True blue: after nearly two decades with the organization, there is no denying it: Bill Bates is the Cowboys - Cover story

Football Digest, Dec, 2001 by Charean Williams

BILL BATES' BASEBALL CAP has a star on it. His shirt is an official Dallas Cowboys gray practice T. He might as well have the star tattooed on his chest.

Bates spent 15 years as a player with the Cowboys. Now he's in his fourth season as an assistant coach with the team. His heart is where his home is.

"I think when he got to Dallas, with the star, it all tied together for him emotionally," says Carson-Newman College head coach Ken Sparks, who was Bates' high school coach. "I think he felt there was a little meant-to-be in all that He certainly made it work for him, didn't he? He sure maxed it out, no doubt about it."

Bates has become as much a symbol of the Cowboys as the star on their helmet. "He's what the Cowboys' organization is all about," Cowboys tight end Jackie Harris says.

Bates' love of the Cowboys began at Farragut High School in Knoxville, Tenn. In Bates' junior year Sparks, who was new to the school, added gray to the Admirals' uniforms. With a star on his helmet and No. 40 on his chest, Bates already looked the part.

"I dreamed about being a Dallas Cowboy, and in my mind I was a Dallas Cowboy," Bates says. "Now, the Cowboys didn't know it, but that was when the dream kind of started. People started comparing me to Charlie [Waters] and Cliff [Harris]."

Bates followed his parents to the University of Tennessee, where he was a four-year starter at safety. He had nine interceptions and six fumble recoveries, and earned second-team All-Southeastern Conference honors his junior and senior seasons. But all of those accolades didn't get him drafted. A mediocre 4.7 time in the 40-yard dash prevented him from being one of the 335 players drafted by the NFL in 1983.

"The Cowboys came to Knoxville, Tenn., and they said, `Gosh, if there were 13 rounds in the draft, you would have been our 13th-round pick,'" Bates remembers. "So I signed the contract. Then I get to Thousand Oaks, Calif., for training camp, and there are, like, 185 13th-round draft picks.

"I thought there was no way I could make it, because there were so many people out there. The odds were so much against me. But I ended up fighting through the odds and hitting enough people and making enough plays in preseason to make the team."

That's kind of the way Bates' career went. He hit enough people and made enough plays ... for 15 years. In 217 regular-season games, he had 701 tackles.

"When you see a guy like Bill Bates, you just talk about perseverance," Harris says. "I had to play against that guy when he was running down on kickoff coverage and I was in Green Bay on the kick-off return team. It's like, `This guy is not very big. I know I can block him out. I'll just body him up and muscle him.' You'd body him up and you'd think you had him blocked, and the next thing you know ... the guy, he just never stops. He slides off and makes a tackle, and you're backed up inside your own 20. The guy just never quit. He was the guy that if you didn't block anybody else, you better block him."

Bates proved that it doesn't take a star to become a star in the NFL. Although he was a three-year starter for Dallas at safety, from 1986 through '88, it was special teams and the nickel package where Bates left his mark.

"In my hometown, we called him `Nickel Bates,'" says Cowboys cornerback Marlo Edwards, who grew up in Pascagolua, Miss. "He played a long time on special teams and in the nickel packages. You have to really, really be something special to do that, and Bill Bates was that."

Bates' production on special teams prompted the NFL to add a spot on its Pro Bowl teams for special teams coverage players. Bates won three Super Bowl rings and earned a place in the team's record book by playing 15 seasons, ranking alongside Mark Tuinei and Ed Jones for years of service. Bates' 217 games ranks second to the 224 games played by Jones.

"Perseverance and hard work aren't the only traits you need to stay around that long," Cowboys center Mark Stepnoski says. "Bill was fast. He was strong. He was smart. He was athletic. He had a lot going for him."

Bates had to have the jersey torn off him to finally stop playing. In what was a salary cap decision as much as anything, new head coach Chan Gailey gave Bates the option to become a Cowboys assistant coach in 1998. Bates reluctantly agreed.

"You ask any player who played in the NFL for a number of years, and they still think they can do it, even though they're 70," Bates says. "Still, if somebody asked me, `Bill, can you ever imagine that you would play 15 years, and you would still be with the Cowboys going on your 19th season?' No way. Sometimes that 15 years seems just like that, but other times it seems like forever.

"Every day I had to prove that I was supposed to be here: I could not let one day go by without giving it my all, because it might have been my last day. I've always felt like I was on the bubble, even with coach [Tom] Landry, even when I was starting. I always felt like I could not let a moment go by without giving it my all."