To Jason Garrett, Cowboys’ culture shined through on Saturday

8:37 PM ET

OXNARD, Calif. – When Jason Garrett said last Friday he felt the overwhelming strength of the Dallas Cowboys was their culture, many eyes probably rolled.

The Cowboys have the most players facing suspension to start the season of any team in the NFL. DeMarcus Lawrence will miss the first four games. Rolando McClain will miss the first 10. Randy Gregory will miss at least the first four. And over the years the Cowboys have taken many character risks and not seen them pay off. They were one of two teams willing to give Greg Hardy a chance last year, and that ended so poorly the Cowboys have not tried to re-sign Hardy despite the need for pass-rushing help.

But then something like Saturday happens and it makes you rethink everything.

Three groups of Cowboys players, coaches and staff walked silently onto the practice field in Oxnard, arm in arm with family members of Dallas police officers killed in the line of duty in early July. Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings was there. So was Dallas Police Chief David Brown.

It was a lump-in-the-throat moment.

The genesis of the sign of unity came from the players, specifically Jason Witten, who then ran it by other leaders on the team.

“Our players are really pretty special,” Garrett said. “You’ve heard me talk a lot the last couple of days about the character of our football team. We have some rare guys in our locker room and they’re the guys that make up the culture of our team. We’re very deliberate in trying to bring those kinds of guys to our team. I think there are so many great examples for us as coaches every day as to why we think it’s such a privilege to coach these guys. But I don’t know if there is a better example of what happened [than Saturday]. To have Jason Witten and the other leaders of our team initiate …

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