Michael Irvin on Cowboys OTAs: Schottenheimer is molding identity of “competition under pressure”

Michael Irvin on Cowboys OTAs: Schottenheimer is molding identity of “competition under pressure”

to find out next as Dallas continues OTAAS today under new head coach Brian Shanimer they didn’t make the playoffs last season let’s not talk about the Super Bowl drought that’s almost 30 years which is also the last time they even made it past the divisional round espn analytics does not like the Cowboys chances of returning to the postseason our football power index gives Dallas just a 31% shot to make it back for the first time since 2023 that’s fourth worst in the NFC here’s head coach Brian Shottenheimimer today i want to be the greatest uh culture in professional sports uh and that’s saying a lot i get that but um you know it’s no different than sitting up here and talking about winning Super Bowls the big thing that goes into culture too I think is being authentic you know I will always be authentic i’m never going to stand up here and and pretend to be something I’m not i think that that’s a recipe for disaster in this business i’ve seen it i’ve seen it fail the culture that we’re building here is is something that I truly believe in and that most of these players that we have they believe in it or if they don’t believe in it yet hopefully them seeing my conviction makes them uh buy in so after talking with coach last week I finally got a chance talk with him on the phone to go over and spend some time with everybody and let me tell you how the day went let me sum it up first it was amazing it was simply amazing i mean it’s so interesting how much you first miss being in that big meeting room coach brought us all in you know all the guys and he we were in the meeting room with the players hadn’t been in a big team meeting room in a long time not like that with all the guys it was a I call this a locker room you know yeah to try to glean from what we get from being in those situations in that kind of a room that kind of talent you know and and and and I love what Coach Seanheim was trying to do i must admit and I came down hard about this on this decision but I must admit there’s some things I told you that are winning me over like I told you about him understanding how important it is to have the right culture and set the right tone the one thing I would always say that I mean the key card in winning championships and on in every place that I’ve won championships it was always an understanding of how we do things here and people talk about culture culture is something that that when it’s right you don’t even have to speak about it anymore you’ll get past saying “Well we’re trying to create the right culture we’re trying to do you don’t have to do anything.” You know it’s there and and there’s only one way to create the culture that will win championships over and over again and that’s putting someone in that kind of culture over and over and over again you must live in it as I was joking around with the receiver coach and everything and and and talking with with coach Shanham I said “Coach you do what we’re doing here what we do on Sundays.” This stuff is the pressure packed stuff all of it’s pressure when you get those third and nines and all that’s all pressure it’s about competition it’s about pressure those two things competition competing and it’s always pressure you have to live you have to learn and you must love those things competition and pressure and my mind always says because that’s what’s going that’s going to win in the fourth quarter you know I’m not even talking talent i know what I’m saying competing and pressure i ain’t said talent and you know why I didn’t say talent because it’s not going to be determining factor you can have talent but everybody has talent it’s how much you compete and how good you are under pressure and how do I create this every day 24 hours a day so when it happens you feel like you’re right where you’re supposed to be when fourth quarter 2 minutes all that stuff happens your heartbeat drops because pressure is right where you want to be so the day started like this we all come in in the big meeting room and I’m in there and I look up and I said “Oh they got a basketball goal in the meeting room.” Basketball go tape on the line about 10 ft coach comes in and he says “All right guys are here on a good day i want to introduce all the legends.” And he introduced to everybody had everybody come in put all the you know everybody that was there all the legends that were there on the big board and then called out their names and he said to the players “This is what we’re part of this is what they built this very building we are in they go they said I want you guys to spend as much time around them to get whatever you can from them so we can hold up and honor and do what they’ve done i was like “Okay that’s a good start.” Because he’s connecting remember you’re not going to do great things without the connectivity it’s just it just you know without that connectivity all the way around all the way around everybody in the building has to be connected and everybody in the building has to know the importance of what we are doing to build a championship what he was doing which I thought was brilliant stuff in this sense he was connecting these generation and these young men that people try to say you know these guys are selfish these guys only care about them this is a a a social media era and all of that he was saying we different everybody in this room is family and and and this is our thing and we have to honor that we have to honor what they have done this building that we have these opportunities we have we have to honor it with our play i’m just telling you I like that then he gave all the veterans a chance to stand up and talk i mean everybody everybody he said “Anybody want to anybody at this door?” So so you know most of the guys jumped up um and started talking and he put up Dame Liard Lillard and said “Man if Dame Lillard was talking about if I was to talk to my younger self what would I say?” And then he asked guys all of us if we were to talk to our younger selves what would we say and everybody guys just started standing up talking rocket Hollywood Henderson i mean it was was a beautiful moment hollywood shared some beautiful things you know and he’s been sober for 41 years and and you know just to take advantage of the opportunity which it was great it really felt like a family you know us being a family and then after we all stopped sharing you could tell we felt like we were in the locker room again it was It’s high energy it’s all high energy everybody laughing messing around well you say you It was just so great and then and then guys then and then coach did this he said “All right you guys are here we got a competition going you’re here for the right time.” And he brought up two guys they’re doing free throw competitions all right they he brought up first Brady James and and Joe Looney they’re doing free throws competition man and it was so cool cuz I I really wanted to do it i really wanted to do it but but in this sense I didn’t want to overstep everybody i wanted it to be about we and certainly not me so I didn’t even stand up and speak to say anything that I would speak to my younger self i wanted to hear what these guys were saying cuz I’m there waiting and I wanted to hear things or share with you guys and make sure I see what I need to see in my guys dude I love it i love it i love they brought them up and they did the the free throw competition who else went i know Joe Looney and Brady James went for from the old guys but who I forgot who did it on the current team sam Williams who does Sam lose to oh yeah yeah yeah the Sam It was Sam Williams they shot free throws but you get 30 seconds and you get to make as many as you can you got your boy giving you free rebounds dude and everybody hype so get what he’s doing now i want you to get what he’s doing he’s creating competition right there even in the basketball with a basketball in the meeting room between two players and he’s doing it with all of us yelling “Hey let’s go let’s go.” He’s creating competition and pressure see what I’m saying listen to what I’m saying because I absolutely know what I’m talking about as soon as you get here mindset competing under pressure we going to do this before we start our day mindset you got You got Come on up here let’s go everybody yell let’s go competing under pressure so I was just looking i said “Oh okay i like that i like that.” And it’s high level high energy all the time and then we get to go to meeting rooms we broke out like we do always everybody meet and then uh coach said “All right offense stays in here defense gets the lead.” And Charlie Mack you know he played with me Charlie Williams 42 he said “Coach man still things still ain’t changed.” He said “The defense always have to leave dolphins always get to stay in this room and the defense always leave.” And he’s right it was like that when we were playing it was like that when Drew Pearson were playing and in that main meeting room that’s basically the offensive meeting room defense get out and coach was like you know Larry you know you know you you know Charlie you’re right you’re right no we never thought about that you’re right we’ll dig it up next time defense get the hell out of here you know and then we all busted out laughing and having fun man it was like dude I swear man i was getting emotional because I miss it i miss it then I went we break out we do offensive team meetings let me tell you what that’s how offensive team lead off coordinator gets up and remember now we’re on we’re we’re we’re in this era even me I’m going to sneak pics as I’m studying and reading looking at things we’re in this era we’re in this era what is up speech foreign speech foreign [Music] speech fore foreign foreign foreign speech foreign speech wait wait what o yellow i got You know my It’s okay

Michael Irvin on Cowboys OTAs: Schottenheimer is molding identity of “competition under pressure” every d