DALLAS — It feels like ancient history now, the story of how Jerry and Stephen Jones almost came to blows in The Mansion at Turtle Creek in 1995 when the younger Jones realized his father was about to pay an exorbitant salary to pry Deion Sanders out of San Francisco. It was a contract that, along with others, would lead to the Cowboys’ landing in salary cap jail at the end of the decade.
Oh, yes. It was also instrumental in Dallas capturing its most recent Lombardi Trophy.
After losing that particular fight, through the years the steadying hand of Stephen has won many battles with all-in Jerry, famously including the drafting of future Hall of Famer Zack Martin over Johnny Manziel. But now is not the time for frugality. Patience is great when it comes to raising teenagers or anticipating the start of the baseball season, but this is not that kind of time for the Dallas Cowboys.
In 2022 — or at least in March of 2022 — the club needs a little more guidance from its part-time boxing promoter/owner and a little less from its bottom line-focused executive vice president.
Dallas is coming off a 12-5 season, one that surely ended in disappointment against San Francisco but was also their best regular season since 2016. That’s when the club went 13-3 and Dak and Zeke were rookies and the future was brighter than the west end zone glare at AT&T Stadium. And that’s also when the Cowboys chose to move forward with what they view as proper prudence and others might term some degree of idiocy — cutting the cord with three starters in the secondary and hoping to live with their rookie replacements in 2017.
I don’t mean to portray Brandon Carr, Barry Church and Mo Claiborne as three versions of Mel Renfro. But in using almost all of their draft capital on replacements (not to mention Taco Charlton) along with Ezekiel Elliott’s off-the-field drama and suspension dropped the club to 9-7. The Cowboys had never won more than 10 games again until last season.
The current attrition in the NFC — no more Tom Brady in Tampa Bay, perhaps no Aaron Rodgers in Green Bay, a Rams’ championship team that has left itself no room for off-season additions — should have the Cowboys approaching 2022 as their time to shine. It’s Dak’s seventh year now. When exactly is this club hoping to see him produce the playoff wins that are expected to come with a $40 million-per-year salary?
Instead, we hear Stephen Jones suggesting that either wide receiver Amari Cooper or defensive end DeMarcus Lawrence (or perhaps but not likely both) could be too expensive. They are the star players this team could release (in Cooper’s case very soon and in Lawrence’s case in June) to save salary cap dollars and continue the Cowboys’ austerity program that at least one section of the front office believes is the desired goal.
It has to gall Cowboys fans to hear Stephen Jones say this about the Rams.
“Certainly they went about it in a way that is pushing a lot of chips out there. We could obviously do some things that would allow us to keep most of our guys if we wanted to push it all out, but then we’d have a much bigger problem next year and the year after that,’’ he said.
Same old Stephen. One more unfortunate reminder that urgency is a product of having your job on the line with every decision — a way of life in 31 front offices but not the shimmering glass tower at the Star.
He speaks as if to say, “Yeah LA won a Super Bowl but at what cost?”
The Rams don’t have a pick until the fifth round next month although they will probably get a late third as a compensatory pick. They haven’t had a first-round pick the last five years and don’t have one in 2023, either. But they have played in two of the last four Super Bowls and are receiving rings this year.
I have to think that feels a lot like winning.
Honestly, the Cowboys aren’t even as efficient with their toe-dipping approach as they would like you to believe. The Rams may be $13 million over the cap but the Cowboys are $21 million over it. Only the Saints and Packers have more finagling to do with player contracts or releases than Dallas.
We all know that the Cowboys can spread money down the line on the contracts of players who aren’t leaving any time soon, starting with Prescott, and get to where they need to be. There is no need to release Lawrence, especially with Randy Gregory and Dorance Armstrong hitting free agency, and while I understand Cooper did not have a great season in 2021, it still seems foolish to turn that spot over to the less versatile Michael Gallup, who would need to be resigned while recovering from a major injury.
Cowboys fans don’t want to hear about the 2024 budget that Jones mentioned earlier this week. Dallas wasn’t far from the top last year and the uncertain quarterback situations around the conference suggest a possible opening if only this team can get the off-season right.
The last time the Cowboys were this good management chose to retreat. No one should be willing to accept that conservative path being chosen again.
