Roy Williams Hands Dez Bryant His Pads, And Bryant Says Carry Your Own Pads Bitch!

Posted by By Sports Session at 26 July, at 10 : 44 AM Print

Ok, so he didn’t exactly call him a bitch, but he might as well have.  The Dallas Cowboys drafted Dez Bryant as their first round draft.  Bryant out of Oklahoma State is expected to challenge Roy Williams for the starting wide receiver position this season.  With that being said it could explain the reason that Bryant refused to carry Roy Williams’ shoulder pads after he handed them to him at the end of practice.

For those that do not know there are many traditions for sports teams especially at the professional level, and one of those traditions is that rookies carry the shoulder pads of a veteran player after practice.  There have also been several where rookies take water to coaches during breaks at practice; it is a widely accepted tradition on most teams.  Bryant chose to buck the trend and said he is there to catch passes and not carry someone else’s shoulder pads.

The underachieving Roy Williams seemed to take it all in stride, but he commented that he had to carry veteran players shoulder pads when he was rookie in Detroit.  I am sure Williams is feeling the heat from the rookie because he had an underwhelming season last year, and Dallas made it known they wanted to upgrade their receiving corps in the off season.

What Bryant did was a good thing; there is not rule that says you have to do these things.  Rookies are often expected to pay for meals as part of a ritual as well, and it does not matter if you are the first pick or the 300^th pick the expectations are the same.  Think about it a guy making $250,000 a year paying for dinner of guys making $4 and $5 million dollars a year.

If people think this is only at the pro level they are very much mistaken, high school and college sports have similar practices.  Several of these traditions include dousing a freshman with a used trash can full of water, and holding a player down as their head is shaven.  These are just a few of the things freshmen and rookies are made to endure when they are new to a team, some of them are harmless and some of them are not.

Bryant probably will not admit it publicly, but it seems he feels that Williams is the inferior player and he is going to beat him out for the starting job.  Why set the precedent that you are going to carry these guys’ pads and play second string to him.  Bryant was sending Williams’ a message that he is in a competition for his job, and he does not care if Williams was the starter last year.

Maybe more rookies will go against these rituals and focus on the task at hand, the veterans can complain because they had to do it.  But you have to admire a guy who says I am not doing this because other people did it before, instead he is focusing on playing ball instead of simplistic rituals.

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