Tag: souvenir

Cowboys RB Ezekiel Elliott rescued souvenir TD ball from stands for OL Terence Steele

Terence Steele spiked his first-ever TD ball into the luxury suites, so RB Ezekiel Elliot went back to get it for him. | From @ToddBrock24f7

When the play was called, Terence Steele didn’t want anyone to think he’d be getting the ball. After the play was over, he was quick to get rid of it again.

Thanks to a quick-thinking teammate, though, he got it back.

The football is now a souvenir the Cowboys’ 310-pound offensive lineman will treasure for the rest of his life, a memento of his contribution to a historic obliteration of the rival Washington Football Team.

But it almost went home with someone else.

The Cowboys offense were set up on the Washington 1-yard-line, ahead 28-7 late in the second quarter. Coordinator Kellen Moore sensed an opportunity to run a play they’d been working on for a while and had even tried the week prior in New York.

They called a timeout to get the personnel exactly right.

Steele, who had already been in the game at left tackle, slid over to the right tight end position and declared himself eligible, as required by rule. Ty Nsekhe came on to fill Steele’s left tackle slot. Lineman Connor McGovern lined up in the backfield as blocking fullback. Seven beefy linemen on the field at once for what looked to all the world like it would be a goal-line carry for running back Tony Pollard.

Only after bumping his man at the line, Steele peeled off and broke for the end zone. He turned to find Dak Prescott’s pass floating his way.

The second-year undrafted free agent out of Texas Tech who has done everything the team has asked, at multiple positions along the offensive line and subbing for future Hall of Famers, logged the first reception and touchdown of his football career.

“When they called the play, I just tried to play it off as normal,” Steele said after the game. ” I didn’t want to get too excited or anything. I just wanted to keep everything as normal. When the play happened, that’s every O-lineman’s dream, to catch a touchdown. I blocked and I just tried to get my head around as fast as possible. And it was there. I caught it. Perfect ball from Dak.”
It was, in fact, his first catch and score. At any level of football.
“I’ve always been an O-lineman. I’ve never touched the ball in my life. Never ever ever ever.”

So the big man can be forgiven, perhaps, for not exactly knowing what to do with the ball afterward. The personal significance of the moment may have been lost in the excitement of the moment. So Steele unleashed a monstrous spike in celebration.

 

“Steele was super excited,” running back Ezekiel Elliott explained to the media after the Cowboys’ 56-14 win. “He spiked it so hard, it bounced almost into the second level of the stadium. But it went to the suite area.”

“That was a spike with some authority to it,” guard Zack Martin said. “Last year, Zeke gave him a ball, and he kind of had a weak spike. So he made up for it tonight.”

With that spike, for Steele anyway, the moment was over. He trotted back to the sideline with his teammates, stopping to surprise head coach Mike McCarthy with an enthusiastic- and forceful- bear hug.

“I had to check my teeth because he jammed right into me,” McCarthy deadpanned in his postgame press conference. “A lot of anticipation, because obviously when you call those plays, you’re looking for the reaction. It looked like Terence stumbled coming out of it, and then you see Dak put a little air on it. It’s looked good for a couple weeks, so it was good to get it called.”

“The last couple of weeks, Kellen’s been trying to get an O-lineman a touchdown,” Martin added. “We tried to get McGovern one last week. I think this week, we had a good feeling they were going to get sucked in, and Terence was going to be open there. It was great for the big guy to get a score.”

On the TV broadcast, Al Michaels stated that Steele was the first Cowboys offensive lineman to score a touchdown since the legendary Rayfield Wright in 1968. While Wright did, in fact, haul in a 15-yard touchdown catch versus the Eagles that season, the future Hall of Famer had not yet made the positional switch to tackle. When he caught his score in ’68, he was still considered a tight end.

So as it turns out, Steele’s touchdown may be even more historic than originally thought.

“He earned it, every bit of it,” lineman La’el Collins said. “He earned it. He’s been working his ass off since he got here. He’s gotten better. He’s proven it. He’s proven it.”

“Steele’s a hell of an athlete,” Elliott agreed. “He can run, he’s definitely got great hands.”

But as he returned to the sidelines, Steele’s hands were empty. The ball from his highlight-reel moment was up in the stands.

And that’s when Elliott sprang into action. Not even on the field when Steele’s number was called, Elliott ran to the section of field-level suites where the football had landed and asked for it back.

“I want to say thank you to whoever caught that ball and gave it back to me out there,” Elliott said afterward. “I think that’s a big tradition when you go to the NFL: you’ve got to keep that first touchdown ball, so thank you for giving the ball back.”

Elliott reportedly arranged for the fan who gave back the ball to get a replacement pigskin, but the one Steele actually caught for his big-man touchdown will remain in his possession, thanks to his heads-up teammate.

“Shout-out to Zeke, because I want that ball,” Steele said. “That’s something I’m going to cherish forever.”

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Travis Frederick had one warm-up ball for Cowboys career; wants it now as souvenir

The newly-retired center has shed playing weight and his trademark beard, but he wants his warmup ball as a keepsake of his Cowboys career.

Somewhere at The Star in Frisco, there’s a football with Travis Frederick’s name on it. Maybe his name isn’t literally scrawled across the leather in black Sharpie. Or maybe it is. The ball could be on a shelf or in a locker or at the bottom of a mesh bag. It might be tucked away for safekeeping in a trainer’s desk. Either way, it’s Travis Frederick’s football. And he would like it back.

The 29-year-old center retired from football back in March after a heavily-decorated career with the Cowboys. He played five seasons, took 2018 off as he successfully battled Guillain-Barre Syndrome, and then returned in 2019. He was in the league for seven seasons. He played six. He earned a Pro Bowl nod in five.

And in that entire time, Frederick apparently warmed up with just one football. The same one, week in and week out, year after year. Now it’s the lone souvenir from his playing days he’d like to keep.

The nugget comes buried at the end of a Fort Worth Star-Telegram piece last week on Frederick. Writer Mac Engel details how life has already changed for the 2013 first-round draft pick after walking away from the game this offseason.

Frederick has dropped thirty pounds or so; he says, “That’s the dream: To get skinny.” He’s down two ring sizes and a shirt size already.

And the trademark beard has been shaved off.

During a call with Engel and ESPN’s Todd Archer, Frederick talked about his charity work with The Blocking Hunger Foundation, providing food and meals to children of lower-income families. He spoke of possibly entering the business world, maybe in the tech sector. He shared his plans to move back to Wisconsin.

And he talked about the Cowboys, now moving on without him. Joe Looney and rookie Tyler Biadasz are expected to compete for the starting center job this offseason. While Frederick has left a hole in middle of the offensive line, he’s confident that his former teammates will find success.

“The team is set up extremely well,” Frederick is quoted as saying. “The front office did a great job of getting people in place. On paper, it looks like a really, really solid team. They have a chance to go far. I’m excited to see them and watch them, and hopefully provide some outside guidance. I know whoever takes over at center will be well-cared for.”

Frederick hopes his treasured warm-up ball has been well-cared for, too. According to Engel, Frederick called team owner Jerry Jones in March to inform him of his decision to retire, and then immediately followed that phone call with another. This one was to the club’s equipment managers, asking for his ball. But with the facilities having been closed at the time due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the ball was ostensibly locked away somewhere in the building. Frederick would have to wait for the world to return to normal to be reunited with his keepsake.

That Frederick had a single lucky warm-up ball is perhaps not surprising. On gamedays, the Wisconsin native had his own unique pregame routine with guard Zack Martin. The two 300-pound linemen would famously spend 45 minutes running full-blown receiver route trees and throwing passes to one another as a way to get loose before team warmups.

For Travis Frederick, the man whose grip on the ball started each play for the Cowboys, he’ll now rely on the team’s equipment staff to deliver his ball back to him to symbolically close out the center’s short but stellar career.

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