Michael Irvin Remembers ‘Snitching’ on Teammates Who Lacked Passion for Winning

Michael Irvin

Cowboys legend Michael Irvin had such an overwhelming desire to win, that it led him to dime out his teammates.

During an appearance on Undeniable with Joe Buck, the “Playmaker” revealed that his extreme distaste for losing led him to call coaches and tell them which players seemed okay with losing.

“I was nearly crying in the locker room after we would lose games and a lot of guys would come by and say, ‘Come on, man, you’re in the pros now. We don’t do that in the pros. Just make sure you pick up that check on Tuesday.’ I was blown away with this, man. I was like, ‘Man, this is the NFL?’ It was the hardest year for me, to get through that year with all that losing,” Irvin recalled.

Following that tumultuous 3-13 rookie season, the Cowboys hired Irvin’s college coach Jimmie Johnson. Irvin said he wasted no time in telling Johnson which players did not possess a passion for winning.

“When Jerry bought the team and we heard Jimmy was coming in, I went home and called Coach Johnson. And you know how, as brothers we have this thing, ‘I don’t snitch’? Man, I was snitching,” Irvin explained. “‘Hey, man, this dude’s gotta go. He’s gotta go. He’s not about winning.’ And it took Coach about the first few months, first year, but boy, he started getting rid of everybody. And we got people in like the people we had at Miami that wanted to win.”

And win they did.

Follow Dylan Gwinn on Twitter @themightygwinn

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