{"id":788952,"date":"2026-03-03T12:14:14","date_gmt":"2026-03-03T12:14:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/788952\/"},"modified":"2026-03-03T12:14:14","modified_gmt":"2026-03-03T12:14:14","slug":"donovan-mcnabb-these-are-the-3-best-leaders-i-played-with-in-the-nfl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/788952\/","title":{"rendered":"Donovan McNabb: These are the 3 best leaders I played with in the NFL"},"content":{"rendered":"

This story is part of Peak,\u00a0The Athletic\u2019s desk covering the mental side of sports. Sign up for Peak\u2019s newsletter\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Donovan McNabb played for three teams over 13 years in the NFL. These are the three best leaders he played with during his career.<\/p>\n

Brian Dawkins, safety, Philadelphia Eagles<\/p>\n

Brian was an emotional leader, an uplifting leader. He provided confidence. He understood what it took to get the most out of somebody and could push them to their limits.<\/p>\n

Brian and I were both weight-room guys. We would challenge each other and the guys who worked out with us to understand there was always more. Whatever you put on the bar, there was always more.<\/p>\n

On the field during conditioning, he was always telling guys: \u201cKeep your head up. You\u2019ve got more. Don\u2019t give up on me. Just because you may feel tired, you\u2019re not really tired.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brian didn\u2019t curse much. At all. But he was emotional in his speeches. He could get everyone on the same page and could get them to play with fire in their eyes. He liked to use the term: \u201cI\u2019m going to run through a wall, or somebody is going to pay.\u201d<\/p>\n

You understood he was going to throw his body on the line every time for his teammates. That was something he was very animated about: You had to rely on the guy next to you, and that meant you needed to do your job.<\/p>\n

Brian led by example. A lot of guys talked and barked, and sometimes you got tired hearing their voice because they weren\u2019t doing what they were supposed to do, or they weren\u2019t doing what they wanted you to do.<\/p>\n

Brian was a guy you trusted because he was reliable. You could see it with your eyes every day. You could see how he prepared. And you knew you had to be on that same level with your preparation because he was going to give his maximum effort.<\/p>\n

Troy Vincent, cornerback, Philadelphia Eagles<\/p>\n

Troy was unique because he always had a plan, and he prepared me for life after football while I was a young pup in Philadelphia.<\/p>\n

I began to gravitate towards him as a rookie because he always tried to prepare me for what was next. \u201cWhat\u2019s your plan after football? How are you going to go about it? What\u2019s your A? What\u2019s your B? What\u2019s your C?\u201d<\/p>\n

He taught me to always have a plan B and a plan C.<\/p>\n

He did the same thing with football. \u201cHow are you preparing? How are you watching film? Are you watching enough film? Do you know what they\u2019re going to do on first down? Second down?\u201d<\/p>\n

Every year, Troy talked to me to make sure I had a plan for after football. Troy had been in the game a while and had had success. But his leadership was more about: \u201cWhat\u2019s your life going to look like after football?\u201d<\/p>\n

It was just natural for him.<\/p>\n

Jared Allen, defensive end, Minnesota Vikings<\/p>\n

Jared is obviously a Hall of Famer, could get to the quarterback, is known for his sack dance \u2014 but Jared had a jokester in him.<\/p>\n

I came over to Minnesota in 2011. I was a 35-year-old quarterback, and I ran into him in the cafeteria, and we instantly clicked. We just started laughing and joking.<\/p>\n

We didn\u2019t have the best season that year, but Jared always gave all he had. He put in maximum effort in the weight room and on the field. When it came to competition, you knew Jared was going to give what he had \u2014 and was going to talk trash in the process.<\/p>\n

But he also always made light of every situation that we were in. I was always kind of the jokester in my career, throwing jokes at different players, coaches, whoever. Jared would just always throw a little something in there that would make you laugh.<\/p>\n

I respected that because a lot of guys, when they\u2019re older, can become a little standoffish. \u201cI made it. I\u2019m this. I\u2019m that. I don\u2019t have to do all of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jared believed in galvanizing the guys through laughter and by making the situation lighter than it was. He never put too much into anything negative that might have been going on. He hosted Bible study at his house. We were all serious during that. Jared said he had some snacks for us one time. I was thinking maybe steaks, maybe chicken, something like that. He had cookies. I was like: What are we, 12? We just laughed.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s how Jared was all the time.<\/p>\n

We could have lost or not had a great practice, but he would find a way to laugh and make a joke to try to uplift everybody. Meanwhile, he still worked extremely hard to try to turn things around. I always respected that.<\/p>\n

\u2014 As told to Jayson Jenks<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This story is part of Peak,\u00a0The Athletic\u2019s desk covering the mental side of sports. Sign up for Peak\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":788953,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2068],"tags":[25,7,259,6,4864,242,109,2476,156,111],"class_list":["post-788952","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia-eagles","tag-eagles","tag-football","tag-minnesota-vikings","tag-nfl","tag-peak","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-eagles","tag-philadelphiaeagles","tag-sports-business","tag-washington-commanders"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116165192166347385","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/788952","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=788952"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/788952\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/788953"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=788952"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=788952"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=788952"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}