Cowboys Corner

Campo unfazed by Cowboys' interest in Ray Horton

While assuring Dave Campo he would be on the Cowboys' 2011 coaching staff, Jason Garrett was pursuing Steelers secondary coach Ray Horton to take Campo's job. Campo was Horton's position coach with the Cowboys from 1989-92, so he and Horton already had a familiar relationship.

But Campo's duties with the Cowboys would have changed had Horton been hired.

"I knew Ray was somebody he [Garrett] was interested in," Campo said. "Of course, I love Ray. ...That wasn’t going to be an issue no matter what. Now, how it was going to be split up and what exactly what was going to happen we didn’t know. But we were going forward with everybody here. And I knew that from the very beginning."

Campo said he was the first coach Garrett talked to after Garrett was named the team's eighth head coach on Jan. 6. Campo was told he would have a place on the coaching staff, though it might something other than as the secondary coach.

"I think my record over the longevity speaks for itself," Campo said. "I wasn’t really concerned with whether or not I was going to be here. It was more of what exactly are you going to be doing and how are you going to do it to help us win."

As it turned out, the Cowboys were unable to lure Horton. Horton became the Cardinals defensive coordinator instead, leaving Campo in charge of the Cowboys' secondary with help from Brett Maxie, who works with the safeties.

Campo said he understands the nature of the business, and the Cowboys' secondary did not play well last season. They allowed 33 passing touchdowns and an average of 351.8 passing yards per game.

"What have you done for me lately?" Campo said. "We didn’t play well. We need to play better. That’s something I actually happy that Rob [Ryan] and Jason have enough confidence in me that it’s going to be better."

-- Charean Williams

Rob Ryan video: "You gotta come in here with the right frame of mind"

Tough-talking Rob Ryan held court at Valley Ranch on Thursday, and he's already making his unique presence felt.

-- Clarence E. Hill Jr.

Romo is looking good

Tony Romo's golf swing looks as good as old. His broken left collarbone is healed, and Romo has been throwing the football as well as hitting the driver.

"We’ve actually thrown a few times," Cowboys quarterbacks coach Wade Wilson said. "He’s come by here [Valley Ranch]. I know he threw with the caddies at Pebble Beach, and he’s thrown with his dad a little bit. But he’s come by here and we’ve thrown a few days when the weather was good. He’s throwing the ball with a lot of velocity, and I think he’s right where he wants to be at this juncture."

Romo was injured on a hit by Giants linebacker Michael Boley, after a missed block by Chris Gronkowski, in an Oct. 25 game. He did not play again, finishing with 1,605 passing yards, 11 touchdowns and seven interceptions. The Cowboys placed him on injured reserve before their game against Arizona on Christmas Day.

Wilson, a former NFL quarterback, said the time on the sideline might benefit Romo in the long run.

"When you take a step back, and it’s kind of taken away from you, some of that hunger and desire comes back," Wilson said. "There are things you can learn from watching, just from a different perspective."

-- Charean Williams

Teaching safeties the sense of smell

Alan Ball moved from cornerback to free safety last season, but he was not an impact player. Ball seemed tentative much of the season and he did not have the attribute that many great safeties possess – he wasn’t a ball hawk. Or in football lingo, he didn’t have “a nose for the ball.” Ball had only two interceptions the entire year.

The question is: Can a player be taught to be a ball hawk? Or is it simply an instinct that you have or don’t have. Apparently under new defensive coordinator Rob Ryan, we’re going to find out.

“The only way you can help a guy do that is to give him the latitude to go,” defensive backs coach Dave Campo said. “Tell him to go. One of the things I’ve been impressed with Rob is that on a blitz, he’ll say, “I don’t care what you do. Go. Go. Go. Blitz hard and fast. Go. I could give you the congruent angle, go over here and do this. Go.’ And that’s something that I think helps with the mentality of being able to do that.”

Can it make a difference with Ball? Campo believes it could, but also pointed out that, “You don’t teach Ed Reed to go steal balls. But if you’re teaching a technique and you’re saying if that guys does that, you do this. If that guy does this, you be Ed Reed. Go get the football. And that’s what I mean by freeing a guy up to say ‘go.’ I think it will help all of our guys.”

-- Jan Hubbard

 

Losing Julius Peppers doesn't hurt?

New defensive line coach Brian Baker has a challenge coaching a line that – except for Jay Ratliff – was only average during the season. But Baker has had bigger challenges. He was the defensive line coach in Carolina and last season, the Panthers had to play without Julius Peppers, who signed a huge free agent contract with the Bears.

But Baker handled the challenge quite well. Peppers is one of the top pass rushers in the league, but in his last season in Carolina, the Panthers had 31 sacks. The season after he left, they also had 31. Defensive end Charles Johnson, a fourth-year player out of Georgia, increased his sack total from four to 12 after Peppers left. Peppers had eight in Chicago.

“That was challenging,” Baker said. “The thing that was great about coaching Pepp obviously his skill level speaks for itself, but he was such a great person, such a great leader by example and doing those things. [After he leaves] you have to find that other guy in the room. We actually had a guy that had as many sacks as he did. From that standpoint, that was there, but just replacing his as a man was the hard part.”

-- jan Hubbard

 

Wade's son sticking around on merit

Assistant coach Wes Phillips had a strong tie-in with the previous administration – his dad was the head coach. But after interviewing several candidates for the position as assistant offensive line coach, the Cowboys settled on Phillips, who will work with line coach and running game coordinator Hudson Houck.

“There were other dynamics on our staff – whether we were going to go outside or bring Wes into coach with me,” Houck said. “Wes is very qualified. I think it was a good process because we touched base with good coaches that are in college right now primarily, whether they had NFL experience or not, that maybe in the future we can go and say how about this player or how about this player or can have those guys come in our organization sometime I the future. I think the process was outstanding. I’m very pleased with Wes because he’s so familiar with what I teach that I won’t have to teach him on what we’re going to do.

-- Jan Hubbard

 

Can Buehler regain confidence?

Although they never admitted it publicly, the Cowboys have to look back and figure they made a mistake not making David Buehler win the kicking job in training camp. Although they had one other kicker in camp briefly, there was no question they were committed to Buehler, who became the Cowboys’ version of Wild Thing – the Charlie Sheen character.

Buehler could kick it far, but not always straight. He ended the year tied for 27^th in the NFL in field goal percentage at .750. And of the top 31 kickers in the league, Buehler was the only one to miss two extra points. Twenty-seven of those 31 kickers were perfect in extra points.

The Cowboys brought in veteran Kris Brown before the last regular season game to compete with Buehler in training camp. Kicking coach Chris Boniol said Buehler did not lose confidence during the year, but he does have his work cut out for him.

“I don’t know if it’s a matter of losing confidence,” Boniol said. “I think there is an awareness of nothing’s every guaranteed to anyone, and so he knows he’s going to have to battle. Going to have to work hard and just compete for his job.”

-- Jan Hubbard

 

Campo still believes in Jenkins

The Cowboys likely will consider a cornerback with the ninth overall pick, despite having two former first-round picks as their starters. Terence Newman and Mike Jenkins didn't have their best seasons. Newman, according to STATS, Inc., gave up the sixth-most yards and tied for giving up the 10th-most catches, allowing 58 receptions for 871 yards and three touchdowns. Jenkins allowed the second-most yards and tied for allowing the 14th-most catches, with 54 receptions for 935 yards and five touchdowns.

Both were Pro Bowlers in 2009.

Jenkins, who was in only his third season in 2010, looked like he was ready to become one of the NFL's elite cornerbacks with the way he played in his second season. But he regressed last season. Still, cornerbacks coach Dave Campo hasn't given up on Jenkins, saying Jenkins just needs to regain his confidence.

"I think he hit a bump in the road," Campo said. "I really think it's a bump in the road. I don't think he has to climb over the mountain. I think he has to come back with a resolve that he's going to start out a little quicker. This scheme is going to force him to do that in some ways, because it's a little bit more knowing what everybody else is doing, not only yourself. I think that forces everybody to be more focused on everything that's going on. I think that's an advantage of a change. And so, for him, I think he made strides during the season to come back off a slow start, and I think he played better at the end."

LSU cornerback Patrick Peterson, the draft's top-rated cornerback, is expected to be gone by the time the Cowboys draft. But Nebraska's Prince Amukamara could be there.

-- Charean Williams

Cowboys' new strength coach lost out to Deion in first go-round

The return of Mike Woicik as Cowboys strength coach might be Jason Garrett's attempt to build a bridge to the team intensity the Cowboys had in their Super Bowl days. Or Garrett might be trying to right a wrong.

Wocik was with the Cowboys in the 1990-96 seasons. His firing was thought to be over an incident in which Wocik had a sideline confrontation with Barry Switzer over having Chris Boniol kick a seventh field goal against the Green Bay Packers in a 1996 game that the Cowboys already had won.

But in a 2000 column by the Star-Telegram's Randy Galloway, former Cowboys fullback Daryl Johnston said Woicik was fired mainly over the issue of whether Deion Sanders should be fined for missing conditioning work. Johnston said that Sanders' arrival in 1995 led to the erosion of the Cowboys locker room.

Colts owner won't be like Jerry Jones

The Indianapolis Colts can do in 2012 — providing there is a 2011 season — what the 2010 Dallas Cowboys couldn't: be the first team to reach a Super Bowl in its own stadium.

Colts owner Jim Irsay isn't going to pull a Jerry Jones and talk about it, however.

"Honestly, I don't even think about that," Irsay told the Indianapolis Star. "I'm focused on doing whatever it takes that gives us the best shot to win this year. It's not like all of a sudden we're going to try harder this year because we have the Super Bowl. The intensity to win every year is the same and it doesn't change simply because we have the Super Bowl."