As the media began to file out of the Dallas Cowboys locker room today, an uproar came from the middle of the room. Inaudible at first, several players began taunting Steve Dennis, the CBS 11 reporter who on Monday grilled Wade Phillips on the issue of calling the Cowboys 'winners'. Dennis was not confronted by any one player, nor was he approached with any real malice.
But the message was clear: Don't mess with Wade.
It has been a recurring theme since Monday, defending Phillips, one that continued before practice today. On Tuesday, Keith Brooking, who co-hosts a show on TX-21 with Dennis, took exception to his colleague's line of questioning in the press conference Monday, asking, “Is he supposed to call us losers?”
“I’ll go to fight for that man until I hang my cleats up and I’m done playing football, because I have the utmost respect for him," said Brooking, who played for Phillips in Atlanta before coming to Dallas in the off-season. "Everything I’ve seen from my teammates and everything I’ve heard, they feel the same way, bottom line.”
On Wednesday, players continued their defense of the much beleaguered head coach.
"[Phillips] is an accountable guy, a stand-up guy," said Roy Williams. "I'd love to play for him anywhere, anytime, any place."
Igor Olshansky, who played under Phillips in San Diego from 2004-2006, echoed this sentiment.
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"He's a great person and an accountable human being and he expects us to be accountable, he expects us to be professionals," Olshansky said on Wednesday. "This has to be, next to God and family, this has to be the most important thing in your life and you've got to attack it as [such]."
