AT&T Stadium (aka Cowboys Stadium, aka Jerry World) has been called the Death Star since the very beginning — there are currently more than 4 million hits for “jerry jones death star” on Google — partly because it looks like a mass-murdering space station and partly because people hate Jerry Jones and the Cowboys and enjoy PhotoShopping him to look like Emperor Palpatine. But what if there was truth behind the easy jokes?
CONSIDER: as we’ve mentioned previously, the stadium’s east-west orientation is unusual. The construction cost was originally estimated at $650 million, but ended up somewhere around $1.2 billion. And now, to Gene Jones’ much-discussed art collection, they’ve added Anish Kapoor’s Sky Mirror. If that’s not the final piece to something like this, then it’s certainly close. There is a very good chance Jerry Jones is at least three-quarters of the way to a fully operational Death Star.
OK, so assume I’m right. What’s Jerry’s endgame here? What is the target for his weapon? I discussed this with Tim and the answer was obvious: destroy the moon.
Sounds crazy, but hear me out. I know — blow up the moon, and it sets off a crazy chain reaction on Earth. Earthquakes, tsunamis, and so on. But that would be the point. There is a good possibility that when you change the tides, you’d also end up changing the habitable parts of the world. Maybe now there is land in the middle of the Pacific where there was once only water. Maybe the new coast of North America hits somewhere around Utah. You see? And guess who now owns those new habitable parts? One Jerral Wayne “Jerry” Jones Sr.
Everyone thinks about Jerry only as the owner of the Cowboys. But where he’s making his real money is in real estate. He even hinted at his future plans in a recent D CEO cover story saying that, even though the team is worth $2.3 billion, “Some people think the real estate may be worth more than the franchise some day.” And if you think this is a plan beyond Jerry’s intellect, it’s basically a plot point of the Tom Cruise vehicle Oblivion (blowing up the moon) grafted onto Lex Luthor’s plan from Superman: The Movie (a real estate play based on catastrophe) with a liberal sprinkling of various James Bond movies and, obviously, heavy elements of Star Wars(es) A New Hope and Return of the Jedi. You don’t need to be a genius. You just need a BluRay player and a fair amount of cash. AND THE IRON WILL OF A WINNER.
Don’t call me a prophet or a hero. That’s for history to decide. Also, this whole contraption may be a weather machine, in which case I’ll only be sort of right. Thanks to Tim for talking this out, and you guys for listening. Thanks and God bless. I am second.
