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Pretty good (long) read.....Skips gets interviewed about his media career and then gets in depth about the books he wrote covering the Dallas Cowboys.
Some of this has come out before, but it was interesting to read again. I bolded/underlined the key parts for the dudes who dont wanna read...
Some of this has come out before, but it was interesting to read again. I bolded/underlined the key parts for the dudes who dont wanna read...
Skip: Six months later, I realized this guy Jimmy Johnson was something. I had never encountered a force quite like him. He was a coaching force of nature created a force field around what had become a sleepy facility out there in Valley Ranch that was so irreverent, yet so effective, that I started to realize right away that good stuff was about to happen.
As you remember, they went 1-15 the first year but you could just see it coming. He was gonna clean house completely and run Everson Walls outta town-which he did right away-and start fresh.
Once they got Michael Irvin healthy-he wrecked his knee in the first year-and they drafted Emmit Smith in the second year, it just started to pop.
A year and a half passed and my publisher asked if I was sure there wasn't another book here-the Jerry Jimmy Cowboys?
I told them I didn't know. We went back and forth and finally signed a deal to do a second book preseason 1992 and it was going to be a season inside this crazy new Cowboy outfit. The publisher didn't really care if they went 8-8 or 9-7 or missed the playoffs or whatever happened.
Lo and behold, they shocked everyone and themselves by winning the Super Bowl. I washttp://thestartingfive.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/who-looks-happy-here.jpg collecting my information all along that trail the entire way and wound up with a Super Bowl in my lap. That was even a tighter deadline. That was a 2 month write. It became a look into the new dynasty in the NFL.
The crux of that book-which was highly controversial-was and this was completely unreported in Dallas, was the growing clash between the "best friends" Jimmy and Jerry. No one had touched that. I was able, because i took the time to do it by hanging around Valley Ranch, to see it in action. It was really escalating by the end of the year to the point that one of the people who worked under them predicted to me that they won't make it another year. That was the end of my book,[/i] "This would be short lived. Enjoy it while it lasts."
I just got barbecued in Dallas, Texas for writing that. None of my colleagues knew anything about it. Every talk show was saying this was a fabrication and never happened. It was an exaggeration. It was knock down, knock down, knock down. I took a terrible beating over that book. Even Jimmy was upset about things in the book. He went off on me. He went after me after practice and told me I would not be allowed on the practice field again.
To Jerry's credit, when I went to training camp, the first day it opened next year in Austin, Texas, Jerry walked right over to me and told me he believed every word that I wrote. That I nailed it all and that I was allowed around his football team any time I wanted to be around his football team. He said "I am the boss and I will remain the boss."
It took a year and that was a rough ride for me, because you know they won a second Super Bowl.
Shortly after that victory over Buffalo, Jerry Jones in a fit of rage at the owner's meeting in Orlando fired Jimmy Johnson. As soon as that news hit in Dallas, I was finally vindicated because it was the shock of all shocks. That was the most shocking story I've been apart of in sports and that hit Dallas, Texas. It was just unfathomable the owner fired the coach that was poised to win a third straight Super Bowl-an unprecedented third straight Super Bowl.
It made complete sense to me and I can't believe they made it as long as they did.
To complete the trilogy for you, I did the book, said that's it, I'm out and the next book will be on pro basketball. I almost did a NBA book in this period with Simon and Schuster. I just couldn't figure out if I was going to have much time to do what they wanted me to do and still write my damn column.
That being said, what does Jerry Jones do? He turns right around and hires Barry Switzer? From the University of Oklahoma to the Dallas Cowboys?
Mizzo: Something else big falling into your lap huh?
Skip: Yes! Oh my God! I had grown up and Oklahoma Sooner and I knew Coach Switzer a little. Not a lot, but a little. I had some dealings with him. I was intrigued by him. He had been deposed in '89 at Oklahoma for what he called the "rapin', dopin' shootin' at my dormitory."
They had gone straight outlaw there.
Mizzo: Charles Thompson?
Skip: Charles Thompson was selling drugs out of the jock dorm on campus. He was selling cocaine and got busted.
It became a disaster, but I did think he was a really good college football coach-if you could tolerate his morals or not. He was a wild man. Foremost, I knew he would be great copy and the prospect of Barry Switzer taking Jimmy Johnson's team that was poised to win several Super Bowls was just too good.
Right away, Barry comes in and I reconnect with him. He liked me and he was very open with me. Then a shock-not on the scale of Jimmy Johnson being fired-that a quarterback he recruited to the University of Oklahoma wasn't digging the way Barry coached the team he basically ran. Troy (Aikman) and Jimmy clashed early, but they had become very close and Troy was cut out of the Jimmy mold in that both of them were perfectionists…driven and extremely dedicated to severe practices. Hard, punctual and demanding practices.
http://thestartingfive.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/barry-switzer.jpg
Here comes good ole' Barry in the door and he's like "What the hell? We have practice at three and if you guys want to show up at 3:15…what the hell."
Troy started going crazy right away in the first camp. He did not like it and began to voice to his boys in the media that this was not going to work.
It began a little feud between them that began to brew prior to that year that was under the surface. That year…and you might remember…they ended up in San Francisco and frankly, thanks to Troy's horrendous start, they fell behind 21-0 in the NFC Championship game. Then Troy and Michael began to battle back and they ended up losing…
Mizzo: 38-28.
Skip: Yep. They shouldn't have. They were just better. Emmit was hurt that game. He had a pulled hamstring, tried to go but wasn't effective.
That opened the floodgates of emotion. We went into the next camp and it became open warfare between Barry and Troy.
In those days, I called my agent and said you aren't going to believe this but I am sitting on one of the most incredible soap opera stories that you could ever imagine. The coach and the quarterback are getting to the point where they don't even speak to each other. My agent asked me if I wanted to shop this and if anybody would buy it and I didn't know. I said it's incredible. It's better than God's Coach or The Boys. She said that we should try.
I did another proposal and she had like seven or eight publishers interested in it. Auctioned it off and it ended up with Harper Collins. It was gonna be another season inside another extremely talented, extremely troubled football team. If I could have written my proposal after the year, my proposal would have been ten times richer and stronger than it was before the year because it became better than fiction what happened as the season unfolded.
Again, open warfare between Aikman and Switzer. I was close to Barry and also his daughter, Kathy-who basically lived with him. She was a close friend of mine, so I was privy to a lot of things most people weren't privy to.
The first thing that came up was that Norv Turner had left to go coach the ********. Troy loved Norv Turner because he was his quarterback coach the first Super Bowl go around. They were like big brother, little brother. Barry became convinced that Troy wanted to get Barry fired and Norv hired in Dallas.
I believe there was a lot of truth to that. Barry claimed-and I know this seems out there, but the facts are the facts-that Troy played less than his best in both Washington games. You know how that rivalry is. The 'Skins weren't that good and beat the eventual Super Bowl Champions in both games-including the one in Texas Stadium. It wasn't as Switzer described it as "throwing the games", he just thought Troy's heart wasn't in those games in part because he just wanted to get Norv Turner back and the quickest way to get the Cowboy coach fired was to lose to the rival, ********.
In the second ******** game on December the 3rd, 1995, at Texas Stadium, an incident occurred during the game in which Kevin Williams-the little wide out from (University of) Miami-ran a wrong route according to Troy. It was a route that during practice that week, Kevin Williams and Michael Irvin and the other receivers were cutting up and goofing around. They weren't running with any discipline and because of that inattention to detail in practice, Kevin Williams ran a wrong route on a 3rd and 8 play in this home loss to the ******** that caused a misfire and an incompletion.
When they came to the sidelines and according to numerous people within earshot, Troy Aikman calls Kevin Williams a n word out of rage.
Well as you well know, this would just not fly on the sideline of a pro football game or anyhttp://thestartingfive.net/wp-conte...went-3-8-as-oklahomas-head-coach-in-1996.jpeg locker room. It was just not allowed. Sorry, you cannot cross that line. One of the assistant coaches, John Blake, who is now recruiting for the University of North Carolina and had another sensational recruiting class, was apparently Switzer's right hand guy at Oklahoma and became the head coach at Oklahoma. John Blake told me that he heard it and was just outraged over it. He was stunned by it. It spread very quickly through the Black players on the team. Switzer was closer to the Black athlete than he was the White athlete for the most part. Switzer had a deep heart for the plight of the Black athlete. He was not going to accept the n word from his quarterback in anger in some sideline fit. The secretary called Troy that night and told him to be in Barry's office at 9 in the morning. Troy came in thinking Barry was gonna give him a pat on the back and of course Barry laid down the law and told Troy either he was going to apologize to the rest of the team when they came in today at 1:00 pm or he was going to have to apologize for Troy.
Troy was so angered by that ultimatum that he just (according to Troy) launched right out of that office and the two of them refused to speak to each other from December 4th all the way to the Super Bowl that they won in spite of each other.
This lead to incredible mudslinging back and forth and I'm sure you know about this and it became the flash part of the book but shouldn't have been. It was just another wanna be incredible incidents between the two but, the Troy Aikman gay rumors had been in Dallas for several years. I did talk radio in Dallas and I would get at least one call a week from someone asking if Troy Aikman is gay. I would hear about the various incidents and would not pay too much attention to them until Switzer asked me at one point if it was true. I told him I didn't know. His quote was, "You know this is incredible. I gotta take all this s___ off this kid and he's ++*!*!"
He challenged some of the other reporters also telling them to tell the truth about Troy and saying he's a hypocrite. He was saying here he is doing all these commercials for Brut cologne and Acme Brick in Dallas…these sorta macho adds…and he is not what he appears to be.
It went all the way to the period where I was writing the book and Barry called me one day at home and asked me what's going on. He said he heard I was having trouble with Aikman-which I certainly did because I was trying to write the book. Troy would call me at home saying I can't write this and I can't write that. It really wasn't about the gay stuff. It was about the n word and game throwing. Barry would say he's just afraid you are gonna write the gay stuff. I told Barry I had no idea and nor do I care if he's gay or not. It definitely became part of the clash and mudslinging between the two of them.
Again, Barry just went off on this tirade saying many security people have told him about this incident and this and this and this.
So I just wrote it became the clash between the two. My only regret about the book is that it does not say that Aikman is gay. I had no idea and nor do I care to this day.
A number of the Black players-with whom I was close-contended that he was bisexual.
They didn't like him to start with because he was distant, knee jerk emotional, quick tempered. His friends on the team loved him for one reason and that was because he could play. When it was time to play, he performed.
Deep down…trust me…the stars on that team…the Black players…and you know who they are…they didn't like the guy (Aikman).
I wrote, [/i], and it's the best read of each of my three books. Maybe not the best writing-once again extreme deadline.
I also knew I had to go back and live with them because I had no plans on leaving Dallas. I wish I could have written it even harder than I did because I felt like I tip toed through some of it.
I wish I had sledgehammered it because it was the truth and everyone who knew what was going on inside the locker room told me the book was a terrific job and that I nailed it.
Because I did. It's exactly what happened. All I heard from people around the country who didn't read the book was, "You outed Troy Aikman?"
I didn't. The coach definitely thought he was gay and a lot of his teammates thought he was gay. More than that, they thought he was racist and they thought he was trying to get Barry Switzer.
I basically think he did get Barry Switzer before it was over.
So those are the tales of my books.
Full interview here:
http://thestartingfive.net/2009/02/...lorful-conscious-and-of-course-controversial/
at Troy Aikman...
