Quarterback Don Meredith, known as “Dandy Don,” is considered the original Dallas Cowboy, having been signed to a personal services contract before the team even had a nickname. A three-time Pro Bowl quarterback, he led Dallas to the NFL Championship game in 1966 and 1967, losing both to the Packers, and was once named NFL Player of the Year. After his playing career, Meredith – a native Texan born in 1938 – became part of a cultural phenomenon when, in 1970, he joined the first Monday Night Football broadcast team as a color analyst. Initially alongside Keith Jackson and Howard Cosell, whom Meredith would banter with in his folksy Southern style, Meredith established a tradition of singing the Willie Nelson song, “Turn out the Lights, The Party’s Over,” on the air whenever a game was effectively over. His witty one-liners, like declaring, “He thinks they’re number one in the nation” when a camera showed a fan with his middle finger raised, endeared Meredith to football fans across America.