Even the Cowboys’ Stadium Is Falling Apart

The Cowboys are the last remaining team in U.S. professional sports to have not won a home game in 2024. Even their stadium can’t take it.

Two hours before a Monday Night Football game that would end in a 34–10 Cowboys loss, a sheet of metal from the roof of AT&T Stadium fell to the field. No one was injured, though the metal reportedly came close to hitting several production staffers. Small bits of debris also came loose in addition to the larger sheet. The hope was for the Cowboys to play their first game with the roof open since October 2022, but the plan was thwarted due to the mishap.

The team blamed high winds and said the situation is under further review. “Got a lot of wind gusts in this area this afternoon, and apparently that created some looseness up there,” owner Jerry Jones said after the game. “And then when the wind, when we did try to open it up, the wind got in there and exacerbated the looseness.”

Workers bolted metal back to the frame, and the game was played with a closed roof.

It’s the second week in a row with a stadium-related storyline coming out of Arlington. Last Sunday, receiver CeeDee Lamb missed a catch in the end zone because of the sun in his eyes, a result of Jones’s refusal to hang curtains during late-afternoon games despite years of problems for his own team. “We do know where the damn sun is going to be in our own stadium,” Jones said after the game, while Lamb said he “one thousand percent” supports curtains. The shades did go down for Friday night’s Mike Tyson–Jake Paul fight.

The Cowboys are now 3–7, though they’re not last in the NFC East thanks to the fumbling Giants, who said Monday they will bench quarterback Daniel Jones and avoid his $23 million injury guarantee.

The Monday Night Countdown crew had a little fun with it before the game.

“The bottom done already fell out in Dallas, the top might as well, too,” ESPN analyst Ryan Clark said. “It’s very metaphorical for Dallas’s season,” responded fellow analyst Jason Kelce.