When it comes to football, DeMarcus Ware is a lot of things: Dallas Cowboys retiree, Pro Football Hall of Fame inductee, Super Bowl champion, and, to my particular delight, a big fan of the bench warmer.
On September 21, 2025, I had the opportunity to sit down with him on the occasion of him hosting the “That Deserves a Crown with Kane Brown Finale,” the conclusion of a series honoring remarkable veterans. Attendees had the chance to showcase athletic ability (or mediocrity) in punt, kick, and pass areas, among others, before Kane Brown took the stage for an acoustic set. A fan, I loved Kane chatting with the crowd between songs, even with me shouting “One Mississippi,” him mysteriously replying, “Man, I cannot tell you how much I hate playing that song,” and me skulking off to the Crown Royal bar in defeat. But! Before all that, DeMarcus led a tour of the Star in Frisco, the Dallas Cowboys’ sparkling, sprawling practice facility—and home of those legendary if not terrifying Dallas Cowboy Cheerleader auditions—and took some time to talk to me.
He’s the real deal. I’ll let him speak for himself.
Bailey Powell Aldrich: You retired as a Cowboy, right? What made you want to do that?
DeMarcus Ware: Before I got released by the Dallas Cowboys… this was three years before I was able to retire with them, Jerry Jones, at the time, he didn’t have to release me. And I remember just sitting back praying at night, like, “Hey, I gotta get Jerry Jones to release me, because I’m going into my last year of my contract.” And he said to my face, “I can’t pay you, DeMarcus.” This is the relationship [he and I] have. “And so, what I’m going to do is let you go and test the market.” So, we had a meeting, and right after the meeting, he said, “Hey, I’m going to release you, and there are two things I want you to do. Go test the market, and whatever that market is, don’t go play for any NFC East team.” I said, “Deal.” And he said, “And number two, you come back here and retire as a Dallas Cowboy.” I said, “I can do both of those. That’s easy.” That was the biggest reason. He was the one that gave me a chance over Bill Parcells who wanted Sean Merriman at the time, and it was either me or Sean Merriman. Sean Merriman was [overall pick] 12, I was 11. Jerry Jones said, “We want DeMarcus here.” For him giving me an opportunity and playing with the Dallas Cowboys, why not come here? And that’s where my longevity is, here for nine years.
BPA: It sounds like it was a meeting based on mutual respect, a man seeing another man, and making that decision together, but also that guarantee of being able to come back with the Boys long term really set you free, in its own way, to be confident. Obviously, that turned out well with the Super Bowl.
DW: It did, yeah. I mean, the Super Bowl, it was great, because it was like the [pinnacle] of my career. I wanted to go and win. We had a chance to win with the team that we had. I think two years after that, I think it was that Dez catch, and I was like, “I wish I coulda been there! I know we woulda won! He woulda knocked that out of pocket and threw it, you know…” I won the game at the end—win a Super Bowl, say “I did it,” but then come back and say “I’m home.” That was the biggest thing for me, because I didn’t want to leave. I wanted to stay here and have my whole career here and to finish it and retire as a champion.
BPA: You’re back, baby. Do you live in DFW now?
DW: I do. When you say Dallas/Fort Worth, that’s big.
BPA: Whenever you were little, did you always want to play football?
DW: I did not want to play football. Everybody in my family played football, and I played baseball. I was a pitcher and a right fielder, and I threw my arm out, and my coach was like, “Hey, you are a great athlete. I think you should go and play football.” So, my junior year, I’m starting to play football at wide receiver. I only got one scholarship coming out of high school to Troy University—it was Troy State at the time—Division I-AA, and the sky was the limit after that. I got an opportunity. When one guy gets hurt, I’m number two. I was number three. Another guy gets hurt, I’m number one. Let me just try this out at 205 [lbs.] 6’4″, soaking wet at defensive end. It was one of the coolest things for me to see how everything grew. Every year I got bigger and stronger. I gained 50 pounds in four years. It wasn’t a freshman 15, it was a four-year 50.
“Every year I got bigger and stronger. I gained 50 pounds in four years. It wasn’t a freshman 15, it was a four-year 50.”
BPA: Were you not done growing height-wise, too?
DW: No! I had a growth spurt in college. My sophomore year, that’s when everything hit, and I got taller and stronger, and then I started to become defensive end-like for Division I-AA but, when you start looking at the big guys, like Marcus Spears and David Pollack, those big guys, I was 250, they’re 290! I was little, so they said, “Maybe put him at linebacker. He’ll be a big linebacker.” I was athletic enough to do that.
BPA: Did you have a favorite football player growing up?
DW: If I say a favorite football player, it was actually Bo Jackson. And the reason why I say Bo Jackson—I remember sitting at the Boys and Girls Club, trying to just stay off the streets. He came to the Boys and Girls Club at the time—he was getting an award—and he said, “Hey, if you get a college scholarship, you can eat for free.” That meant something. When you come from a community where you gotta get that little ticket, and every single time in the morning, that’s where you get your free meals, when they say, “You can eat for free if you get a scholarship, if you play football,” I said, “Really?” I remember selling Cokes at the Auburn University football game, and I saw him come out because he was getting an award, and the whole stadium erupted. And I said, “Wait a minute.” I put the Cokes down, looked, and said, “That’s the guy that came to the Boys and Girls Club! One person can make the crowd move like that? I think I wanna play football.” That’s what really made me really gravitate to playing football, seeing the effect of what one person can do in a crowd of 90,000.
“…[Bo Jackson] said, ‘Hey, if you get a college scholarship, you can eat for free.’ That meant something.”
Keith Powell: He was a baseball player, too.
DW: Exactly.
BPA: A lot of synergies.
KP: Maybe one of the greatest athletes, ever.
BPA: Were you born in Alabama?
DW: Auburn, Alabama, yeah.
BPA: [There were] generations of Alabamans in your family. People in Alabama are serious business about football. Auburn, Roll Tide, the whole thing. Did [your family put] heat on you to stay in Alabama?
DW: No, there was no heat because I only had one opportunity. [Laughs] But it was either Auburn War Eagle or Roll Tide. I grew up across the tracks [from] Auburn University, so I just walked across the street, sold Cokes, and went back across the street. My daughter, she’s a War Eagle fan, so I was a fan, but you’re going to be either/or at the house. But, yeah, I only had one opportunity, so it didn’t matter to me. I knew I wasn’t good enough to play at Auburn, but I was a good enough player to just play the sport, and I got an opportunity at Troy just to go and do it.
BPA: Go and do, improve and build, and, apparently, keep growing taller. [FLEX ON DEMARCUS WARE INCOMING] I won state [with] my volleyball team, 5A, Texas state. I was a trash volleyball player. My coach gave me a jersey because I made her laugh. So, we won state; I did nothing. I rode the pine. Every team’s got a bench. Every team has people who have to ride the pine. That’s a part of the team, a part of the setup. You were not riding the pine.
DW: I did early!
BPA: Okay, early. You weren’t at the end. Do you have any advice for those bench warmers out there and what they bring to the team?
“The number two players are the most important players on any team, because the [players] riding the bench are getting the ones ready. They aren’t in the spotlight, but they are the glue that keeps everything together.”
DW: I wouldn’t say “bench warmers,” I would say number two. The number two players are the most important players on any team, because the [players] riding the bench are getting the ones ready. They aren’t in the spotlight, but they are the glue that keeps everything together. For a lot of the guys on the team, they’re like, “Oh, I’m never going to get on the field.” But when they play a little bit of special teams, when they’re in the practices and making a guy like me better, they are the glue that, at the end of the day, keeps the cohesiveness of the team, even though they aren’t seen. That’s the most important thing is that the “bench warmers,” the guys that aren’t out there, or girls that aren’t out there, the harder they can become the image of what they are—which is that number two—and own it, the better the number ones will be, the better the team wins, because it’s a team sport. It’s not about the individual getting out there on the field. It’s about how well can the team get together and have that glue in the twos making the ones better to win a championship. When the ones win, the twos win, too. They’re part of it, they’re part of the process.
BPA: My people appreciate that. [Laughs] I think a lot of people talk with you about athletic connections, but I’m a relationship person. Who was your favorite person to play with, not just connecting on the field, I mean who did you have the most fun with whenever you got to get on the field with them, you’re like, “Yes! We’re gonna tear it up. We have so much fun. We’re gonna have a laugh.”
DW: The rookies. The ones that are on the bench, because I know their appreciation. It’s crazy that you’re talking about this, because the ones that really appreciate getting on the field, they might get in a whole season, out of 1,240 plays, five. But when they get out there and they’re very impactful, and you know you poured into them, and they do exactly what I told them to do, and they’re successful at doing it… that warms me here [places hand on heart]. And I always say, if you can pour into somebody and make them feel like they’re first, even though they might not get number one plays or number one quality out there, that’s the coolest thing for me, because I was a captain for 12 years, and I think that’s why I was a captain, because I poured into everybody. I saw something in them that they didn’t see in themselves. That was the most important thing to see somebody going, “I don’t have a chance!” And then all of a sudden, wait, you’re a starter now. Wait, you’re a special teams player now. What? Oh, you’re a captain now. To see that, that’s the coolest thing.
Kane Brown and DeMarcus Ware
BPA: I know you have children, obviously one of your beautiful children is here [motions to Marley Ware]. Three, right?
DW: Three children.
BPA: What does legacy mean to you? Not necessarily athletically, but in general, for your children.
DW: I think legacy for me is… I didn’t grow up with a father. For me it’s saying, “Jesus Christ, show me how to do it, so I can be a better father for my daughter, I can be a better father for my sons.” I’ve already won, because I’ve accepted [Jesus Christ] into my life. With that said, the legacy that I’m leaving is a spiritual legacy telling them they’re perfect, they’re loved, that no matter what they do, they’ve already won. It’s not about money, it’s not about accolades, any of that stuff. How do you be the best you, and me supporting you in what you’re doing, and then I see them thrive. That’s legacy to me.
BPA: That’s beautiful. [To Marley] What’s your favorite thing about your dad?
Marley Ware: Everything.
BPA: That’s the sweetest answer. [To DeMarcus] What’s your favorite sports movie?
DW: Maybe All American. The young kid, they show him having to go way far away to go practice on another team. I had to do all that, drive 45 minutes to go practice and do all that. It shows the true life of, if you really want it, you just gotta go out there and get it, but [there’s] going to be a lot of turmoil.
“No ‘One Mississippi’ for you!”
