Tyrus Wheat didn’t just stick around in Dallas. He carved out a role the hard way, and it’s paying off.
Three seasons and 37 NFL games into his career, the former Mississippi State linebacker had to fight for a spot on the Cowboys’ 53-man opening day roster this time around. He did it through special teams, and he’s clearly embracing that lane in his second stint with the team.
“It’s been great,” said Wheat, 26, who played at State between 2020 and 2022. “I love special teams, especially when you get out to start the game, make a play and that just gets everybody going, the juice gets everybody going.”
That edge has helped him settle into a part of the game that never really leaves a player alone. Wheat said he has been drawn to the hidden grind of special teams since his days at Mississippi State, when he first began building the habits that matter in that phase.
He pointed to his first year with the Cowboys in 2021, before being elevated to head coach in late ’22, as a key step in that process. Wheat credits Jeach, Arnett and Matt Brock, the Bulldogs’ special teams and outside linebackers coaches in 2020 and linebackers coach in 2022 and linebackers coach in 2021, for helping him develop in his integral role in his development.
“I loved Arnett, he was a good coach, one of the best coaches I ever had,” Wheat said. “I also can’t forget about coach Brock, love coach Brock, he’s very intelligent. He taught me how to read the offensive side first and then you could tell what you could do, what plays you could get because of their formation.
“Coach Jeach was crazy. We were in practice and I forgot what we had been talking about, but it was not football.
He loved pirates. I remember when he first came, he talked to everybody in his office and there were so many pirates, it was crazy.
I like Mike Jeach, too, because he brought a lot of people with him everywhere he went. He brought his own people, I like that.
He was very big on family and loyalty, very loyal.”
It was at State where Wheat first embraced playing on special teams, an affinity for this often-unsung role which has helped him carve out a nice niche for himself in the NFL as a linebacker who can contribute on defense and on punt and kick coverage units.
“I played kickoff return at State, so I had to make the 33 coming in,” Wheat said. “That was a big emphasis, to just go hard on special teams if I wanted to make the team.”
Of course, he has a high-profile Dallas teammate in Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott, regarded as one of the top signal callers in the NFL and a fellow ex-Bulldog to boot. And what can’t be understood why so many people, fans and media, diminish the accomplishments of Prescott, a fourth-round pick of Dallas in 2016, on and off the field.
“Dak gets disrespected a lot, I don’t know,” Wheat said. “I don’t know, probably because he plays for the Cowboys and a lot of people don’t like the Cowboys.
I tell people Dak is one of the best players in the league. You see the throws he makes?
That’s crazy, not a lot of people can make those throws. When I first got here, Dak told me if you need something, let me .”
In his final season at Mississippi State, Wheat earned second-team All-SEC honors. Regardless of where he’s played as a professional - Dallas, where he played in 2023 and 2024 before returning in 2025, or Detroit, where he played 13 games last season - the reason he continues to love the game has never changed.
“I love contact, can’t get that anywhere else. I like kickoff returns,” he said.
“Punt coverage is hard, but you got to do it. You’ve got to play special teams to get paid.
You’ve got to have your drop step on punt coverage to be successful, but I like it.”
Last weekend, he and the Cowboys ventured to South America to face Baltimore in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. And even though the Cowboys lost to the Ravens in heartbreaking fashion in the game’s waning moments, Wheat admits he never thought football would one day take him to play on another continent.
“It was great. It was crazy, unbelievable.
The field wasn’t bad. I’ve played on worse in juco.
I’d have never thought I’d play outside of the US in Brazil and the fans, they were crazy. It was great though,” he said.
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The Bulldogs have built their own buzz around quarterback Kamario Taylor, who has been one of the standouts of the season so far, and the home crowd will get a first real look at how that translates against elite competition. Alabamas recent track record and momentum make it the favorite on paper, but Mississippi State enters with a spotless record and the kind of confidence that only comes when a team has earned its way into the conversation. The game should answer plenty about where the Bulldogs stand, even if not every question gets settled by kickoff. [Read more 🡒]