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What about Cliff Harris?
4:35 PM Tue, Feb 03, 2009 | Permalink | Yahoo! Buzz
Tim MacMahon E-mail News tips
ESPN.com's Matt Mosley wants to make sure Captain Crash doesn't get left out of the conversation about Landry era Cowboys who ought to get serious Hall of Fame consideration.
In an effort to educate the youngsters and entertain the old-timers, I dug into the DMN archives to find a Kevin Sherrington column from a couple years ago about Harris, an All-'70s safety. Follow the jump and enjoy.
The Cowboys never got a better bang for their buck than Cliff Harris.
And bang is probably the word for Captain Crash.
Only six Cowboys - Bob Lilly, Larry Allen, Mel Renfro, Randy White, Emmitt Smith and Troy Aikman - played in more Pro Bowls than Harris' six.
All six of the players in front of Harris were first- or second-round draft picks.
Harris? The Cowboys didn't draft him at all. Neither did anyone else.
Twenty-six teams. Seventeen rounds.
Four hundred forty-two players.
On one hand, Harris remembered thinking he'd played so well that he was sure he'd be drafted, especially after Gil Brandt told him they planned on taking him sometime in the first six rounds.
On the other, he didn't realize how infinitesimal the chances were for a skinny safety out of Arkansas' tiny Ouachita Baptist.
Ouachita - WASH-i-tah, is how you say it - was still an NAIA school in Arkadelphia, Ark., not far from where he grew up, when Harris played cornerback and safety there in the late '60s.
Fast and fearless even then, he knocked out receivers just as regularly as he would in the NFL.
Only a handful of teams noticed, though. Brandt was drawn to game film of Harris returning punts for touchdowns. He called Harris and told him their plan.
So the first day of the 1970 draft, Harris holed up in his dorm room with a couple of friends and waited.
And waited.
And waited.
The draft wasn't the overdone extravaganza it is now. No TV or radio coverage.
Occasionally, Harris' phone would ring. Each time it was a friend wanting to know if the Cowboys had called.
The first day came and went. Second day, too.
No phone call.
The Cowboys took Duane Thomas in the first and Charlie Waters and Steve Kiner in the third and John Fitzgerald in the fourth and Pat Toomay in the sixth.
If the Cowboys could hit on that many players now, they wouldn't be a decade waiting on a playoff win.
But Harris wasn't on the list. Disappointed and discouraged, maybe even a little embarrassed, he wasn't too agreeable when the phone rang around midnight.
It was Brandt. The scouting guru wanted to send someone over with a free agent contract.
"Look," Harris told him, according to his book, Captain Crash and the Dallas Cowboys, "don't send anyone here. I'm not going to sign."
The next morning, Harris talked it over with his coach, Buddy Bob Benson, who told him the Cowboys had shown more interest than anyone else. His advice was to reconsider.
Brandt called again a few hours later. Harris took the offer. Not that it seemed promising.
The Cowboys' equipment manager gave him the No. 43. Harris told him someone else was already wearing the number.
"You're not going to make the team anyway, rookie," the equipment manager said.
Harris not only made the team, he was in the starting lineup. Over the next 10 seasons, he would play in five Super Bowls. He was also named to the '70s all-decade team, named a finalist for the Pro Football Hall of Fame and inducted into the Cowboys Ring of Honor.
Not bad for an undrafted kid out of Arkadelphia.
"Throughout my life," Harris said, "it seemed like I was always behind and trying to catch up. I was accustomed to being the kid they didn't count on.
"I just figured, 'Here we go again.'"
He couldn't imagine the same turn of events now. Neither could Brandt.
Not with scouts combing every campus and parents sending DVDs to coaches, as Harris did with his own sons.
Cliff Harris' David-and-Goliath story? Only Everson Walls comes close in Cowboys history.
"And he didn't go to Ouachita Baptist, either," Harris said.
4:35 PM Tue, Feb 03, 2009 | Permalink | Yahoo! Buzz
Tim MacMahon E-mail News tips
ESPN.com's Matt Mosley wants to make sure Captain Crash doesn't get left out of the conversation about Landry era Cowboys who ought to get serious Hall of Fame consideration.
In an effort to educate the youngsters and entertain the old-timers, I dug into the DMN archives to find a Kevin Sherrington column from a couple years ago about Harris, an All-'70s safety. Follow the jump and enjoy.
The Cowboys never got a better bang for their buck than Cliff Harris.
And bang is probably the word for Captain Crash.
Only six Cowboys - Bob Lilly, Larry Allen, Mel Renfro, Randy White, Emmitt Smith and Troy Aikman - played in more Pro Bowls than Harris' six.
All six of the players in front of Harris were first- or second-round draft picks.
Harris? The Cowboys didn't draft him at all. Neither did anyone else.
Twenty-six teams. Seventeen rounds.
Four hundred forty-two players.
On one hand, Harris remembered thinking he'd played so well that he was sure he'd be drafted, especially after Gil Brandt told him they planned on taking him sometime in the first six rounds.
On the other, he didn't realize how infinitesimal the chances were for a skinny safety out of Arkansas' tiny Ouachita Baptist.
Ouachita - WASH-i-tah, is how you say it - was still an NAIA school in Arkadelphia, Ark., not far from where he grew up, when Harris played cornerback and safety there in the late '60s.
Fast and fearless even then, he knocked out receivers just as regularly as he would in the NFL.
Only a handful of teams noticed, though. Brandt was drawn to game film of Harris returning punts for touchdowns. He called Harris and told him their plan.
So the first day of the 1970 draft, Harris holed up in his dorm room with a couple of friends and waited.
And waited.
And waited.
The draft wasn't the overdone extravaganza it is now. No TV or radio coverage.
Occasionally, Harris' phone would ring. Each time it was a friend wanting to know if the Cowboys had called.
The first day came and went. Second day, too.
No phone call.
The Cowboys took Duane Thomas in the first and Charlie Waters and Steve Kiner in the third and John Fitzgerald in the fourth and Pat Toomay in the sixth.
If the Cowboys could hit on that many players now, they wouldn't be a decade waiting on a playoff win.
But Harris wasn't on the list. Disappointed and discouraged, maybe even a little embarrassed, he wasn't too agreeable when the phone rang around midnight.
It was Brandt. The scouting guru wanted to send someone over with a free agent contract.
"Look," Harris told him, according to his book, Captain Crash and the Dallas Cowboys, "don't send anyone here. I'm not going to sign."
The next morning, Harris talked it over with his coach, Buddy Bob Benson, who told him the Cowboys had shown more interest than anyone else. His advice was to reconsider.
Brandt called again a few hours later. Harris took the offer. Not that it seemed promising.
The Cowboys' equipment manager gave him the No. 43. Harris told him someone else was already wearing the number.
"You're not going to make the team anyway, rookie," the equipment manager said.
Harris not only made the team, he was in the starting lineup. Over the next 10 seasons, he would play in five Super Bowls. He was also named to the '70s all-decade team, named a finalist for the Pro Football Hall of Fame and inducted into the Cowboys Ring of Honor.
Not bad for an undrafted kid out of Arkadelphia.
"Throughout my life," Harris said, "it seemed like I was always behind and trying to catch up. I was accustomed to being the kid they didn't count on.
"I just figured, 'Here we go again.'"
He couldn't imagine the same turn of events now. Neither could Brandt.
Not with scouts combing every campus and parents sending DVDs to coaches, as Harris did with his own sons.
Cliff Harris' David-and-Goliath story? Only Everson Walls comes close in Cowboys history.
"And he didn't go to Ouachita Baptist, either," Harris said.
