Thirty-two years, two Super Bowl rings, and his name on the Dallas Cowboys Ring of Honor haven’t been enough to erase the sting Jimmy Johnson felt when his stint with America’s Team ended. Every question about the dynasty years around Johnson still goes back to the disputes over authority between him and Jerry Jones. The 83-year-old owner/general manager of the Cowboys would say he had the final say on all player moves; Johnson would say it was he who built the dynasty team. Instead of starting that debate again, Jimmy did something that answered those questions once and for all.

Jimmy took to his X handle with a simple question: “Does this explain Cowboys responsibilities?” Under that question, he added a picture of his Cowboys contract, outlining his roles and responsibilities. He didn’t have to say anything in his caption because the three points highlighted in that picture did all the work for him.

“Johnson shall have the following duties and responsibilities:
(1) No assistant football coach, trainer, equipment man or strength coach shall be fired or employed by Employer without the prior approval of Johnson.
(2) Johnson shall have the right of prior approval with respect to acquisition, releasing and trading of all football players of the Dallas Cowboys.
(3) Johnson shall have complete control of all assistant coaches, players, trainers and equipment men during training, practice, preparation for and the actual playing of games.”

Jones and Johnson were teammates who played for the Arkansas Razorbacks, and even won a national championship together in 1964. When Jones fulfilled his dream of owning a pro football team, he decided his old friend would be the best head coach, and hired him the very next day. But a 0-6 start slapped them with a reality check, turning into the legendary Herschel Walker trade.

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Even as their maiden voyage ended with a 1-15 record, they leveraged the draft picks from that trade to build heavily around Troy Aikman, who’d been drafted by Dallas first overall the same season Jerry bought the Cowboys. Michael Irvin was already on the roster since 1988, and the team suddenly started to look dangerous. The 1991 season first gave Jerry and Jimmy the taste of NFL playoffs, and they brought two Lombardi Trophies to Dallas in ‘92 and ‘93. But the foundation these two had built was already showing cracks by then.

Everyone credited Johnson’s tireless drive for turning the Cowboys into a championship team. Jerry, meanwhile, was seen as just the man who signs the checks. Jerry didn’t like that, so just two months after Jones and Johnson embraced on stage holding their second Lombardi Trophy, Jones decided to take a wrecking ball to everything he’d built.

On Netflix’s The Gambler And His Cowboys, former Cowboys DC Dave Wannstedt recalled a dinner at the NFL owners’ meeting where Jerry raised a toast to their second Super Bowl win. Everyone raised their glasses, with the sole exception of Jimmy Johnson, and something in Jerry snapped. On the docuseries, reporters Ed Werder and Rick Gosselin revealed what Jones had told them later that night.

“Don’t leave now,” Jones said, per Werder. “You’ll miss the story of the year. I’m going to fire that m–f– Jimmy Johnson, that disloyal son of a b**ch.”

So, Johnson was shown the door as Jerry bought out the remaining $2 million of his contract. Barry Switzer became the next man up, as if to prove Jerry’s infamous quote that 500 coaches could have won a Super Bowl with this team. But hopes of a three-peat died when the Cowboys lost to the San Francisco 49ers in the conference championship. Switzer won the Super Bowl the next year, but that January 1996 victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers would be the last time. In the 30-year-drought that followed, the questions about who built that team never went away… until now, with Jimmy Johnson pulling out his contract for the world to see.

Most recently, when Troy Aikman went for an interview with Dale Hansen, the subject was brought up again. Aikman criticized the drought and made it clear that the players already knew what Johnson’s contract has now spelled out.

“[Jerry] knows why we won with Jimmy Johnson, and I believe the reason we won is because every player in that locker room felt, and I think knew, that Jimmy was calling the shots, that Jimmy was in control of their destiny, so if you didn’t do what you were supposed to do by Jimmy’s standards, you were held accountable.

“He was a great evaluator of talent; he drafted these players, he built those teams, he was a tremendous general manager – I say general manager, he was a tremendous evaluator of talent, and in many ways he was the de facto general manager. I think he was probably better in that role than he was even as a head coach, as good as he was there.”

Now, Jerry Jones might still push back, saying he took a big risk with Jimmy, who’d never coached in the NFL before. But in his own words from the Netflix docuseries, Jerry has outlined how he operates, especially when things are going too well for him.

“I look back, I should have hung my hat on the fact that I knew that Jimmy Johnson wasn’t perfect,” Jones said. “He knew that I was one of the most imperfect people that he had ever been around. And then when we are on top of the world, and just won the gold cup, and I’m liable to break the damn thing.”