Marked Man
One night after a Cowboys playoff game in Detroit, I hitched a ride home on the team's charter flight. Some editors frowned on this because it was a subtle way for a team to buy a columnist's objectivity by providing free airfare. But as any player or coach from the Jerry Jones era will tell you, my objectivity was not for sale.
I just wanted to get home faster.
And in this case, I was risking my life. Oh, the plane was as safe as planes can be. But I sat in the front of a coach section filled to the back with angry football players drinking alcohol. That's a dangerous mix.
The Lions had just taught Jimmy Johnson's young Cowboys a 38-6 lesson, and the silence behind me was deafening.
But about halfway through the flight, a player commandeered the PA system and said, "Skip Bayless, you are wanted at the back of the plane."
Media members seated around me gave me "uh oh" glances. One of them said, "Just ignore it." No, I said, I can't back down.
I inhaled and exhaled deeply and started walking up the aisle as if I could whip anyone on the plane. I was scared to death.
Waiting for me by the lavatory door was the scariest man on that team, left tackle Mark Tuinei (who's since passed away). Left guard Nate Newton, who weighed about 350 pounds, had told me Tuinei was the one Cowboy he couldn't beat in a fight to the death. And now Tuinei was literally breathing fire on me -- I could smell the alcohol on his breath as he positioned me against the bathroom door.
"Why have you been so hard on Troy?" Tuinei asked.
Scary things can happen when you pick on Troy Aikman.
Ah, now I got it. Tuinei in effect was serving as quarterback Troy Aikman's bodyguard.
Aikman's sprained knee had given backup Steve Beuerlein a chance to play, and the team had taken off. Not only had the Cowboys stunned the Eagles in Philadelphia to make the playoffs, but in the first round they had knocked off Mike Ditka's Bears at Soldier Field.
I knew Johnson still wasn't sold on Aikman, and the team obviously had responded to Beuerlein's moxie and leadership. As Jones would say after the Cowboys broke through the following season and won the Super Bowl with Aikman: "Jimmy was as surprised as anyone about Troy's success."
But Beuerlein had struggled that day in Detroit, and Aikman hadn't been much better in relief. Still, Aikman obviously was steamed that I had led the cheers for Beuerlein, and now Aikman eased up behind Tuinei to listen to the interrogation.
I calmly tried to explain to "Too-ey," as he was called, why I had written nice things about Beuerlein. But Tuinei wasn't interested in polite logic. He obviously just wanted to intimidate me, or worse.
He began to shove me against the bathroom door with explosive little open-handed shots to the shoulders, as if he were pass blocking a defensive end. I wasn't hurt, just a little shook up. But I was too scared to be scared, if that makes sense.
Now several other players gathered in the aisle to watch the show -- or maybe they just needed to use the bathroom and were afraid to ask Tuinei's permission. Even if one of them had thought Tuinei was going too far, I doubted that any player would have the guts to say so.
This time I didn't raise my voice or get angry. I wasn't afraid of Frank Thomas, but this was a whole new ball game.
Through a maniacal grin, Tuinei said: "How would you like it [shove] if somebody [shove] wrote bad stuff about you [shove]?"
Suddenly, the players in the aisle parted and Jimmy Johnson came rolling through like Emmitt Smith on third and short.
"What are you doing back here?" he asked me with a knowing smile.
I just shrugged.
"I think you need to get back to your seat," he said. "Same for all the rest of you."
Fortunately for me, there was one man who scared Mark Tuinei.
