Pittsburgh will never be ‘America's Team'

I've been hearing it all week, as have many of you.

The Pittsburgh Steelers are the new ‘America's Team' we keep hearing, a moniker that's been held by the Dallas Cowboys since the 1970s. And now one sports network wants to transfer the crown over to the 2009 Super Bowl champions.

This comes out of ESPN, of course - the network which appears to be clutching at straws as this decline in the economy has been a major hit to media companies around the globe. Any news that involves the Dallas Cowboys is huge. They've come to learn that. They're starting to act on the information they have, which means the more Dallas Cowboys news the better.

The NFL Network knew that, and even had an all-day Dallas Cowboys marathon a few months back.

The Cowboys are a lot like E.F. Hutton: When the Cowboys talk (or people talk about the Cowboys), people listen.

The Dallas Cowboys aren't ‘America's Team' because they won five Super Bowls. If that was the case, then the San Francisco 49ers should have been ‘America's Team' -- they got there first.

But the 49ers are not because holding the title of ‘America's Team' doesn't necessarily involve the number of hardware in the trophy case. It involves a legion of superfans that follow the Cowboys to Arizona, California, Chicago, Florida, Washington and anywhere else they play. The Steelers have their loyal following in those places, too, but that still doesn't make them the new top dog.

The Dallas Cowboys are the No. 1 sports franchise in the galaxy (second was Manchester United) as Forbes noted on Sept. 14, 2008. They rank atop the sports world valued at $1.5 billion.

Where do the Steelers rank? Try No. 18 after Washington, New England, New York Giants, New York Jets, Houston Texans (Houston Texans?!?), Philadelphia, Indianapolis, Chicago, Baltimore, Denver, Tampa Bay, Miami, Carolina, Cleveland, Green Bay and Kansas City. And that's their NFL rank, not their global ranking.

Let's talk merchandising. When it comes to jersey sales, the most popular sales belong to Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo. In fact, of the top 10 jerseys sold in the NFL in 2008, three Cowboys players ranked in the top 10 (Romo, Marion Barber and Terrell Owens).

Here's the top 10: Romo, Brett Favre, Eli Manning, Peyton Manning, Adrian Peterson, Brian Urlacher, LaDanian Tomlinson, Barber, Tom Brady and Owens.

There were zero Pittsburgh Steelers jerseys up there. Zero.

Here's the question Forbes posed: "When Marion Barber's jersey outsells those of LeBron James, Kobe Bryant or Derek Jeter, what more proof is needed about the power of the NFL and the Cowboys?"

Look, the Pittsburgh Steelers deserve their sixth Vince Lombardi trophy. They earned it, being the best team in the NFL six times. There are no issues with that.

But as far as the title of ‘America's Team,' they're going to have to try a lot harder than six Super Bowl championships to knock off the top dog.