Cowboys great Daryl Johnston honors John Madden with vintage sweatshirt during broadcast

On the Sunday when the NFL honored the late John Madden with a moment of silence at each of its home stadiums, legendary Cowboys fullback Daryl Johnston literally wore his respect for the iconic coach and broadcaster on his sleeve.

Coming back from a commercial break in the third quarter of FOX’s early-afternoon Buccaneers-Jets telecast, the network ran a short video montage of moments from Madden’s remarkable football career. At the conclusion of that tribute, viewers were treated to a 1992 clip of Madden introducing Johnston as a member of his hand-picked “All-Madden Team” for that season.

Johnston was wearing the commemorative sweatshirt from that accolade when cameras joined him and play-by-play partner Chris Myers in the booth, and the longtime Cowboys star spent a moment sharing what Madden meant to him and his career.

“One of my most prized possessions, ” Johnston said of the 30-year-old sweatshirt with its leather throwback helmet design. “I think one of the things that John really helped everybody with: I was not a player whose statistics were going to be something that John Madden would recognize; my role was to block for Emmitt Smith. There weren’t a lot of numbers behind what I did. It was John’s knowledge of the game and his ability to bring that to the viewer in an amusing and important way. I will always be indebted to John Madden for everything he helped me with with my career.”

And if Madden helped introduce the casual fan to Johnston- by then in his fourth season- during the early years of the Dallas dynasty, he’s the one Johnston credits with popularizing the nickname given to him during his rookie season by Cowboys backup quarterback Babe Laufenberg.

“I lost my name in ’92. I was no longer Daryl Johnston; from that point on, I was just ‘Moose,’ because that’s what John Madden called me during Sunday games.”

Madden passed away Tuesday at the age of 85.

Johnston wasn’t the only Cowboys player sporting a wardrobe item memorializing Madden. Quarterback Dak Prescott had a special shirt, too, for his pregame warmups.

The Cowboys had a video tribute planned prior to their late-afternoon game versus Arizona that would also include former player-coach Dan Reeves, who passed away early Saturday morning.

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