Dallas Cowboys honor late strength coach Markus Paul on anniversary of his death
There are daily remembrances of the late Dallas Cowboys strength coach Markus Paul at the team’s headquarters at The Star in Frisco.
New strength coach Harold Nash begins a stretching exercises by saying “let’s do some these,” the way Paul would uniquely describe a warm-up arm movement that has no name.
Nash has a photo in his office of his long-time friend who he followed to Dallas a year ago to work on his staff.
Coach Mike Mike McCarthy says not a day goes by that Paul’s name is not mentioned.
Nothing, however, will erase the indelible impact Paul made on the Cowboys through his heartwarming and fatherly coaching style which made his shocking death in the weight room of a massive heart attack one year ago today even more tragic and unforgettable.
It was the beginning of one of the toughest and most unimaginable weeks in what already was one of the strangest and roughest seasons in Cowboys history due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the loss of quarterback Dak Prescott to a fractured ankle.
The disappointment of the 6-10 finish in Mike McCarthy’s first year couldn’t come close to devastation of that week when the 54-year-old Paul collapsed in the weight room that Tuesday morning. Paul was officially declared dead on Wednesday and the Cowboys played a game on Thanksgiving against the Washington Football Team that Thursday.
His funeral was the following Thursday, eight days after he had passed.
The Cowboys are again the midst of their annual short week in preparation for Thursday’s Thanksgiving Day game against the Las Vegas Raiders, just four days after Sunday’s 19-9 loss to the Kansas City Chiefs.
McCarthy, however, used the meetings Tuesday morning on the official one-year anniversary of his death to celebrate Paul’s legacy.
The coach said it was a reminder for older players and an introduction to the new players who weren’t on the team last year to know who Paul was and what he meant.
“The first thing when you talk about Markus Paul, you talk about his faith, you talk about his family and you talk about his fatherly presence that he had to the players,” McCarthy said. “I think that’s really a big part of our message just when you want to celebrate somebody and he’s part of the building blocks of our culture. It was more about the person and he exemplified that to the highest level so and we just want to make sure our team particularly our locker room has an understanding that he’s part of the foundation of what we’ve got going on here.”
Paul’s death would have been heartbreaking no matter the circumstances but the tragic way it occurred remains surreal to all at the Cowboys headquarters.
McCarthy walked in the building with him that morning at little after 6 a.m. They checked in to do COVID-19 testing together and then Paul went back to his truck because he forgot his phone. He collapsed shortly after 7 a.m.
McCarthy said it was on the most difficult days he has ever gone through.
Nash expressed similar sentiment. He saw Paul at the coffee machine and then went to the coaches’ office to change his shoes and get something to eat.
“I walked into the weight room and [assistant strength coach] Kendall Smith flagged me and said Markus just passed out,” Nash said. “The trainers were already there. You wanted to be optimistic, but hope was futile. He was not supposed to look like this. We just went to the hospital and prayed.”
Said McCarthy: “I think the biggest thing is you go from Tuesday to Thursday, it wasn’t about the game. Everything involved with Markus was so much bigger than the game and particularly the day of the game, Thanksgiving, the emotions that were wrapped into that. It’s an experience that will always be with me, and I hope that I don’t have to draw from that experience again.”
As difficult as it was for the coaches, it was an even more trying situation for the players because of the type of person Paul was and the impact he had on their lives inside and outside the building. Emotions were running high that day and the memories are still fresh.
“It was real tough for us,” receiver Amari Cooper said. “A lot of guys were crying. We see each other a lot. We see each other more than we see our families throughout the season. So we grow a close relationship with the coaching staff and each other. We think about that. It was an unfortunate situation.”
It all makes doing “some of these” even more meaningful this week.
“Marcus was a special man to so many people, just the way he lived his life,” Prescott said. “So consistent, somebody that we all could look up to in every aspect of life. I think that’s something that is special that we continue to carry on his legacy in everything we do around here.”
This story was originally published November 23, 2021 at 4:14 PM.
