JJ To Gauge Success Of His Housecleaning Against Dallas

By STEVEN WINE / AP Sports Writer (Oct. 24, 1996)

DAVIE, Fla. (AP) - Beyond the Jimmy-Jerry-Barry grudge match, Sunday's game between the Miami Dolphins and Dallas Cowboys will allow Jimmy Johnson to gauge his progress in building another championship team.

He has tried to do it the same way in Miami as he did in Dallas - by cleaning house. Of the 53 players on Miami's roster, 26 are new this season, including 10 rookies.

Turnover has been steady: Johnson sent shock waves through the locker room by releasing veterans Keith Byars and Gene Atkins on consecutive Mondays this month.

The holdovers confess to a sense of insecurity about their status, which is exactly what Miami's first-year coach wants.

"The one thing you notice about a team coached by Jimmy is that it doesn't make a lot of mistakes," Dallas quarterback Troy Aikman said Wednesday. "That's because Jimmy doesn't tolerate them. When players realize that, they recognize that if they don't go out and do the job they're being asked to do, they won't be around very long."

Johnson's makeover of the Dolphins is still a work in progress. Miami (4-3) has lost three of four games since an ankle injury sidelined quarterback Dan Marino, who will be back in the lineup Sunday.

Johnson says he wants to beat the Cowboys not because of any feud with Dallas owner Jerry Jones or coach Barry Switzer, but because his young team needs a win. Miami is starting six rookies, not counting third-down running back Jerris McPhail, and their inexperience can be costly.

"You put out one fire and another one crops up," Johnson said. "All they know is that they hear 'Set, hike,' and somebody starts hitting them."

But the overall attitude pleases Johnson, who replaced Don Shula in January after the Dolphins finished a disappointing 9-7 last season. While that team was undermined by dissension and lack of effort, cornerback Troy Vincent says 90 percent of the problem players are now gone.

"Jimmy is finding them; they can't hide from him," said Vincent, who spent four years in Miami before signing a lucrative free-agent contract with Philadelphia this year.

"He's finding his workers, and he's finding the guys who are just going along for the ride, which is great. If we'd had that attitude years ago, I might have a championship ring or two instead of just a wedding band."

Malcontents are easy to spot, Johnson said, because of the dedication he demands.

"The players we have, to work as hard as they work, they have to love the game," he said. "If they're playing for a paycheck, I'll see that and send them to another team.

"My role is not only to bring in the right people but eliminate the wrong people. If the wrong person is a good player, I eliminate him. You don't win with wrong people."

Not every departing player was an overpaid underachiever. But the release of Byars, Atkins, Eric Green, Aubrey Beavers and others sent a message and changed the chemistry of the Dolphins.

"Coach Johnson is an old-fashioned coach," defensive end Trace Armstrong said. "He believes in discipline, hard work and sacrifice. If you don't like those things, you'd better be a hell of a player."