{"id":143440,"date":"2023-08-06T15:00:36","date_gmt":"2023-08-06T19:00:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/?p=143440"},"modified":"2023-08-06T13:52:09","modified_gmt":"2023-08-06T17:52:09","slug":"demarcus-ware-hall-of-fame","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2023\/08\/06\/demarcus-ware-hall-of-fame\/","title":{"rendered":"Hall Of Fame Inductee DeMarcus Ware Gives Emotional Speech"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>New Hall Of Fame inductee DeMarcus Ware knows a thing or two about stellar defensive play.<\/p>\n<p>The former Dallas Cowboys pass rusher holds nearly a handful of Cowboys franchise records. In his nine years in Dallas, he became their all-time sack leader (117) and tops the list for forced fumbles (32) amongst others. His career in Dallas ended in 2013 before making the switch to the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/category\/nfl-teams\/broncos\/\" target=\"_self\">Denver Broncos<\/a>, where he added another 21.5 sacks and winning a Super Bowl before hanging up his cleats.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Ware emotional at Hall Of Fame<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>This past weekend, he was in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbssports.com\/nfl\/news\/2023-pro-football-hall-of-fame-induction-takeaways-joe-thomas-demarcus-ware-headline-emotional-afternoon\/live\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Canton, Ohio<\/a> to be inducted into the Pro Football Hall Of Fame. He was inducted with the help of Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, who also has his own bust in the Hall. It was an emotional speech that he gave, as he recalled a never-before-shared life-changing moment in the years leading up to him being drafted. He was involved in an assault that saw him confronted by a man wielding a gun. The incident happened at a parking lot whilst on his way home after a trip to Troy University.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">.<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/DeMarcusWare?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@DeMarcusWare<\/a> reserved seats in Canton for his former teammates who have passed away. \u2764\ufe0f<\/p>\n<p>\ud83d\udcfa: <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/PFHOF23?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#PFHOF23<\/a> Enshrinement on <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/nflnetwork?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@NFLNetwork<\/a><br \/>\ud83d\udcf1: Stream on NFL+ <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/YdDnR6wlJC\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/YdDnR6wlJC<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; NFL (@NFL) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/NFL\/status\/1687875477661532161?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">August 5, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>\u201cWithout warning. I was knocked across the head with a gun. A knife dropped to the ground and I picked it up.\u201d An emotional Ware said, \u201cWhen I looked up, all I could see was the potential shooter\u2019s eyes and a gun barrel pressed against my head. All I heard was my family say, \u2018Don\u2019t kill him.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<h3><strong>Second chance<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>\u201cI dropped the knife. God gave me a second chance and I had to do something with it. That was my turning point. The memories of those parking lot lights and the sounds of those screams \u2018Don\u2019t kill him\u2019 became the fire that empowered me. You can imagine how many years that night echoed in my head.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The second chance was taken. Leading the NFL in two seasons as sack leader. A name that quarterbacks feared. The emotion shown during his speech was more powerful than any of his record number of sacks. More than that, though, it showed his true resilience. And, how to overcome an unhealthy environment that he was surrounded by at a young age. After having slipped on his gold jacket, he stood beside the bust that will immortalize his football prowess.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>Good vibes at Training Camp<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>He visited the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bloggingtheboys.com\/2023\/7\/29\/23811218\/cowboys-demarcus-ware-sees-growth-team-mike-mccarthy-leadership\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Cowboys training camp<\/a>, to offer encouragement to players that look to emulate him, and his former teammates. What he saw surprised him. What he could sense was a team that is playing for each other, rather than having several individuals leading the play.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt was a great feeling to see that the guys actually owning who they are, where they fit in the defense or offense and they were having fun. And the leaders were actually being leaders.\u201d This was a marked improvement he said from the start of the Mike McCarthy era. \u201cNow you have a lot of guys that can be leaders but they pinpointed like a DeMarcus Lawrence, or a <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2021\/02\/21\/2021-nfl-draft-profile-micah-parsons\/\" target=\"_self\">Micah Parsons<\/a>, or a Dak Prescott. You are our guy, We\u2019re following you.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Is it finally a show of the team&#8217;s maturity? A sense that being more together will see better results, especially in the postseason. \u201cI always say the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2023\/08\/02\/dan-quinns-cowboys-defense-young-guns-2023-edition\/\" target=\"_self\">Dallas Cowboys can win the Super Bowl<\/a> every year,\u201d he stated, but now even he is thinking that it really could be their time, and who knows one day part of this roster could be in the Hall Of Fame like DeMarcus Ware.<\/p>\n<p>Main Image: Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>New Hall Of Fame inductee DeMarcus Ware knows a thing or two about stellar defensive play. The former Dallas Cowboys pass rusher holds nearly a handful of Cowboys franchise records. In his nine years in Dallas, he became their all-time sack leader (117) and tops the list for forced fumbles (32) amongst others. His career [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4802,"featured_media":143449,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6431,19,54],"tags":[7422,591],"class_list":["post-143440","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nfl-teams","category-cowboys","category-editorials","tag-dallas-cowboys-news","tag-demarcus-ware"],"modified_by":"Drew Crabtree","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143440","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4802"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=143440"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143440\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/143449"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=143440"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=143440"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=143440"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}