FRISCO, Texas — Dak Prescott can’t stop thinking about the Dallas Cowboys’ 23-17 loss to the San Francisco 49ers in the wild-card round of the playoffs.

He entered the postseason believing the Cowboys were ready for a deep run and maybe put to rest the franchise’s 26-season Super Bowl drought. Instead, they were the only home team to lose on the first weekend of the playoffs.

“There’s probably some games, some moments in an athlete’s career that just stick with them forever, and I’m sure that’ll be one of them,” the quarterback said at Ford Center recently.

The disappointment may linger, but the work to renew the optimism he had in January will soon begin.

After the loss to the Niners, Prescott said he would take a little bit of time away to reboot. He passed on playing in the Pro Bowl after a long period of constant rehab due to the dislocation and compound fracture of his right ankle in 2020, the right latissimus strain he suffered in training camp and the right calf injury he suffered in October.

A year ago at this time, Prescott was just getting out of a cast after a second surgery on his right ankle. He was in a walking boot and a month or so away from signing the richest deal in Cowboys history: four years, $160 million, including a $65 million signing bonus.

If 2021 was about Prescott’s return to health, 2022 will be about his ability to carry the Cowboys back to a Super Bowl with a roster that may look a lot different than the one that finished 12-5 and won the NFC East.

“Dak has the skill to make that happen,” owner and general manager Jerry Jones said on 105.3 The Fan in Dallas after the season ended.

Unlike last year, quarterback Dak Prescott heads into the offseason without having to rehab back from major injury. Richard Rodriguez/Getty Images

History, however, is not on the side of Prescott, who’s entering his seventh season as the Cowboys’ starter in 2022.

Since 1980, only three quarterbacks have made it to their first Super Bowl with their original team after a longer run as the every-game starter than Prescott has had as the Cowboys’ starter. Ken Anderson was in his 10th season with the Cincinnati Bengals when they made Super Bowl XVI. Peyton Manning and Matt Ryan were in their ninth seasons as the starters for the Indianapolis Colts and Atlanta Falcons in their first runs to Super Bowls XLI and LI, respectively.

Prescott is coming off a season in which he set a franchise record for touchdown passes (37). He completed a career-best 68.8% of his passes. He threw for 4,449 yards in 16 starts, the second-best total of his career. He directed the no. 1 offense in terms of yardage and points.

Yet it wasn’t good enough to get the Cowboys past the first weekend of the playoffs.

It was almost as if Prescott had two seasons inside one season: the first six games before suffering a calf injury and his last 10 after the calf injury.

Before getting hurt on the overtime touchdown pass to receiver CeeDee Lamb to beat the New England Patriots in Week 6, Prescott was an MVP candidate, throwing for 1,813 yards with 16 touchdown passes to four interceptions while completing 73.1% of his passes.

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After the injury, he threw for 2,636 yards with 21 touchdown passes and six interceptions and completed 66% of his passes. Those numbers are still good but not at the level Prescott showed in the first games of the 2020 season before his ankle injury and the first six games of the 2021 season.

“I went through a period in the time right there in the season and just didn’t play my best ball, and people tried to say it was the calf,” Prescott said on “The Rich Eisen Show” podcast. “The calf got better. I did everything that I needed to do for it to heal.”

Something happened, be it the ineffectiveness of the running game in part because of the partially torn posterior cruciate ligament Ezekiel Elliott suffered in October, the refusal to give running back Tony Pollard more looks, the inconsistencies on the offensive line or the unavailability of key receivers Amari Cooper, Michael Gallup or Lamb because of COVID-19 or injuries.

At times, Prescott’s footwork seemed out of whack, although coach Mike McCarthy called that a “blanket statement.”

“I don’t think it’s, you know, ‘My god, we’ve got to fix that,’ No, that’s not the case,” McCarthy said. “I think just like anything if he was standing here he’ll tell you there’s some throws or some things we maybe need more reps at or more timing. And I think with the challenge of having multiple perimeter options [out], getting in tune with every guy on every particular route, working through the route tree, we definitely need to continue working on the details of that. So I think it all will be a part of moving forward.”

One other thing changed after Prescott’s calf injury on Oct. 17. His personal quarterback coach, 3DQB’s John Beck, took a job as an assistant with the New York Jets on Nov. 2 to help tutor Zach Wilson, the No. 2 overall pick in the draft.

Prescott said he was still getting feedback from Adam Dedeaux, Beck’s partner.

“The in-season is not that important, I guess you can say as much as the off-season is,” Prescott said during the season. “But yeah, I look forward to getting back to him [when] the off-season happens.”

Prescott credits Beck and 3DQB as part of the foundation to his success. While his pregame warm-up became a viral sensation, the details of the program helped further Prescott’s game. Last offseason, however, they could not do everything they wanted because of Prescott’s recovery from the ankle injury.

Back in motion! @dak #3DQBTEXAS pic.twitter.com/vPYv94kzCQ

— 3DQBTexas (@DamianDevon) April 7, 2021

“Everything had to involve rehab,” said Beck, who will not return to the Jets. “Like in the beginning there were days that we couldn’t have him on his feet going through a normal work day. We had to do things that took him off his feet and be strategic on how we’d work some rotational abilities, his balance, his mechanics without requiring too much from his leg and ankle too soon.”

Considering the detail involved in the position of the shoulder relative to the hips and the torque required to make certain throws, there was only so much they could do.

“Dak by nature is a pusher,” Beck said. “He’s going to push the envelope. He’s going to try to come back sooner, ‘Hey, I’m feeling good. Let’s go.’ But you’ve got to be smart with it.”

Most of the power comes from Prescott’s right leg, although not every throw requires the same amount of strength. A lot of the work Prescott goes through is to simulate game situations so the unnatural can become natural.

“Dak is wired that way to have great feet and be as clean as possible,” Beck said.

The goal last offseason was to get Prescott back to where he was before the injury. Now the goal is to make him better than he has ever been, “even if it’s by just one percent,” Beck said.

The workouts bounce between the Dallas area, including Prescott’s backyard turf field, and California. The time on field varies. Sometimes teammates will be on hand with Prescott putting together trips to build a better rapport on and off the field.

“I know he’s excited to have an offseason that feels like his normal offseason,” Beck said.

Beck is right.

“Just having a full offseason to be able to go through my training and not worry about getting my leg healthy, all my quarterback drills and everything that I do in a normal, healthy offseason,” Prescott said.

In addition to his health at this time a year ago, Prescott’s contractual future was in question. Would the Cowboys place the franchise tag on him again? Could they justify such a big contract coming off such a severe injury?

Those questions were answered by March when he signed a deal that averaged $40 million per season, topped only by Kansas City’s Patrick Mahomes ($45 million) and subsequently topped by Buffalo’s Josh Allen ($43 million).

While not perfect, Prescott answered questions about his ability to return from the injury during the course of the season.

Now Prescott, who turns 29 in July, needs to answer another question: Can he take the Cowboys to a Super Bowl?

“I’m a worker. That’s all I know,” Prescott said from the AT&T podium after the loss to the Niners. “I’ll take maybe a week or so to get away I guess you could say, clear my mind. But that’s kind of hard for me, especially after a season like this, having a chance, having the people that we have, I think this is a season that will probably stick with me and motivate me throughout the rest of my career, not just this offseason. I’ll be back at it pretty quick.

“I’m looking forward to getting better, becoming a better player, and doing whatever I can to help the team to get back to this position, but more importantly win.”

The post Transferring previous 2021, Cowboys’ Dak Prescott welcomes offseason targeted on development, not restoration – Dallas Cowboys Weblog appeared first on Los Gatos News And Events.

Family-owned heating, ventilation, and air conditioning companies with steady, recession-resistant incomes are a hot acquisition target for private equity firms.

The Gulf Coast in particular was a popular hunting ground. These include companies like Alpine Investors, a San Francisco-based PE company whose former subsidiary Wrench Group operated in the Tampa / Sarasota, Atlanta, Dallas, Houston and Phoenix markets, and which jointly bought HVAC companies – like Sarasota’s CoolToday for annual sales of $ 150 million. Alpine eventually sold the Wrench Group to another investment firm, Investcorp.

Alpine is now back with Apex Service Partners, a newly formed Tampa-based company led by President and CEO AJ Brown, 32, and CFO Will Matson, 30. Apex is again backed by Alpine and has $ 100 million in funding that can be purchased independently from its own HVAC and household services businesses.

“Our goal,” says Brown, “is to work with the best brands in the best communities and help them become bigger and better versions of themselves so they can better serve their communities.”

“I’ve done the big businesses, but what I’m passionate about is building small businesses. This is how you affect people’s lives. ‘Will Matson, Apex Service Partner

Despite their youth, Brown and Matson have impressive pedigrees. Brown, who grew up in Fort Myers, worked at Goldman Sachs before becoming CFO and Head of M&A at AVITRU, an Atlanta-based construction software and services company that Roper Technologies of Lakewood Ranch acquired from Alpine in December 2018 Has. Matson, who grew up in Texas worked for JPMorganChase & Co. in New York and London.

Matson, who worked for his family’s blue collar manufacturing business prior to college, said his penchant for small, founder-owned businesses led him to Apex.

“My father wore blue jeans and work boots and I worked for him over the summer and had all the troubles of a small family business,” says Matson. “I’ve done the big businesses, but what I’m passionate about is building small businesses. This is how you affect people’s lives. “

Brown agrees, calling small businesses “the lifeblood of the economy.”

GO FAR

For Brown, Matson, and the entire Apex team, the success of their business begins with a national strategy. In addition to Florida, the company has already acquired HVAC and household services companies in Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi. The most recent acquisition is St. Louis-based Academy Air.

To date, Apex has acquired 14 companies with gross sales of approximately $ 200 million. (Brown and Matson prefer to use the term “partner” rather than “acquire” when discussing business.)

“We’ve worked with some of the best small and medium-sized businesses in the business,” says Matson. “But we want to give them resources that they have never had before. It’s like a racing driver who has never had a pit crew. You’ve never got anyone into professional finance, accounting, professional recruiting, professional business intelligence, and marketing. So it’s about making resources available to them while keeping them extremely local. ”

In other words, rebranding is not the apex way. The company is largely straightforward in its approach, allowing HVAC companies to maintain their carefully honed identity and reputation.

“We have 20 different brands,” says Matson. “We have one of the oldest brands in New Orleans, one of the oldest brands in Naples, Orlando, and we want to continue to strengthen them as local institutions.”

GO DEEP

An early step in building a comprehensive, unified business development platform was the hiring of Steve McCarty, who assumed the role of Chief People Officer at Apex. McCarty, a longtime manager at Enterprise Holdings, the parent company of Enterprise Rent-A-Car, helped set up Enterprise’s renowned training and management program.

“He wanted to take the same framework and apply it to the craft because it works so well in a rental car [sector]This is, in a way, a similar industry, ”says Brown. “It’s worker; They wash cars; It’s about sales. ”

Courtesy. Academy Air in St. Louis is now part of Apex Service Partners’ portfolio of HVAC companies.

Winning a rock star like McCarty as one of its first employees is an indication of how Apex intends to nurture deep, lasting, and mutually beneficial relationships with the businesses it has acquired, rather than just flipping them over for a quick buck. Three of the companies Apex acquired have already had gross annual sales up from $ 15 million to $ 50 million, and their experiences have been summarized in tactics and strategies shared with other Apex partners aiming to make similar leaps.

“When each of our partners grow, they run the biggest company they’ve ever run,” says Brown, “because they’re growing month by month every month. So we offer them talents and best practices to share, shared insights that will help them not be the lid that stifles the growth of their business. ”

This mindset speaks volumes for Apex’s approach to mergers and acquisitions. The company itself, Matson and Brown explain, is not a private equity firm. Yes, it’s backed by the deep pockets of Alpine investors, but he and Brown view what they’re doing as long-term, growth-oriented business development with the intent to buy and hold. The strategy is similar to that of Clockwork Home Services in Sarasota in the 1990s and 2000s, when a network of home service companies was built under multiple brands. Toronto-based Direct Energy bought Clockwork in July 2010 for $ 183 million.

“Private equity gets a bad rap,” says Brown. “Quick flip, quick flip, quick flip – there are private equity firms that do that, but our private equity investor is not keen on them. We build companies to last. “

Brown adds that Apex invested millions of dollars back in the HVAC businesses it acquired. “We’ve done more than 50 implementations to help modernize systems,” he says. “We spent millions of dollars building corporate infrastructure, millions of dollars on facilities and equipment. A lot of capital has been put into these companies to free them up so that they can be on the catwalk for the next 20 years. ”

“We want to build something that will be around for a very long time,” adds Matson, “a company that can endure and lead the industry.”

TO GO TO SCHOOL

Small businesses may be the lifeblood of business, but people are the lifeblood of small businesses, and therein lies a major challenge Apex must overcome in order to expand its involvement in HVAC and household services.

“I don’t think it’s an imminent threat, but there aren’t enough people going into trade,” says Matson. “People have options. Trying to be a preferred employer in a labor shortage market is difficult. We are really trying to separate there. ”

Apex is investing heavily in local recruiting and training initiatives, according to Matson, to fill the ranks of the companies it has bought with talented, hardworking, and entrepreneurial artisans. “We spend so much time and energy recruiting, training, developing people and really giving them a roadmap,” he says. “We say, ‘Look, you just got your GED – are you interested in going to a business school? There is a card that will take you six numbers in a couple of years. «We see this story all the time. ”

Apex’s educational efforts extend to corporate owners as well. In many cases, Matson and his team are dealing directly with a founding owner, the only person who has ever been a company’s chief executive. Through a series of conversations, Apex must figure out how best to meet the owner’s desires while preparing the company for future success.

“We want to honor and preserve the legacy of your life’s work,” he says, “and look after your employees. But some people have different desires. Some toss the keys at you and say, “I want to retire and be on the beach in 90 days.” Others say, “I’m slowing down. I want to keep working, but I want to work two days a week. ‘While others are just starting out. We have to meet many different requirements, but in the end that’s why we call ourselves Apex Service Partners. We try to serve our partners. ”

(This story has been updated to clarify that William Matson was not part of the Wrench Group prior to joining Apex Service Partners and that AJ Brown, not Matson, grew up in Fort Myers.)

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Fed chairman Jerome Powell has avoided the issue or completely denied the Fed’s involvement in growing economic inequality in the US, but San Francisco Fed President Mary Daly and other members of the Fed have been much more proactive.

Where it says: While Daly insists that the answer to whether the Fed has increased inequality is “not yes or no,” she admits it is an issue the Fed has been involved in and could do more to decrease it.

• “Many of us openly discuss this … and talk about the role we can potentially play in balancing asset distribution or access to assets,” Daly told Axios.
• “If we really want to address this, we can’t just say we don’t have the toolkit. We have to investigate what we can do.”

Why it matters: Inequality becomes a major concern for policy makers as more Americans become dissatisfied with the economy and the disjointed K-shape recovery takes place after the coronavirus pandemic outbreak.

What you do: Daly says that prior to the pandemic, the events of the San Francisco Fed, including the Fed Lists series, included discussions on how “monetary policy can be thought about in a way that supports those who are at the end of the income or wealth distribution stand or not as promoting inequality. “

• The Fed’s credit facility on Main Street and its support for the Paycheck Protection Program were “developments that emerge from this realization, if you will, that we are our lenders of last resort in markets other than treasury , give the opportunity and have to use it. ” . “

The last word: “There is more work to be done, but I definitely want to go back to the characterization that we don’t think about it.”

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NICOLEHOLLIS

Employer:

San Francisco, CA, USAPlace:

Wed, February 24, 21Published on:

Full timeType:

IA RESIDENTIAL DESIGN ASSISTANT

NICOLEHOLLIS, an award-winning large interior design firm, is looking for a talented and motivated IA design assistant to support our residential design team.

The IA Design Assistant contributes to the success of Nicole Hollis, Inc. by helping with general office and design tasks, drawing, sourcing, coordinating, filing libraries and images. The ideal candidate will have 2-3 years of experience in residential interior design with an emphasis on high-end home design.

RESPONSIBILITIES AND MATERIAL WORK FUNCTIONS INCLUDE BUT ARE NOT LIMITED TO THE FOLLOWING:

The main role of Design Assistant is to assist the designers during the design process by gathering the necessary design materials for projects, including:

• Materials, surfaces, appliances, plumbing, hardware and bathroom accessories.
• Color and finish options, preliminary color schemes
• Write mood boards, collect relevant pictures.
• Drafting of views, floor plans and presentation of presentation drawings.

Organize and maintain the design library:

• Set up meetings with vendors and present new materials to the project team
• Research building materials and surfaces.
• Maintain the library and send the samples back to the Design Center.
• Collect relevant images from magazines and books
• Research new products and materials

Prepare for customer meetings and other tasks as needed:

• Gather and pack the necessary materials and organize the meeting’s agenda
• Write and revise the facility specifications
• Create budgets, schedules, and specifications
• Enter meeting notes and create project folders

COMPETENCIES:

• Degree in interior design or interior design
• At least 2 years of experience in interior design
• Excellent presentation skills including room planning and drawing
• Knowledge of AutoCAD, AutoCAD LT
• Ability to read a range of design documents and section details
• Ability to create and manage Excel tables
• Knowledge of Adobe Illustrator, InDesign and Photoshop
• Knowledge and / or ability to learn about time recording and accounting software
• Experience in the selection and specification of mills, lighting, hardware, plumbing, materials and surfaces
• Experience with Spexx preferred
• Experience with Sketchup and / or 3DSMax preferred
• Ability to interact effectively with the design team on multiple projects
• Experience with budgets
• Knowledge of trading resources and providers

CORE COMPETENCIES:

• Task Focus: Provides customers and vendors with legendary service that meets and exceeds expectations.
• Ethics and Integrity: Follow Nicole Hollis, Inc.’s values, beliefs, and principles for innovation and design excellence
• Serenity: stay calm, maintain perspective and react professionally to difficult situations
• Personal learning: Takes personal responsibility for continuously learning new knowledge, skills and experiences
• Dealing with Ambiguity: Can function successfully in times of uncertainty and changing priorities
• Decision Making: Makes sharp and timely decisions based on a mixture of analysis, wisdom, experience and judgment
• Interpersonal Skills: Builds effective relationships with everyone – up, down, and sideways, inside and outside of Nicole Hollis, Inc.
• Results-oriented: Achieve results and achieve goals

This position is full-time, perpetual, with full health coverage, 401 (k) Safe Harbor Matching, pre-tax flexible expense account, commuter benefits, 529 college pre-tax plan, and PTO

Please send your resume, portfolio and additional documents with CAD details, drawings, schedules and presentations and salary requirements to careers@nicolehollis.com

View your application history

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