Mandatory Photo Credit: © Tim Heitman-USA TODAY Sports © Eric Hartline-USA TODAY Sports
DALLAS — The Dallas Cowboys are used to being in the spot light. But that’s not necessarily a good thing. Just ask Dalton Schultz.
The tight end, is fresh off his new three-year, $36 million extension, with the Houston Texans. Schultz played five years in Dallas before signing a one-year contract with the Texans last year, and he said on the Pat McAfee Show that there’s an enormous difference between the two teams.
“The focus is just football, you know what I mean?” Schultz said during “The Pat McAfee Show” on Wednesday. “I’m going back and telling some people about being around the Cowboys practice facility and game day and describing some of the interactions and stuff that you see on a day-to-day basis and it surprises a lot of people. They’re like, ‘Holy crap. That actually happens at a practice facility?’ You think it’s normal, and then you come to a place like this.”
Schultz said that while the Texans get to do their work uninterrupted, the Cowboys give tours of their team facility while the players are practing.
“(Dallas is) literally a zoo, dude. There’s people tapping on the glass trying to get people’s attention while they’re doing power cleans or whatever. It’s different. That’s the brand that they’ve built, that’s what [owner] Jerry Jones likes, that’s the way that they run things and there’s nothing wrong with that. You don’t realize how many eyeballs and how much that can maybe distract in the locker room, just being in the facility until you go somewhere else and you’re like, ‘Holy crap, there’s none of that.’”
While the Texans have had their own culture issues in the past, it seems that coach DeMeco Ryans — who was hired last January — has established a different type of program.
“This place is a well-oiled machine,” Schultz said. “The coaching staff — the coaching changes, I can’t speak to the previous stuff — but the strength staff is phenomenal, the training staff is unbelievable. This has been the most trainers that I’ve ever seen on a staff and they take really amazing care of the players. The nutrition staff is phenomenal.”
Playing for big-market teams is not for everyone. Earlier this offseason, both Jerry and Stephen Jones insisted that the Cowboys do not have a “culture” problem; but if a former player is comparing your facilities to a “zoo” – that raises a red flag. But as Schultz said, Jerry likes the way things work and likes that the Cowboys are the center of attention. Mission accomplished, right?
The tight end tallied 59 catches for 635 yards and five touchdowns this past season, and the Texans liked what they saw enough to keep him around for another three years.
