The
Washington Redskins and Dallas Cowboys are a lot like the NFL’s version of
Yankees and Red Sox. Their games always have divisional standing implications
on top of the decades of bad blood players seem to immediately inherit. During
the 1987 football strike, the match-up between a Washington team made up
entirely of free agent replacement players (scabs) and nearly the entire
regular season Dallas squad would seem to favor the latter. However, the
scrappy team that won over Washington fans always played to win. Their
underappreciated underdog story is chronicled in John Dorsey’s ESPN 30 for 30
documentary Year of the Scab, which
premiered last night at the 2017 Tribeca Film Festival.
Both
Washington and Dallas were proactive planning for the strike, but the
approaches differed drastically. While the Redskins cast a wide net for
replacement players, Dallas sought to game the system, by using the loss of
potentially millions of dollars in future contractual annuity payments to force
their star players to cross the picket lines. Yet, thanks to their drive and
the leadership of Coach Joe Gibbs, the Redskin replacement players excelled in
their first two games (both of which were also in their division). That set the
stage for a showdown worthy of Rocky when
the Redskins blew into Dallas for their first grudge match of the season.
The
Replacement Redskins are widely credited with starting the winning momentum
that carried the team all the way to a Super Bowl victory, but they have been
largely ignored by sports media, most likely for ideological reasons. That is a
shame, because each player’s story has so much to say about the nature of
sportsmanship, particularly that of disgraced former Tennessee Vols star
quarterback Tony Robinson, who is now a respected small businessman and peewee
football coach.
Dorsey
introduces viewers to at least half a dozen replacement players, on a very
personal level. Some are struggling with the long-term physical effects of
their football years, just like drafted full-season players. He scored
sit-downs with many of the Redskins players and staff, including Gibbs,
Robinson, strike game starting QB Ed Rubbert, and Super Bowl MVP Doug Williams.
However, Dorsey is explicitly (and justifiably) critical of the Redskins’
treatment of their replacement players after the strike games, especially
considering how much they contributed to the championship season and the extent
to which the fans embraced them.
