NY Times: Cowboys See Talent, Not Just Trouble
By BILLY WITZ
August 20, 2008
OXNARD, Calif. — Welcome to America’s Team. Or is it Only in America’s Team?
This is where Jerry Jones, the owner of the Dallas Cowboys, can proudly point out two of his team leaders: Terrell Owens, who left behind a locker room’s worth of ulcers in San Francisco and Philadelphia; and Tank Johnson, who has collected enough guns and ammo to start a militia.
It is also where Pacman Jones, who was suspended for last season because of a litany of off-the-field troubles, is being counseled by the twin pillars of humility and virtue: Deion Sanders and Michael Irvin.
It is not clear if this is a sociology experiment, or the Mean Machine gone cinéma vérité.
What is clear is that the Cowboys have not won a Super Bowl since the 1995 season. And after last season’s disappointing end — Dallas’s 13-win team, with 13 Pro Bowl players, lost to a Giants squad it had beaten twice in the regular season — there is a palpable sense of desperation to reach the title game.
Thus, the addition of Jones, a dynamic cornerback and punt returner who was acquired from the Tennessee Titans, and the ascension of Johnson, an athletic tackle, into a key role on the defensive line in his first full season with the team.
“It’d be naïve and not realistic to think there aren’t going to be people who are skeptical and waiting for the next shoe to drop,” Jerry Jones said this month during training camp here. “But I’ve already passed that in my mind.
“We’re very sensitive about our image, we’re sensitive about our reputation. There’s no free lunch here when we bring in a player that has some controversy involved. I always want to make sure that an individual understands that we’re paying a pretty big price to have them involved.”
Jones, who made his fortune in the oil business by buying up leases to drilling sites that bigger companies had walked away from in the 1960s, has taken the same approach with building his team. Where others see risk, he sees reward.
He took defensive end Charles Haley, a malcontent in San Francisco, and won three Super Bowl titles with him. He took chances on defensive linemen Alonzo Spellman and Dimitrius Underwood, who had been found to have mental illnesses. (Those did not work out as well.) He has always regretted that he did not take one on receiver Randy Moss when he had the chance to draft him.
“Jerry’s a wildcatter,” said Calvin Hill, a former Cowboys running back and a consultant for the club in its off-field program for players. “But he doesn’t do it without good geologists talking him through what the risk is.”
In the case of Pacman Jones and Johnson, the risks are not a matter of science. They are a matter of public record — police records, to be more precise. Bad raps are one thing; rap sheets are another.
Jones has been arrested six times and been involved in 12 incidents in which the police were called since he was chosen sixth over all by Tennessee in 2005. Most notably, he was part of a strip-club melee in Las Vegas in 2007 in which three people were shot.
Johnson served two months in jail on a parole violation after the police raided his home in late 2006 and found 6 unregistered firearms, 550 rounds of ammunition and 2 pounds of marijuana. Two days after the raid, a man who was Johnson’s bodyguard and friend was shot and killed while the two were at a Chicago nightclub.
When he considers a troubled player, Jerry Jones said, there are three criteria he examines. The player must be extremely talented. Also, Jones said the Cowboys’ success is more likely to keep a player out of trouble. And there must be a core of “top-quality people” in the locker room who lead by example.
Once the Cowboys decide to take on a player, Jones said, there is constant communication with at-risk players throughout the organization — the coaching staff, the player support staff, the public relations staff and himself. The key, he said, is to always make them aware of what is at stake.
“There’s a sign in the offices,” Hill said. “It says, ‘There are lots of reasons, but no excuses.’ We make it very clear what the rules are, what’s acceptable and what’s not.”
That was also the point being made when N.F.L. Commissioner Roger Goodell toughened up the league’s personal-conduct policy last year after a number of incidents — particularly the ones involving Pacman Jones and Johnson — left the league with a public relations problem. Goodell promised longer suspensions, heftier fines and also threatened teams with penalties.
“What happens to young guys — they get overzealous,” said Nate Newton, a former Pro Bowl offensive lineman for the Cowboys. “Nobody ever told them no, so they went on to their next wild adventure.”
Newton, who retired nine years ago, understands this well. He spent 32 months in prison after being arrested twice in 2001 for transporting several hundred pounds of marijuana across state lines.
“I’m not going to make excuses for athletes,” said Newton, who does radio and TV work in Dallas. “I’m not going to say, ‘Oh, man, look where he’s come from, look what he’s been through.’ What football does is it exposes us, as athletes, to every nature of person there is. If we want to grasp the good people, the intelligent people, we can. If we want to grasp the ignorant people and the stupid people, we can, too. When you play football, you meet everybody — from the lowest dope dealer to the highest prince of Egypt. It’s just what the person wants.
“Jerry pulls you into his office and he looks you right in the eye and he asks: ‘What do you want? Where are you going from here? Have you learned anything?’ ”
After his meeting with the owner, Johnson, whom the Cowboys signed last September after he was released by the Bears, said he felt as if he was getting another chance rather than a last chance.
“He kind of reinforced to me that I don’t have to look over my shoulder every day,” said Johnson, who was reinstated by Goodell last November. “That was the most important thing. I can come out here with a clear conscience and play the game like it’s supposed to be played and not feel like I have a short leash — even though I know I do. When you get in trouble your leash is shortened.”
Nobody has a shorter leash than Pacman Jones.
He is the prime example of Goodell’s get-tough policy. Jones was allowed by Goodell to practice and play in preseason games, which many view as a trial period, and he is hoping to be reinstated for the regular season. Jerry Jones is optimistic Pacman Jones will be allowed to play, pleased that training camp has been “uneventful,” but also careful not to be presumptuous. He is expecting a decision by Aug. 30, when rosters have to be trimmed to 53 players.
That will be eight days before Dallas plays at Cleveland, the start of a season that may best be described as Super Bowl or bust.
August 20, 2008
OXNARD, Calif. — Welcome to America’s Team. Or is it Only in America’s Team?
This is where Jerry Jones, the owner of the Dallas Cowboys, can proudly point out two of his team leaders: Terrell Owens, who left behind a locker room’s worth of ulcers in San Francisco and Philadelphia; and Tank Johnson, who has collected enough guns and ammo to start a militia.
It is also where Pacman Jones, who was suspended for last season because of a litany of off-the-field troubles, is being counseled by the twin pillars of humility and virtue: Deion Sanders and Michael Irvin.
It is not clear if this is a sociology experiment, or the Mean Machine gone cinéma vérité.
What is clear is that the Cowboys have not won a Super Bowl since the 1995 season. And after last season’s disappointing end — Dallas’s 13-win team, with 13 Pro Bowl players, lost to a Giants squad it had beaten twice in the regular season — there is a palpable sense of desperation to reach the title game.
Thus, the addition of Jones, a dynamic cornerback and punt returner who was acquired from the Tennessee Titans, and the ascension of Johnson, an athletic tackle, into a key role on the defensive line in his first full season with the team.
“It’d be naïve and not realistic to think there aren’t going to be people who are skeptical and waiting for the next shoe to drop,” Jerry Jones said this month during training camp here. “But I’ve already passed that in my mind.
“We’re very sensitive about our image, we’re sensitive about our reputation. There’s no free lunch here when we bring in a player that has some controversy involved. I always want to make sure that an individual understands that we’re paying a pretty big price to have them involved.”
Jones, who made his fortune in the oil business by buying up leases to drilling sites that bigger companies had walked away from in the 1960s, has taken the same approach with building his team. Where others see risk, he sees reward.
He took defensive end Charles Haley, a malcontent in San Francisco, and won three Super Bowl titles with him. He took chances on defensive linemen Alonzo Spellman and Dimitrius Underwood, who had been found to have mental illnesses. (Those did not work out as well.) He has always regretted that he did not take one on receiver Randy Moss when he had the chance to draft him.
“Jerry’s a wildcatter,” said Calvin Hill, a former Cowboys running back and a consultant for the club in its off-field program for players. “But he doesn’t do it without good geologists talking him through what the risk is.”
In the case of Pacman Jones and Johnson, the risks are not a matter of science. They are a matter of public record — police records, to be more precise. Bad raps are one thing; rap sheets are another.
Jones has been arrested six times and been involved in 12 incidents in which the police were called since he was chosen sixth over all by Tennessee in 2005. Most notably, he was part of a strip-club melee in Las Vegas in 2007 in which three people were shot.
Johnson served two months in jail on a parole violation after the police raided his home in late 2006 and found 6 unregistered firearms, 550 rounds of ammunition and 2 pounds of marijuana. Two days after the raid, a man who was Johnson’s bodyguard and friend was shot and killed while the two were at a Chicago nightclub.
When he considers a troubled player, Jerry Jones said, there are three criteria he examines. The player must be extremely talented. Also, Jones said the Cowboys’ success is more likely to keep a player out of trouble. And there must be a core of “top-quality people” in the locker room who lead by example.
Once the Cowboys decide to take on a player, Jones said, there is constant communication with at-risk players throughout the organization — the coaching staff, the player support staff, the public relations staff and himself. The key, he said, is to always make them aware of what is at stake.
“There’s a sign in the offices,” Hill said. “It says, ‘There are lots of reasons, but no excuses.’ We make it very clear what the rules are, what’s acceptable and what’s not.”
That was also the point being made when N.F.L. Commissioner Roger Goodell toughened up the league’s personal-conduct policy last year after a number of incidents — particularly the ones involving Pacman Jones and Johnson — left the league with a public relations problem. Goodell promised longer suspensions, heftier fines and also threatened teams with penalties.
“What happens to young guys — they get overzealous,” said Nate Newton, a former Pro Bowl offensive lineman for the Cowboys. “Nobody ever told them no, so they went on to their next wild adventure.”
Newton, who retired nine years ago, understands this well. He spent 32 months in prison after being arrested twice in 2001 for transporting several hundred pounds of marijuana across state lines.
“I’m not going to make excuses for athletes,” said Newton, who does radio and TV work in Dallas. “I’m not going to say, ‘Oh, man, look where he’s come from, look what he’s been through.’ What football does is it exposes us, as athletes, to every nature of person there is. If we want to grasp the good people, the intelligent people, we can. If we want to grasp the ignorant people and the stupid people, we can, too. When you play football, you meet everybody — from the lowest dope dealer to the highest prince of Egypt. It’s just what the person wants.
“Jerry pulls you into his office and he looks you right in the eye and he asks: ‘What do you want? Where are you going from here? Have you learned anything?’ ”
After his meeting with the owner, Johnson, whom the Cowboys signed last September after he was released by the Bears, said he felt as if he was getting another chance rather than a last chance.
“He kind of reinforced to me that I don’t have to look over my shoulder every day,” said Johnson, who was reinstated by Goodell last November. “That was the most important thing. I can come out here with a clear conscience and play the game like it’s supposed to be played and not feel like I have a short leash — even though I know I do. When you get in trouble your leash is shortened.”
Nobody has a shorter leash than Pacman Jones.
He is the prime example of Goodell’s get-tough policy. Jones was allowed by Goodell to practice and play in preseason games, which many view as a trial period, and he is hoping to be reinstated for the regular season. Jerry Jones is optimistic Pacman Jones will be allowed to play, pleased that training camp has been “uneventful,” but also careful not to be presumptuous. He is expecting a decision by Aug. 30, when rosters have to be trimmed to 53 players.
That will be eight days before Dallas plays at Cleveland, the start of a season that may best be described as Super Bowl or bust.
posted by The Gryphon at 5:09 PM
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