University of North Carolina Athletics
UNC in the News: Former Tar Heels Help Change Dallas Cowboys' Off-field Image
August 4, 2000 | Football
Aug. 4, 2000
Former Tar Heels Help Change Dallas Cowboys' Off-Field Image
By NICK GHOLSON, Scripps Howard News Service
WICHITA FALLS, Texas -- Just in case you haven't noticed, these Dallas Cowboys aren't wearing black hats anymore.
We've got NFL players out there allegedly hiring hits on their girlfriends, having sex with their baby-sitters, buying hookers and, of course, there is still enough smoking and snorting going around.
But for the past year, the Cowboys have been almost squeaky clean. Strangely, the biggest headlines were made by owner Jerry Jones himself running from the police to get to church on time.
Quite a change from the previous four years where it seemed every time you picked up the paper, there was some new story about some Cowboy doing something he shouldn't be doing. Some of it was blown out of proportion, but it was a problem.
It was such a big problem that in 1998, Dallas passed on wide receiver Randy Moss in the draft because it couldn't take a chance at bringing in another guy with off-the-field baggage.
Instead the Cowboys have drafted players such as former North Carolina defensive linemen Greg Ellis and Ebenezer Ekuban for their combination of skills and reputations as solid citizens off the field.
Former Cowboy runner Calvin Hill was also brought in to help clean up the mess. Jones said Hill has a staff of "psychologists, psychiatrists and our own players program people."
Notice, he didn't mention bail bondsmen.
"We have made a big commitment and spent a lot of money in that area. Probably, by not having in place the things we have in place today kept us from getting Randy Moss. Had I felt the way we feel today about what we do off the field, that might have been a different decision. But I want to point out that we've got a great player in Greg Ellis."
So, what has really happened? Has this team cleaned up its act or just learned how not to get caught?
The true answer is probably "all of the above," but I say give Jones and Hill the benefit of the doubt.
Hill said the situation he walked into wasn't nearly as bad as what he had feared.
"I kiddingly say I thought I was going to a team of characters and found that I came to a team of real character," Hill said. "Even some of the guys who were responsible for some of the incidents that got us a lot of bad publicity, you saw them exhibit great character in some areas.
"And when I walked into that locker room for the first time and looked around and saw Troy and Emmitt and Moose Johnston and Darren Woodson and Tony Tolbert and Kevin Smith -- I could go on and probably omit guys -- suddenly I realized that image is a lot different than reality."
The biggest reason for the cloud over the Cowboys wore No. 88. Michael Irvin's arrest with cocaine and hookers at an Irving motel only days after the team's victory in Super Bowl XXX triggered an onslaught of nasty stories.
The most famous White House in the country was in Washington D.C. The second most famous White House was in Dallas.
Then when you thought things had quieted down, "Scissorsgate" took center stage at the team's first training camp in Wichita Falls.
But that was smalltime compared to the heroin-related death of Mark Tuinei less than a year later.
Stuff like this happens when you give young men fame and a lot of money, but the Cowboys, it seemed, were the baddest boys in the NFL.
"It wasn't just the Dallas Cowboys," Hill said. "We get a lot of attention, and we always will. Every time you stub your toe here, people are going to read about it because you're the Cowboys, just as if you were the Yankees or Michael Jordan's Bulls.
"Fame is a microscope. Dallas Cowboys fame is an electron microscope."
Hill's son Grant is an NBA superstar whose only off-the-court problems is an addiction to McDonald's French fries. That was easy, the elder Hill said, because "I've had him since he was born."
Some of the guys on this team, he has only had a few months, but he said that he and Jones are constantly preaching character to young players and educating them on the dangers that lurk outside the gates of Valley Ranch.
"There's an old English proverb: 'Pray that you do not enjoy success before you can endure success.' You give a guy a lot of money, and there is a lot of pressure. These guys are exposed to things that would be difficult for even more mature people not to fall into traps."
With Hill's program now in place, the Cowboys felt comfortable signing troubled Alonzo Spellman last summer, and it paid off big-time. Then this year they took another chance on another player with person problems, Dimitrius Underwood.
Also, in the draft, the team took cornerback Kareem Larrimore even though he had failed a drug test for marijuana at the NFL combine.
Many of the critics blamed Jerry Jones for what went wrong with the Cowboys off the field. Now it's time to give Jones credit for what's gone right.
