the ball to Emmitt for his first carry of the season.
He burst through the middle like he was shot from a cannon, knocking over one potential tackler and faking out another. Suddenly, he was all alone. Sixty yards later, he scored.
The run set the tone for the game, and for the season. The Cowboys’ defense shut out the Giants, while the offense made use of Emmitt Smith to control the football. He scored three more touchdowns and finished with 163 rushing yards as the Cowboys won, 35–0.
Dallas opened the season with a perfect 4–0 record as Emmitt rushed for more than 100 yards in each game. In Week Five, the Cowboys finally lost to Washington, 27–23, as Emmitt Smith was held to only 95 yards.
But the Cowboys rebounded against Green Bay, winning 34–24, as Emmitt again broke the 100-yard barrier. All his hard work in the off-season was paying dividends. He was off to the best start of his career. Not only was he gaining a lot of yardage, but he was breaking loose for long runs and scoring touchdowns like never before.
The Cowboys opened up a big lead in the Eastern Division. But a midseason 38–20 loss to archrival San Francisco and losses to Washington and Philadelphia a few weeks later had people questioning whether the Cowboys were prepared for the playoffs.
Suddenly, there appeared to be problems everywhere. Quarterback Troy Aikman was playing on two wobbly knees, the defense had turned soft, and the offensive line wasn’t dominating the line of scrimmage. Even Emmitt Smith had slowed down. In the twelfth game of the year, against Kansas City, he sprained his knee. He failed to reach 100 yards in that game, and in two of the next four.
Still, he finished the regular season with 1,773 yards rushing, 25 touchdowns, and 62 pass receptions, all career highs. Yet Emmitt Smith and the Cowboys entered the playoffs surrounded by questions. Were they ready?
With a 12–4 record, the Cowboys had earned a bye during the first week of postseason play. The Philadelphia Eagles obliterated the Detroit Lions in the NFC wild card game, 58–37, and earned the right to play the Cowboys in Dallas.
The Cowboys knew the Eagles would give them a tough game. The two teams had split their two regular-season meetings, and Dallas knew the Eagles would be confident after their big win against Detroit.
Once the game began, the Dallas defense made an early statement, forcing the Eagles to punt on their first three possessions. That gave the Dallas offense a chance to get on track.
In the second quarter, Deion Sanders scored the first touchdown of the game on a 21-yard reverse, and Emmitt Smith followed with a touchdown of his own to put the Cowboys ahead, 17–3, at the half.
They went on to a 30–11 win. Emmitt Smith rushed for 99 yards, Troy Aikman threw for 253, and the Dallas defense dominated. Suddenly, the Cowboys looked like a Super Bowl team!
This time the upstart Green Bay Packers dumped the 49ers in their divisional playoff, leading to a showdown with Dallas for the conference title. The two clubs squared off on January 14, 1996, in Dallas to decide who would go to the Super Bowl.
The Packers proved to be the Cowboys’ toughest opponent to date. Packer quarterback Bret Favre directed Green Bay’s powerful offense to perfection, leading the Pack to 17 first-half points.
But the Cowboys’ offense showed its strength, too. They responded with 24 points on two Troy Aikman–to– Michael Irvin touchdown passes, a field goal, and a 1-yard plunge by Emmitt Smith.
Yet in the third quarter, Green Bay took command, scoring 10 unanswered points as the Packers’ defense shut out Dallas. The Cowboys had fifteen minutes to find a way to win.
They didn’t panic. Dallas calmly drove down the field, mixing runs and passes, to the Green Bay 6. Then the Cowboys turned the ball over to Emmitt Smith.
The Packers were expecting a pass. Instead, the Cowboys ran a draw play to the left.
The Cowboys’ huge tackle, Nate Newton, blocked two men on the play and opened up a big hole. Emmitt danced through, and the Cowboys regained the lead, 31–27.
Now the defense had to stop Green Bay. They did, intercepting a Favre pass and returning it to midfield.
The Packers expected Dallas to give the ball to Emmitt Smith and try to run out the clock. But the Cowboys crossed them up again as Aikman threw far downfield to Irvin, who made it to the Green Bay 17-yard line.
Now the Packers were expecting another pass. They got Emmitt Smith.
Another draw play to the left worked to perfection. Emmitt raced all 17 yards into the end zone for his 150th rushing yard and third touchdown of the day. Dallas won, 38–27. The Cowboys were going back to the Super Bowl!