OXNARD, Calif. — After a feisty Dallas Cowboys apply earlier this week, coaches wanted to speak to the “A-No. 1 violator” of their apply ethic.
That violator wasn’t the participant whom a lot of the web may guess.
Linebacker Micah Parsons hitting quarterback Dak Prescott? That was a difficulty of self-discipline.
Cornerback Trevon Diggs playfully lobbing expletives at Prescott after a team-drill snap Tuesday? That, in response to gamers and head coach Mike McCarthy, was simply the mixture of aggressive ardour and wholesome brotherhood.
“To me, that exhibits you the eagerness throughout the apply and the comfortability and the connection that guys have throughout the ball,” Prescott stated Thursday after apply. “Me and Diggs simply bought finished trash-talking once more, in a way. So it is enjoyable. One of the best groups I’ve been part of have that and have that in a wholesome method.”
[Join or create a Yahoo Fantasy Football league for free today]
Diggs’ chirping wasn’t out of the peculiar even when using phrases so near cameras caught some followers and media off guard. Since offseason practices of the 2020 second-rounder’s rookie 12 months, Diggs and Prescott have challenged one another within the passing recreation and ribbed one another accordingly. Throughout a 2021 coaching camp apply, Diggs intercepted Prescott on the primary play of 7-on-7. Prescott guess the younger nook $1,000 he’d rebound then accomplished a move to Diggs’ task the subsequent snap.
Diggs went on to energy an 11-interception All-Professional marketing campaign that season. Prescott equally threw for 4,449 yards and 37 touchdowns to 10 interceptions because the Cowboys gained the NFC East.
After a league-worst 15 interceptions in 2022, Prescott has spent this offseason dialed in additional on his mechanics, together with timing his footwork with receivers’ routes extra exactly. Practising in opposition to the reigning fifth-toughest scoring protection ought to solely make Prescott and his teammates higher, they determine. And if trash-talking additional lights the aggressive hearth? Deliver it on.
“I’d actually speak essentially the most (trash) and I deliver it on, actually, with regards to that,” Prescott stated. “I begin it, often within the locker room earlier than apply. So when it’s thrown at me at apply, I anticipate it.”
Prescott dismissed the notion {that a} quarterback ought to be handled as extra sacred than trash-talking, the eighth-year professional preferring to be amongst teammates reasonably than above them.
“That’s a type of my management is I open the door and make individuals comfy to speak trash to me,” Prescott stated. “I’m encouraging these guys and I do know a few of these guys want that to play their greatest (so) I spark it generally.”
Diggs, for his half, stated Thursday that he has “the utmost respect for Dak,” calling Prescott his brother whereas including “I like Dak to loss of life.” The cornerback whom the Cowboys awarded a five-year, $97 million extension at camp’s begin stated the artistic emotion “makes apply enjoyable.” His message to these deciphering the alternate as disrespectful?
“Get out of our enterprise,” Diggs stated. “On the finish of the day, it’s our workforce. Dak’s the chief of our workforce. He’s going to go on the market and have a terrific 12 months. I’ve the utmost respect for Dak. No matter narrative individuals wish to run with, that’s simply what it’s. However we all know and we all know how we’re and we all know it’s nothing.
“That stuff can by no means come between us.”
McCarthy, who likes to say his Pittsburgh upbringing taught him battle is nice, stated trash-talking has been a staple of NFL practices since he entered the league within the Nineteen Nineties. The material of a aggressive tradition breeds this. The Cowboys don’t wish to stifle that vitality.
“You need the aggressive spirit,” McCarthy stated. “You need the play fashion to be a sure degree. Now you’re going to say, ‘Oh, he stated a few unhealthy phrases’?’ S***, I would like as a lot of that as doable. I believe it exhibits their connection after they go at one another.
“I don’t referee that. (Trash-talking) goes on within the lunch line.
“Dak is fairly good, too.”
