Retired safety Danny McCray becomes latest ex-Cowboy to compete on ‘Survivor’

Danny McCray felt prepared.

The former captain of the Cowboys special team watched about half of Survivor’s 40 seasons after his retirement, with his final NFL season coming in 2015. When cast on the reality competition show, he celebrated flint, tinder and a knife and built a small one Fire in his Plano garage.

McCray trained under retired Cowboys strength and conditioning coach Mike Woicik; they prioritized balance and muscle endurance. For weeks he ate one meal a day and lost 12 pounds. He rehearsed a backstory to convey to other participants.

Then he got there.

“You can try as best you like to prepare while you are at home,” said McCray. “But it’s very different on this island.”

In March, the man who wore the number 40 in Dallas said goodbye to his wife and young daughter to compete in Fiji for season 41 of Survivor. The start of his island experience will air on CBS Wednesday night when the show returns from a layoff caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Former Security Cowboys Danny McCray is a Survivor CBS nominee. Danny McCray arrives on SURVIVOR when the Emmy-winning series returns for its 41st season with a special 2-hour premiere on Wednesday, September 22nd (8:00 pm-10:00pm ET / PT) on CBS Television Network. Photo: Robert Voets / CBS Entertainment 2021 CBS Broadcasting, Inc. All rights reserved.(Robert Voets / CBS)

Filming was originally scheduled to start in March 2020.

A year-long delay gave McCray more time to prepare.

“I should probably have camped a few more times before I went on the show,” McCray said in a phone interview on Tuesday. “I would say I was prepared for anything, but if you hadn’t been living in nature and dealing with bugs and figuring out how to find your own food then this really is a shock to you. I didn’t know how to do that. I wasn’t at Uber Eats so it was super tough on me. “

McCray is hardly the first survivor with a cowboy tie.

Pro Football Hall of Fame coach Jimmy Johnson was the best-known former competitor. Alan Ball, Gary Hogeboom and Steve Wright are others who have tried their luck. McCray is committed to not revealing most of the details of his show experience, including the most obvious of whether he won.

He would be the first ex-cowboy to do this. For most years, the grand prize is $ 1 million.

McCray played for the Cowboys from 2010 to 2013, for the Chicago Bears in 2014 and again for the Cowboys in 2015. When he arrived in Fiji, his plan was not to tell other participants about this NFL experience.

He was going to say he was a college walk-on. This is true.

He wanted to say that no NFL team drafted him. Also true.

“I would watch the show and you would see these guys carry on,” McCray said. “Basketball players, baseball players, they said, ‘I’ve played every sport.’ And then they were voted out or despised because it is believed that you have already made enough money. So why should we give it to you if you can make it to the end of the game?

“My idea was to hide it as much as possible and not let anyone know what I was doing in my previous career. … I was hoping this would work. We have to see how it turns out. “

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