You can be forgiven if you are constantly pinching yourself to make sure you are awake and Jerry Jones is actually making solid decisions about the Dallas Cowboys.
During the recently concluded NFL Combine, Jones was strangely quiet. Not once holding court with reporters and uttering those dreadful words: “We’re all in!”
Then came news that the Cowboys had begun contract extension talks with Micah Parsons.
Then Osa Odighizuwa was signed to a reasonable four-year deal.
Shortly after that, CeeDee Lamb’s contract was restructured. On Wednesday, Dak Prescott’s deal was reworked and one expects Terence Steele’s soon will be too.
Suddenly, the Dallas Cowboys have plenty of room under the cap to play with.
Could it be that, when free agency officially kicks off next week, the Dallas Cowboys are going to be serious players for the first time in a very long time?
Is it possible, after nearly three decades of “Jerry’s Way”, the Cowboys’ owner has finally got the memo?
Hope Springs Eternal
Ever since Jimmy Johnson was fired departed Dallas after winning back-to-back Super Bowls, and the team Johnson built was finally disbanded, Jones has had one mission.
He wanted to prove to the world that he was more responsible for the success of the early 1990s than Johnson.
Jones has been trying to do that for three decades. He’s been failing at it for three decades.
No matter who he’s drafted, which free agents he’s signed, which players he’s traded for, or which coaches he’s hired, he hasn’t seen the Cowboys make it to even a conference title game.
Each year since the Super Bowl XXX victory over the Steelers in Arizona at the end of the 1995 season, we’ve seen the same script.
More of his draft picks have been blunders than have been stars. Most of his trades have backfired, with very few exceptions.
He has made the wrong choices in re-signing his players, and letting good ones get away instead, far too many times.
Each year we’ve heard him say he was confident this year would be the year. Each year we began with great hope.
Only to see each year ending no later than the divisional round, those few times the team made it that far at all.
So why is it that many of us, who have long called for Jones to sell the team, or at least hire a competent general manager, are starting to feel a slight sliver of hope this spring?
What Has Changed?
For starters, Jones isn’t out there pontificating in front of any camera he can find. For another, the moves made so far are making a lot of sense.
Maybe the constant drumbeat of fans and media has finally forced Jones to read the memo.
It isn’t a very long one, and it goes something like this:
Dear, Jerry.
What you’ve been doing hasn’t worked in 30 years. It’s time to do something else.
While the criticism levied at Jones and the front office has been harsh, it isn’t unwarranted.
For too long, the perception of those of us outside The Star in Frisco has been that the ownership has been more focused on being named the most valuable sports franchise. In terms of money rather than in terms of championships, of course.
The perception is that the front office as a whole seems more interested in the glam, and the mainstream media hype, than it is in listening to the fan base.
For whatever reason, be it Jones’ age, last year’s abhorrent 7-10 record, or maybe watching the Eagles win a title for the second time by actually doing something, the message has finally gotten through.
It certainly took long enough.
Will It Stick?
There’s the question of the hour, the day, the month, and the year.
Yes, the Cowboys are off to a very good start this offseason. So far.
We’ll see how committed this organization is to changing their ways starting next week.
There are some very good, high-end free agents out there. Many of them are in areas of need on the Cowboys’ roster.
Of course, a few hours after I wrote this post and scheduled it to run today, Jones goes and undoes everything by saying this on Wednesday.
“I don’t think aggressive is the right word. … I’m not looking at free agency as a place to fill voids.”
Let’s hope this was a glitch in the new matrix, a moment when Old Jerry broke through but was quickly stuffed back in a box.
Change is hard, you know. Sometimes it takes a little bit for the new programming to take.
How next month’s draft plays out will also offer up more clues as to this being for real or just an aberration.
I will repeat once again: I doubt Ashton Jeanty will be there to be taken at No. 12 by Dallas.
But if he is, the Cowboys cannot pass up the best player on the board. Unless they want to see him become Randy Moss 2.0.
Letting Jeanty pass them by would be a colossal error. It would also be a tell that they really haven’t changed their ways.
No matter how the draft plays out, the real tell on whether of not Jones has finally figured it out will come as the summer plays out.
If he returns to his old ways of holding court, if he isn’t a player in free agency, or if he bungles the draft, we’ll know we were taken for fools yet again.
But, if he has finally learned that what it takes to build a title-contending team begins at the top of the organization, then maybe our time in football purgatory is coming to an end.