Steve Sabol's infectious enthusiasm

I considered it praise of the highest order when Steve Sabol of NFL Films called me out of the blue one day in 1997 to say how much he enjoyed “Cotton Bowl Days,” my then-new book about growing up in Dallas as a fan of the Cowboys. No one loved pro football more than Sabol. He loved everything about it – the games, the drama, the winners, the losers, the sights, the sounds, the smells … and most of all, the stories. Sabol’s genius lay in the fact that he understood the importance of storytelling, and it meant a lot, a whole lot, if he thought I had told a good one.

We weren’t in contact much after that. I called him now and then as a source on a book project or newspaper feature. (He always gave you terrific material, the best of anyone, no matter how many people you spoke to.) He would let me know whenever NFL Films referenced my book in one of its many projects.

“We love ‘Cotton Bowl Days’ up here,” he told me once from NFL Films’ suburban Philadelphia offices. This was years after the book had disappeared from most shelves, and needless to say, the author appreciated that anyone remembered, much less someone who was so esteemed and valued a good story.

In 2009, when the people at NFL Films were pulling together their documentary on the history of the American Football League for Showtime (Full Color Football”), they asked to interview me on the subject of the early years of pro football in Dallas, when both the AFL and NFL had teams there and those teams, the NFL’s Cowboys and AFL’s Texans, fought to gain the favor of the city’s fans. I had devoted a chapter to the subject in “Cotton Bowl Days,” so they figured I could comment.

The interview took place at NFL Films’ headquarters, and the producer decided to tape my segment right in Sabol’s office. (Steve was out of town.) As we headed in, I noticed there were two team helmets positioned on a table in the waiting room outside his office. Of all the helmets the NFL had seen through the years, Sabol, the ultimate pro football connoisseur, had picked out two to greet his visitors. And one was the helmet the Dallas Texans wore for three years in the early 1960s.

It was a classic, to say the least, bright red with a map of the state of Texas outlined on the side. The Texans had to give it up when they moved to Kansas City and became the Chiefs, but Sabol understood what a beautiful football artifact it was. So it was lost but not forgotten.

I happened to be searching for a new book subject at the time, and soon after that interview at NFL Films, the light bulb came on in my head. Even though I had written a chapter about the war between the Texans and Cowboys in “Cotton Bowl Days,” the subject was so rich in character and narrative that it deserved an entire volume. Seeing that helmet didn’t hurt my enthusiasm. Within months, I had a signed book contract.

That book is coming out next week, officially published on Oct. 2. The title is “Ten-Gallon War: The NFL’s Cowboys, the AFL’s Texans and the Feud for Dallas’s Pro Football Future.” I’m excited about it, and pleased to report that the book’s black-and-white photo insert includes a close-up of the Texans’ helmet. How could I not include it after seeing it in Sabol’s office?

It saddens me terribly that Sabol won’t be able to read the book and tell me what I got right or what I should have emphasized more. He passed away from brain cancer earlier this month at the age of 69.

 “Ten-Gallon War” is rightfully dedicated to someone far closer to me, Mary Wynne Eisenberg, the love of my life, who married me 28 years ago and continues to put up with me disappearing into the computer room to write for hours. But the book’s existence and spirit trace at least in part to Sabol, a man of great generosity and infectious enthusiasm who loved nothing more than a rollicking football tale and, alas, had many more to tell.