Michael Irvin

Michael Jerome Irvin (born March 5, 1966) is an American sports commentator and former professional football player.

He played his entire 12-year career as a wide receiver for the Dallas Cowboys of the National Football League (NFL).

Irvin was born March 5, 1966, in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

He was a member of the University of Miami's 1987 national championship team and made one of the most legendary plays in school history that year, scoring on a 73-yard fourth-quarter touchdown pass from Steve Walsh that provided the margin of victory in Miami's victory over archrival Florida State, which propelled them into the national championship game, the 1988 Orange Bowl, against the top-ranked Oklahoma Sooners.

Irvin played college football for the Miami Hurricanes and was selected in the first round of the 1988 NFL draft by the Dallas Cowboys.

In 1988, following his junior year at the University of Miami, Irvin announced he was skipping his final year of college eligibility and declaring his eligibility for the 1988 NFL draft.

Irvin was selected by the Dallas Cowboys as the 11th pick in the first round of the 1988 NFL draft.

He was the last first-round draft pick made by the Cowboys under the leadership of long-time general manager Tex Schramm, player personnel director Gil Brandt, and head coach Tom Landry.

Schramm predicted that Irvin would accelerate the Cowboys' "return to the living".

As a rookie in the 1988 season, Irvin became the first rookie receiver in Cowboys' history to start a season opener in 20 years.

In the opening game of his rookie season against the Pittsburgh Steelers at Three Rivers Stadium on September 3, 1988, Irvin caught his first NFL career touchdown.

He also caught three touchdown passes in the Cowboys' win over the Washington Redskins on December 11, 1988, at RFK Stadium, which represented one of only three wins in the Cowboys' 3-13 1988 season, which was the final season of Landry's career.

For the season, Irvin led the NFC in average yards per catch with a 20.4 yard average per catch.

In 1989, the Cowboys hired Jimmy Johnson, Irvin's coach at the University of Miami, to replace Landry.

The Cowboys' misfortunes continued in 1989, and they finished the season with a 1–15 record, the worst season record in Cowboys franchise history.

Injuries limited Irvin to only six games during the season.

He had been on pace to gain over 1,000 receiving yards until tearing his anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee in a game against the San Francisco 49ers on October 15, 1989, after which he was placed on the injured reserve list for the rest of the 1989 season and the first three games of the 1990 season.

In 1990, Irvin did not register his first reception until the seventh game and finished the season with just 20 receptions for 413 yards, but he also averaged 20.7 yards per catch.

Before the injury, Irvin was nearly traded to the Los Angeles Raiders to help bring talent to the Cowboys and potentially pair Irvin up with Tim Brown, but Raiders owner Al Davis essentially talked Johnson out of the trade by saying, "You sure you want to do that? Who is going to catch passes for you?"

Johnson instead traded Herschel Walker to the Minnesota Vikings in what would come to be known as the Herschel Walker trade.

One factor in Irvin almost being traded was that then-offensive coordinator David Shula thought Irvin was slow and not a team player.

When the Cowboys fired Shula and replaced him with Norv Turner, the notion of trading Irvin became nonexistent in part because Turner believed Irvin would become a superstar in his system.

In 1991, Irvin was a major factor in the Cowboys reaching the playoffs.

He finished the season with 93 receptions (second in the NFL for the season), 1,523 receiving yards (first in the NFL for the season), eight receiving touchdowns, and set a Cowboys franchise record with seven 100-yard games.

Irvin was named to the 1991 Pro Bowl, the first of five consecutive seasons in which he was selected to Pro Bowls.

Along with Troy Aikman and Emmitt Smith, Irvin was one of three key Cowboys offensive players, known as "The Triplets", who led the Cowboys to three Super Bowl wins in 1992, 1993, and 1995.

Irvin is widely considered to be one of the greatest wide receivers of all time.

Irvin is a former broadcaster for ESPN's Sunday NFL Countdown and currently an analyst for NFL Network.

In 1992 and 1993, Irvin was a key player on the Cowboys' Super Bowl teams.

In 1994, he enjoyed another stellar campaign with his fourth consecutive Pro Bowl season, but that year the Cowboys lost to the San Francisco 49ers in the NFC Championship Game.

For his part, however, Irvin had one of the most productive games in NFL playoff history, with 12 catches for an NFC championship record 192 yards and two touchdowns.

He spent his entire 12-year NFL career from 1988 to 1999 with the Cowboys before it ended abruptly from a cervical spine injury sustained in a game against the Philadelphia Eagles at Veterans Stadium on October 10, 1999, in which Irvin was carted off the field and transported to a Philadelphia hospital.

Irvin was nicknamed "Playmaker" due to his penchant for making big plays in big games during his college and pro careers, and he relished the nickname, even acquiring "PLY MKR" as his Texas vanity license plate.

In 2007, he was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

In 2009, he competed in Season 9 of Dancing with the Stars in which he was the season's ninth contestant to be eliminated.

He is one of the co-hosts of the FS1 weekday morning debate show Undisputed with Richard Sherman, Keyshawn Johnson, and Skip Bayless.

He is the 15th of 17 children in his family.

Irvin first attended Piper High School in Sunrise, Florida, and then went on to become a football star at St. Thomas Aquinas High School in Fort Lauderdale.

While at St. Thomas Aquinas High School, Irvin was heavily recruited by the University of Miami to play for the Miami Hurricanes, one of the top collegiate football programs in the nation.

At the University of Miami under coach Jimmy Johnson, Irvin set school records for the Miami Hurricanes for career receptions (143), receiving yards (2,423 and later broken by Santana Moss), and touchdown receptions (26).