Cowboys Defensive Coordinator Mike Nolan Leaves Press Conference With Hot Sauce In Eye

There are a lot of reasons that Dallas’ defensive coordinator Mike Nolan should be in the news. For starters, his defense is well in the bottom half of the league, ranked last in rushing yards allowed and second to last in turnovers created. From there, the Cowboys are giving up an average of 408.1 yards and 37.4 points per game and sit at 2-5 on the season. That simply cannot do in a normal year and the first-year staff has been surrounded by rumors of a one-and-done firing, but the incompetence of the NFC East has kept them in the mix for the division title in 2020. Thus, Nolan and the rest of head coach Mike McCarthy’s staff survived another week and took to Zoom for their weekly COVID-19-safe media calls.

When answering a question about defensive end DeMarcus Lawrence on Monday, Nolan had to walk out from the video conference with hot sauce-induced discomfort in his eye.

“He’s been active every week as far as, I think, disrupting the quarterback. He’s escaped several times to do that,” Nolan said. “Obviously, the frustration for him as well is — look, it’s when he misses them. Whoop, excuse me. I’ve got something in my eye. Just had some Tabasco on my finger, and it went in my eye. That wasn’t good. Ugh. Terrible, geez. I’m sorry.”

There are two major red flags to be raised here.

First of all, who uses Tabasco? That’s, like, the eighth best hot sauce. Off of the top of my head I can think of Cholula, Frank’s RedHot (shoutout Eli Manning), Louisiana Hot Sauce, Tapatio, Sriracha and Crystal— all of which are better than Tabasco. Strike one.

For Nolan to use Tabasco is the wrong call, but at least he’s not eating a flavorless meal. Presumably, he put it on a sandwich, some chicken, maybe some tacos. Using deductive reasoning, Nolan ate his lunch prior to hopping on the call and walked over to the designated media computer to answer questions. He missed a very important step, as illustrated by the irritated eye. Nolan would not have had hot sauce on his finger if he had washed his hands or used a napkin. Nope, the league’s worst defense is run by a man who walked around the facility with greasy fingers. Strike two.

He was able to return to the call, but maybe it would have been better to use the old ‘hot sauce in the eye’ trick and avoid answering questions about his group’s awful play so far this season. Watch your seat Mike Nolan, it’s getting awfully hot!