Boys Will Be Boys (39 page)

Once upon a time, when Jones first bought the Cowboys and installed Johnson as his head coach, the organization had preached accountability. You miss a block, you admit it. You skip a meeting, you face the consequences. When Jones was hammered by the Dallas media for the cutthroat manner in which he fired Landry, he stepped up and admitted wrongdoing.

But now, nearly a decade later, the Cowboys were engaged in a fullscale cover-up. McIver was offered a high-six-figure payoff to keep the story under wraps. (He accepted.) Gailey publicly dismissed the brawl as “horseplay.” When those involved in what came to be known as “Scissorsgate” met with the judge overseeing Irvin’s probation, they laughed it off as a simple case of McIver’s having engulfed Irvin in a bear hug that led to some playful wrestling and an accidental cut. No big deal.
Ha, ha, ha, hee, hee, hee.

Of course, the incident
was
a big deal. A
huge
deal. Though the Cowboys under Jimmy Johnson and Barry Switzer often lacked discipline, their talent always compensated. Now, discipline was at an all-time low, and the talent was fading fast. Gailey would guide the Cowboys to a 10–6 record and first-round playoff loss, then last just one more season before being fired after an 8–8 debacle. “Chan tried his best,” says Denne Freeman, who covered the Cowboys for the Associated Press. “But he probably didn’t realize the mess he was getting into.”

In the end, Gailey could do only so much with so little. With his skills in decline and his brain scrambled by repeated concussions, Aikman was never again a marquee player. In 2000 he threw for 7 touchdowns and 14 interceptions, then retired. Though Emmitt Smith lasted with Dallas through 2002, he, too, was gradually slipping. The drive and determination that had been a hallmark of his early years was replaced by selfishness and a single-minded personal goal—to become the league’s all-time leading rusher. Smith exceeded 1,200 yards in each of the 1998, ’99, and ’00 seasons, but in the words of one teammate, “didn’t give a shit about us anymore. He was all about Emmitt, Emmitt, Emmitt.” Like far too many faded stars, Smith saw his career end ingloriously: Left for dead by the Cowboys, he played the 2003 and ’04 seasons with the lowly Arizona Cardinals, running tentatively behind a porous offensive line and bringing to mind Willie Mays’s sad final days with the Mets. He retired with an unparalleled 18,355 career rushing yards, but with his dignity tarnished.

Irvin, meanwhile, suffered the harshest blow. In a game at Philadelphia during the 1999 season, Eagles defensive back Tim Hauck tackled him head-first into the turf. As Irvin lay motionless on the Veterans Stadium field, suffering from temporary paralysis, Philadelphia’s fans stood and cheered. Finally, they had found a way to stop The Playmaker. “That was as big a victory as we’d had in Philly since the 1980 World Series,” says Brian Hickey, former managing editor of the
Philadelphia City Paper
and one of the loudest hecklers that day. “That guy killed us for years, and finally we took him out.”

Irvin’s malady—a cervical spinal cord injury—was more serious than anyone imagined. Doctors told the receiver he was born with such a fragile spinal cord that, should he continue with his NFL career, a future injury of grave consequence was likely.

He would never play football again.

“That was huge,” says Woodson. “It cut out the heart of our team.”

To some, Irvin’s downfall was an isolated tragedy, the sad decline of a once-great wide receiver. To others, it was the natural continuation of an event that had occurred fifteen months earlier, when Irvin took a scissors to the neck of Everett McIver.

The blood covering the floor that day did not drain merely from a man, but from a franchise.

O
N THE AFTERNOON
of August 3, 2007, Michael Irvin wandered into the McKinley Grand hotel in downtown Canton, Ohio, and paced the hallways. He paced left. He paced right. He wiggled his fingers and twitched his toes and took one nervous breath after another. When someone asked for a photograph, Irvin smiled widely. When a group of kids requested his autograph, Irvin signed away.

But behind the façade was a genuinely un-Irvin reaction—The Playmaker was nervous.

In roughly twenty-four hours, Irvin would be called upon to make a speech at his Pro Football Hall of Fame induction ceremony, and the man who was never, ever,
ever
at a loss for words was coming up blank. “I have no idea what I’m gonna say,” he muttered, shrugging his shoul
ders. “I mean, I have a lot of things in my head that I want to get out. I’m thinking of just going up there and speaking from the heart.”

Standing several feet away, former Bills running back and fellow inductee Thurman Thomas possessed the carefree look of a retiree on a hammock—he had written his speech long ago. The same went for the other inductees: Charlie Sanders, Bruce Matthews, and Roger Wehrli. (Gene Hickerson was ill, so his son, Bob, would speak on his behalf.) They were all relaxed, all prepared, all enjoying the moment. “I’m sure I’ll be OK,” Irvin said. “Well, I think I might be probably OK.”

The following evening the Dallas Cowboys’ all-time leading receiver, who had retired with 750 receptions, 11,904 yards, 65 touchdowns, and three Super Bowl championships, strode to a podium inside Fawcett Stadium. He took several deep breaths, looked out among the thousands of faces, and just…spoke.

He spoke about his boyhood in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where seventeen brothers and sisters shared two bedrooms. He spoke about his collegiate career at the University of Miami, where he learned that a merging of hard work and swagger conquers all.

Mostly, he spoke about a man who had once believed the only way to live was lavishly and the only speed to travel was 5 million mph. He looked at Sandy, his wife of seventeen years, and apologized for violating her trust, and looked toward his mother, Pearl, and thanked her for creating a man.

Then he asked his sons, Michael, ten, and Elijah, eight, to rise. The tears streamed from Irvin’s eyes and onto his cheeks, where they nestled like tiny ponds.

“That’s my heart right there,” he said, pointing to his offspring. “That’s my heart. When I am on that threshing floor, I pray. I say, ‘God, I have my struggles and I made some bad decisions, but whatever you do, whatever you do, don’t let me mess this up.’

“I say, ‘Please, help me raise them for some young lady so that they can be a better husband than I. Help me raise them for their kids so that they could be a better father than I.’ And I tell you guys to always
do the right thing so you can be a better role model than Dad. I sat right here where you are last year and I watched the Class of 2006: Troy Aikman, Warren Moon, Harry Carson, Rayfield Wright, John Madden, and the late, great Reggie White represented by his wife, Sara White. And I said, ‘Wow. That’s what a Hall of Famer is.’”

Irvin’s voice cracked. His tears streamed rapidly. Here was a broken man. Here was a saved man.

“Certainly, I am not that,” he continued. “I doubted I would ever have the chance to stand before you today. So when I returned home I spoke with Michael and Elijah. I said, ‘That’s how you do it, son. You do it like they did it.’ Michael asked, he said, ‘Dad, do you ever think we will be there?’ And I didn’t know how to answer that. And it returned me to that threshing floor. This time I was voiceless, but my heart cried out…

“I wanted to stand in front of my boys and say, ‘Do it like your dad’—like any proud dad would want to. Why must I go through so much? At that moment a voice came over me and said, ‘Look up, get up, and don’t ever give up. You tell everyone or anyone that has ever doubted, thought they did not measure up, or wanted to quit, you tell them to look up, get up, and don’t ever give up.’

“Thank you, and may God bless you.”

For a moment, the 12,787 spectators made nary a sound. Then the applause began—tepid at first, but building rapidly. By the time Irvin took a step back, he was overwhelmed by the roar of human thunder. An explosion that lasted and lasted
and lasted.

Among those in attendance were two dozen former Cowboy teammates, including Aikman, Emmitt Smith, Jay Novacek, Nate Newton, Steve Walsh, James Washington, and Darren Woodson. They were present to support their friend, but also to bear witness to his rebirth. Many of the old Cowboys had changed their ways with the passing of years. They looked back at the strip clubs and hookers and Cowboys Café with both joy and humiliation—joy over the excitement and camaraderie of it all, humiliation over having treated women not as people, but objects; over having naïvely believed fame and fortune
were God-given rights, not temporary luxuries; over discarding wives and children for short-lived excesses; over trading in humility for ego.

Just a few years earlier, Newton had paid a visit to Robert Jones, the former Cowboys linebacker, to set things straight. Through his years in Dallas Jones had been faithful to his wife and children, and countless teammates had mocked him for it. “I’m so sorry how I treated you when we were in Dallas,” Newton said to Jones. “You were one of the guys who lived his life the way it’s supposed to be lived, and now look at you. You’re still with your wife. I’m divorced, and she was a good woman. You did things the right way and we made fun of you for it. We were wrong.”

It was eerily similar to an encounter that took place on October 15, 2001, when Jones was in his final NFL season, with the Redskins. Before a game against the Cowboys, Jones was told by a teammate that Irvin was outside the locker room asking for him. During their time together in Dallas, the two players had loathed each other. In Jones’s mind, Irvin was a bully who felt compelled to harass anyone refusing to live the fast life. And now Irvin wanted
him
? No way. “Man, you’re full of shit,” said Jones. “No way Mike’s out there.” Yet when Jones stuck his head through door, there was Irvin. He hugged Jones and kissed him on the cheek. “What’s that for?” Jones asked.

“Man, I’m so proud of you,” Irvin said. “And I apologize for everything I ever did to you. You were righteous. I wasn’t.”

Now, in Canton, with the jersey-wearing and face-painted fans having departed and darkness settling in, Irvin was hosting a party in a large tent on the Hall grounds. There were mounds of food. White leather couches and cascading floral arrangements. The Pointer Sisters singing their hits. Jerry Jones dancing away as his wife, Gene, sat in the rear and laughed over a handful of plain M&M’s. Early on, Irvin called for all his former teammates to climb atop the stage for a group photograph. Among those present were Erik Williams, once responsible for a near-fatal DUI accident; Washington, who had chased after women with an unquenchable thirst; Newton, the man arrested in 2001 for smuggling a mere 213 pounds of marijuana.

More than a decade after their Super Bowl XXX triumph, these Cowboys were different men. Fat had replaced muscle. Gray hairs had started to take up turf. Some possessed run-of-the-mill, 9-to–5 jobs. Others had undergone religious transformations. Washington, once a trash-talking safety, was now a smooth-talking Los Angeles radio host. Even Newton, the largest of the large livers, was primarily focused on helping his son Tré, a star running back at Southlake Carroll High School, attain a college scholarship. (He went on to sign with the University of Texas.)

By 1:30
A.M.,
the stars who had once reigned over the Dallas nightlife were all gone, back to their hotels and snuggled beneath the covers. In fact, only one member of the Cowboys remained. His tie loosened, the top button of his white dress shirt undone, the man led his wife onto the dance floor and gently kissed her cheek. As the couple began a slow groove, Michael Irvin smiled widely.

It was a facial expression millions of Cowboys fans had come to know. Once upon a time, Michael Irvin smiled when he scored touchdowns. He smiled when he won Super Bowls. He smiled as he strolled into court, a mink coat draped over his shoulders. He even smiled in police mug shots.

Now Michael Irvin was smiling for the purest of reasons.

At long last, he knew what it was to be on top of the world.

He was whole.

I am sitting in the café at the Borders in Eastchester, New York—the spot where I have written, oh, 60 percent of this book. Behind the counter is LaToya David, a twenty-four-year-old woman who, two days ago, was mugged while waiting for the bus to take her back home.

On the six days per week that she works, LaToya makes the fifty-minute commute from the Bronx to Eastchester. She spends seven hours here at Borders, slinging defrosted cinnamon scones and overpriced café au lait bullshit to schlubs like me, then drags herself across Post Road for another five hours behind the cash register at Ann Taylor. When LaToya’s not working, she cares for her ill grandfather.

Last week LaToya asked her manager at Ann Taylor whether she could slightly alter her schedule to find more time for Grandpa. “Maybe,” she was told, “you need to go someplace else.”

Every day I take a few minutes and watch LaToya gracefully go about her tasks—make the coffee, heat the bagels, clean the tables, make more coffee. She is a bright young woman stuck in a horrid situation—a person worthy of attending college, not attending to the
crazy lady who sits here twelve hours per day sipping from a large cup of hot chocolate while babbling on about Bob Barker’s lovely white hair.

Yet mixed in with my feelings of empathy for LaToya is a huge dose of fulfillment. Really, of
appreciation.
Here I am, thirty-six years old, married to a wife I don’t deserve, gifted with two healthy children, getting paid to complete my third book. I am, in every sense of the word, blessed.

Hence, this is the last time I will ever include the sentence “Writing a book is a nightmare” in my acknowledgments. Because while it can, indeed, seem nightmarish (
Dammit! Why hasn’t Tom Myslinski called me back?
), the experience is literally a dream come true.

As a boy growing up in Mahopac, New York, I would scan the shelves of the public library, burning through biographies of men like Bo Jackson and Rod Carew and Terry Bradshaw and Joe Charboneau (yes, Super Joe). Now I’m the one doing the writing.

Mind-blowing.

Though the praise and scorn heaped upon a book goes directly to the author, it is—like football—a team effort. To that end, I have been gifted with a pair of editors who are not mere coworkers, but friends. David Hirshey—thanks for the chance to continue to write for HarperCollins. The support and guidance have been invaluable. And to Kate Hamill, the baddest MC this side of Slick Rick, big props on the gangsta tip for keeping it old school and poppin’. Word.

My agent, David Black, continues to thrash the notion that his is a profession for rodents and gnats. David, you are a great man, a great sounding board, a great evaluator, and the best agent in the biz. One thousand thanks.

Finding a reporter who doesn’t merely go through the motions can be challenging, but fortunately, I’ve teamed with the Troy Aikman of the profession. Casey Angle, thank you so much for taking this project personally.
Boys Will Be Boys
is your book as much as it is mine ( just don’t ask for royalties). Furthermore, Tom Cherwin is the best copyeditor I have ever had the pleasure of writing for. The meticulousness is priceless.

My top proofreaders happen to be two of my closest friends, and their dedication over the years can’t be overstated. The ultra-talented Michael J. Lewis of the
Daytona Beach News-Journal
is not only one of the finest scribes I know, but a man finally wise enough to ditch the denim jacket and J-E-T-S necklace. (Moment of silence for Adrian Murrell. Thank you.) And while Paul Duer, the onetime Edna’s Edibles co-captain, is not a journalist by trade, he possesses a keen eye for what belongs (and doesn’t belong) in a sports biography. Now if only he’d trust me on Josh Hamilton…

I spoke to 146 Cowboy players, coaches, and administrators for this book, and from Jimmy Johnson and Jerry Jones to Nate Newton and Tommy Hodson, I want to thank them all for the honest recollections of some crazy days. In particular, I’d like to cite the contributions of Kenny Gant, James Washington, Eric Bjornson, Jeff Rohrer, Kevin Gogan, Jay Novacek, Cory Fleming, Hugh Millen, Bill Bates, Michael Irvin, Ray Horton, Kevin Smith, Cliff Stoudt, Mark Stepnoski, Dennis McKinnon, Crawford Ker, Rob Awalt, Dave Harper, Joe Fishback, Rob Higbee, John Gesek, Jim Jeffcoat, Russell Maryland, Chad Hennings, Alexander (Ace) Wright, and Larry Brown. An extra shout-out goes to three remarkable men—Robert Jones, Darren Woodson, and Clayton Holmes—whose lives serve as both lessons and inspirations. And a big thank-you to Barry Switzer, who opened his wide swath of memories to my pen.

This book could not have been completed without the assistance of a cornucopia of characters: Mike Murphy, the sage attorney who initially said, “How about the ’90s Cowboys?” when I was thinking my next project might be:
I Sing, Too!: The John Oates Story
; Denne Freeman, a wonderful writer who took the time to add his Dallas-based knowledge; Jeff Donaldson of the Irvine Spectrum Center Apple Store, who rescued my battered MacBook and whose Flux Capacitor tattoo will never escape my mind; Kaitlin Ingram of the
Dallas Observer
; Ileana Pena of Fox Sports; Rich Dalrymple of the Dallas Cowboys; Gary Miller of Raleigh Canine Rescue, Inc.; Kyran Cassidy; Joy Birdsong and Natasha Simon of the
Sports Illustrated
li
brary; David Schoenfield and Thomas Newman of ESPN.com; Bev Oden of the Oden Family Jug Band; Stanley Herz, author of the amazing
Conquering the Corporate Career
; Arthur Haviland, publicist to the stars; David Kolberg, who doesn’t exist; the always smooth Nick Trautwein; Brian (Deep Throat) Johnson; Professor Bill Fleischman; Laurel Turnbull; Mike Freeman of
CBS Sportsline
; Mike Silver of Yahoo Sports; Jarrett Bell; Dean Blevins; Rick Cantu; Larry Charlton; Jody Dean; Jim Dent; Mike Doocy; Bruce Feldman; Kenn Finkel; Mike Fisher; Randy Galloway; Rob Geiger; Mark Godich; Rick Gosselin; Dale Hansen; Norm Hitzges; Barry Horn; Mark Kegans; Joe Layden; Richie Whitt; Frank Luksa; Ivan Maisel; Mike McAlister; Gary Myers; Burl Osborne; Jeff Prugh; Brad Sham; Dave Smith; Mickey Spagnolia; Anne Stockwell; Carson Stowers; Jean-Jacques Taylor; Dave Tepps; Chris Worthington; Larry, Diane, Phoebe, James, and Mookie Luftig (aka The Bad Ronald Fan Club); Kim and Colleen O’Neill; Anthony (Paco) Montoya; Steve Cannella and Jon Wertheim—two excellent friends/sounding boards; David (Doovie) Pearlman; Daniel, Naya, and Abraham Pearlman; Dr. Martin Pearlman; Patsy Clay; Leah Guggenheimer, Jordan and Isaiah Williams; Laura and Rodney Cole; Meghan Scott; Richard, Susan, and Dr. Jessica Guggenheimer; Norma “What’s a House Without a Proper Dresser?” Shapiro; Dan, Patrice, and Kyle Monaghan; Reginald Anderson; Lance Lionetti (the biggest Cowboy fan I’ve ever seen); Gary Galvao (the second-biggest Cowboy fan I’ve ever seen); Richard Howell—a fair and honest man in an otherwise sketchy industry; Gil Pagovich; Gloria Chebomui of the Mirage Diner (the refills were always appreciated); Bill Oram, Paula Arrojo; the staff of the Regency Hotel in North Dallas, where the smiles are toothy and the shower liners laced with mysterious hairs.

My parents, Joan and Stan Pearlman, continue to serve as my greatest role models and friends.
(Mom, Dad—the Cowboys are a football team. Football…that game with the weird ball. They have that Super Bowl thing. Yeah, on a Sunday…with all the food…eh, never mind.)

I’ve seen many marriages, and none match the kinship I have
formed with my incomparable wife, Catherine. In the course of writing this book I had the opportunity to sleep with hundreds of Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders. Because of the unconditional love I possess for my wife, I only took up offers from twelve of them (but I rarely enjoyed it).

Earlie, I write for you.

I am also blessed with two children who have reminded me every day that, when push comes to shove, there are more important things than the intricacies of Leon Lett’s sprained knee. Casey, you are everything I’ve ever dreamed about in a daughter. Emmett, my beautiful (and appropriately named) boy—
fish
!

Lastly, I’d like to dedicate this book to the memory of four people: Henry Capro, who never left home without his pocketknife; Heather Fleischman, whose bylines would have sparkled; J. P. O’Neill, who deserved ninety years of Cowboy fandom; and Ann Goldstein, my great-aunt, who died far too young to know the euphoria that is life.