Sanjay Lal's love for football began as innocently as any other junior high student, under the Texas sun in the backyards of Plano.
His passion for the Cowboys, however, didn't start as innocuously.
Lal, the Cowboys' new receivers coach tasked with rebuilding a unit without No. 1 target Dez Bryant, moved to the U.S. in the mid-1980s with his family to Plano.
One of the first NFL coaches of Indian descent, he was born in England and also lived in Iran, Kuwait and Mexico City before attending Haggard Middle School in Plano as a seventh-grader.
Lal said his first experience in the U.S. was quite the culture shock.
"Very much so," he said, smiling. "You can imagine. I don't need to tell you any stories."
When pushed, Lal did recall one story that hasn't left him since his early days in Texas.
"The funny one is, so I didn't know anything about fashion or anything, I just went to school," he said. "But mom took me to Sears to buy some school clothes, and I saw these Dallas Cowboys corduroy jeans that had a Cowboys patch on the back. I thought, 'Well, if I get these, kids are going to like me on the first day.'
"Well, that was the wrong choice. They didn't like the jeans and basically killed me about it. I got acclimated fast, though."
Lal said he quickly grew fond of the Cowboys — despite the corduroy jeans misstep — and has long admired the franchise because it's a family-run organization.
Now, he's a part of it all, hired in January to replace Derek Dooley, who left after five seasons to become Missouri's offensive coordinator.
Cowboys owner Jerry Jones said he's less concerned about overhauling the club's receiver corps this offseason because of Lal, who was hired with a reputation as one of the league's top route gurus.
"He's a real find for us," Jones said. "He was one of the most sought-after assistant coaches in the offseason that I've seen in a long time."
Lal's father, a systems analyst, was born in Tanzania and moved to India with his family when he was 17. His father met his mother — a Montessori teacher — in India, and they moved to London after they married. Lal's extensive travels helped him become multilingual. At different times, he spoke Hindi and Spanish and could understand Arabic.
"My family had no background in football," Lal said. "I don't think they even knew what football was until I started playing it. When we got to Plano, we'd play in the backyards or the front lawns. We'd play football every day. I started reading about all the players and just loved football. And I could catch, so they liked me."
After three years in Plano, Lal moved with his family to Northern California and finished high school there.
Lal knows the ins and outs of receiver because he played the position. He was a walk-on at UCLA and a member of the Bruins' Cotton Bowl championship team in 1989. He then transferred to Washington, where he played for the Huskies from 1990 to 1992. He was part of Washington's national title team in 1992 and played on two Rose Bowl teams en route to being inducted into the Husky Hall of Fame.
Lal graduated with a business administration degree from Washington in 1993 and was invited to the Raiders' training camp. He also spent time with the St. Louis Rams before hamstring injuries derailed any chance of a pro career.
Lal spent 11 years coaching in the high school and college ranks before the Raiders gave him his first NFL opportunity in 2007 as the offensive quality control coach.
Two years later, the Raiders made Lal their receivers coach. From 2012 to 2014 he was the Jets' receivers coach, from 2015 to 2016 the Bills' receivers coach and then he became the Colts' receivers coach in 2017 before joining the Cowboys.
Lal's cerebral approach to coaching is a mix of his parents' paths, calculated and detailed, and he's a teacher at heart.
Lal cares about the finer details of routes, from how to line up in a proper stance, to finding the right depth, to maximizing leverage, to camouflaging a forthcoming break, and so on.
"It's choreography," Lal said of route running. "If you have a free-access look, you can't be thinking about yards and depth. This has to be muscle memory. We're working our footwork, our angles, how far our feet spread apart at the top of a break, where our shoulders are, where our eyes are pointed, and you've got to coach the minutia or it doesn't happen.
"We film from all different angles, and we go in the room and we watch them. We say, 'Hey, your left foot was pointed the wrong way. Turn your toe in a little bit and that will bring you out of this break more efficiently.' So, really breaking down the game for these receivers and teaching them and understanding leverage, how far do I have to sync my hips to take enough speed off my next step ... so coaching the physics of it. Once they can self-correct, then you've got a real good shot."
New Cowboys receivers Allen Hurns and Tavon Austin said they appreciate Lal already for how detailed he is and for his teaching style. Austin said he's one of the receivers who Lal's already harping on about setting his feet just right in his stance.
"He's real precise on what he wants," Austin said. "He is always trying to help us by putting tools in our basket about how to get open. So I definitely like him. He just doesn't tell you, he shows you. He'll take us on every step we're doing right or we're doing wrong. I love him so far."
Lal said he evaluated every Cowboys receiver from 2017 upon his hiring, breaking down strengths and weaknesses, and then went to work.
"My goal, I take pride in, 'They say he can't run this route,' " Lal said. "Well, that's not going to be the case anymore. We're going to coach it, and he's going to be able to run the comeback even though they said he can't."
Lal said he doesn't want to box in any receiver.
"I don't, because I was always boxed in," Lal said. "And I did not like that, and I fought through it. They said I couldn't do anything: 'You can't play, you can't coach, you can't do anything. What are you thinking?' So, I was like, 'I know what I'm doing.' "
Lal has already made an impression on Cowboys offensive coordinator Scott Linehan.
"I can already see a lot of things out here that are a direct impact of what he's teaching," Linehan said. "He just kind of gets the position. He played it. He was one of those, I don't want to call him an overachiever type, but he was one of those guys who had to get the most out of his own abilities. He sees that in players who have the ability beyond that. He's been great."
This is Lal's fourth NFL team in five years, but he said he's right where he wants to be.
"It's been a dream to coach for this team," Lal said. "I always wanted to work here. It was like a no-brainer for me. It's been a pleasure so far."
About the Author
