Category: Jerry Jones

Cowboys’ Jones offers Texas RB Brooks stunning compliment ahead of Day 2

From @ToddBrock24f7: The Cowboys may be looking to add the Longhorns back on Day 2 of the draft. He already occupies a unique place within Jerry’s long history.

The Cowboys brain trust raved about first-round pick Tyler Guyton on Thursday night after making the Oklahoma offensive tackle the 29th overall pick in the 2024 draft.

But team owner Jerry Jones did a fair bit of gushing over a player still on the board, too, perhaps tipping his hand as to who he and the team are eyeing when the second round gets underway Friday evening.

When asked toward the end of the press conference at the conclusion of Day 1 about Texas running back Jonathon Brooks, Jones didn’t hesitate.

“In my 30 years, I thought it was the best interview that I’ve ever interviewed with a player,” Jones said of Brooks.

The brash businessman’s well-known hyperbole aside, that’s saying something, considering how many countless prospects he’s sat down with over the course of his ownership.

“He’s outstanding,” Jones went on about the Longhorns ball carrier who most have pegged as the top back in the draft class. “He’s just outstanding. He’s a great football player. We’ve got him high, high, high.”

If not for an ACL tear suffered in November, Brooks would have likely already been drafted, despite an overall depression in the running back market in today’s NFL and a growing tendency to not draft them early.

“I got to sit with him as well,” Stephen Jones added. “I think he’s working his tail off to get that knee [healthy], you know? He’s good friends with our guy [former Texas teammate and current Cowboys linebacker DeMarvion] Overshown.”

Overshown, the team’s third-round pick last year, sat out his rookie campaign with his own ACL injury.

“I think they’re taking notes on each other’s knees and how they’re coming along. They’re competitive like that,” Stephen went on. “But like Jerry said, he’s one hell of a football player… After visiting with him, you’re betting on him.”

Betting on Brooks to end up with a star on his helmet, though, may be a dicey wager. He’s currently listed by ESPN as the 11th-best prospect remaining; The Athletic ranks him 19th, and NFL.com has him 25th.

The Cowboys are currently slated to have the 24th pick once the second round gets underway.

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The Joneses’ fawning over Brooks could, of course, be a smokescreen designed to camouflage their true intention about who they’re targeting with the 56th overall pick or even a bit of chum thrown into the water to stir up some trade offers.

As the team’s VP of player personnel Will McClay quickly reminded everyone before the lovefest got too out of hand, Brooks is “one of several great players that are still left in this draft.”

But the conviction in Jerry’s voice when he recalled his interview with the 20-year-old Texas native was evident.

The Cowboys like Brooks. Whether that turns into something more will be a story to watch Friday night.

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Jerry Jones rubs Cowboys fans’ noses in ‘all in’ mantra, explains lack of offseason action

From @ToddBrock24f7: Jones got testy when asked how he would explain the team’s pending contract extensions and lack of movement this offseason to fans.

Well, now they’re just rubbing our noses in it.

“All in” it, you might say.

From the moment Cowboys owner Jerry Jones’s backside hit his chair for the team’s pre-draft press conference on Tuesday, it took less than three and a half minutes for him to- completely unprompted, mind you- spit out the catchphrase that first energized and then infuriated the team’s fanbase this offseason.

“We feel great about what we’ve been in free agency,” Jones ramped up before practically delivering the line with a knowing wink and hitting it three times, like any good comedian knows is key. “All in. All in. All in.”

Stephen Jones literally snickered into the microphone as his dad continued on his roll.

“We’re all in with these young guys coming on. And we’re all in with this draft.”

Cowboys fans were told the front office was “all in” on the offseason, and most interpreted that as a promise to be more aggressive in free agency. When the Joneses ended up spending less than every other team on veteran reinforcements, fans assumed it would become about locking in the team’s superstars- quarterback Dak Prescott, wide receiver CeeDee Lamb, and edge rusher Micah Parsons- to long-term extensions.

So far, that hasn’t happened yet, either.

Jones was asked how he would justify that inactivity to fans, and the 81-year-old got uncharacteristically testy.

“You may be working on it and not moving anything but your eyebrows. Who in the world would think that we’re not working on it? I work on it; it pops open at two in the morning sometimes. Your actual question is: why don’t you have something done an negotiated and put in the drawer? Well, we’d like to see some more leaves fall. We’d like to see some more action. It’s called option. A lot of guys need to hand it off to the first guy through the line. Another one will keep it another step, decide whether to pitch it or not, he’ll decide whether to turn upfield with it, and then he’s still got a pitch left. It’s called option quarterback. That’s working the problem. I’ve spent my life being an option quarterback, and I can go right out to the damn sideline and still leave a pitch in me… To say that you’re not working on it is not the right answer. What they differ with is your style. It’s on your mind; it’d be madness not to know that the contracts are ahead. I want to see a few more cards play, candidly. If you’ve got trouble with when the timing is around here, it’s because I’m not ready to go.”

It’s hard to say whether “I am working on it privately behind the scenes” or “I’d like to keep my options open” will drive Cowboys fans more crazy.

Jones reminded reporters more than once that the current conversation about the team’s big-money contracts is something they’ve known was coming.

“It’s called a salary cap. It is not a lack of money, under the premise. It’s not that at all. It’s a part of the rules, just like you can’t be offside or you can’t hit a guy when he’s already on he ground… And that salary cap means that if you pay [Zack] Martin more money one year, you’re going to have less to pay the next year. That’s just part of it,” Jones explained.

The billionaire reframed it in terms that maybe us common folk can better grasp.

“Sometimes you look at your account, and you’re loaded with money in there that day. But you know you’ve incurred bills that’s three times the money you have in your account. But that day, it looks like you’ve got a lot of money. You’ve got to be disciplined about spending what’s in your account if you know you’ve got all these bills out here,” he continued.

“You do understand when you’ve been operating on the credit card. And there’s no question we have been operating on the credit card. That’s how we’ve had Dak Prescott plus this great supporting cast around him for the last three or four years.”

Jones admitted that the supporting cast will have to make do with some less-expensive role-players this season and even acknowledged that there have been money moves made in the past that are partly to blame.

“We’ve had adjustments,” he said. “I saw some criticism someplace about Zeke and about paying Zeke. Do I need a raise of hands in this room of everybody that thought Zeke should be on this football team when he was holding out? But we had to adjust the contract, which took away from money that could have gone to Tyron.”

So the most valuable franchise on the planet is out here using coupons on Hamburger Helper, trying to serve it up like it’s filet mignon at Ruth’s Chris. And acting like it’s all part of the master plan.

“We have embraced running out of cap room, just as we embraced using it when we had it. So you embrace a lot about where you are. The mistake would be not looking around the corner ahead and understanding, two and three years out, where you’re going to be,” Jones said.

“I probably have as a good a feel as anybody living on this earth what the cap is going to be three years from now, four years from now, five years from now. I really do.”

But when it comes to the notion of a future without Prescott under center, Jones was firm.

“We want Dak Prescott,” he said flatly. “That’s that.”

Prescott hinted that he and Jones have spoken recently and are on the same page as to his future. Lamb, though, Prescott’s primary target on the field, said that talks over his expected extension haven’t even started. The Cowboys have traditionally saved their high-dollar announcements for the summer, often fine-tuning their biggest contracts while at training camp in California.

So the current silence is not unusual, the Joneses suggested.

“Talks are not a barometer of whether you’re close to a deal,” Jerry said. “At all.”

“When you’re talking about big contracts, like Dak, like CeeDee, like Micah,” Stephen added, “those things don’t happen overnight.”

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But they also apparently don’t happen over 100 nights, which is precisely how long it’s been since Dallas was embarrassed at home in a first-round playoff loss to seventh-seeded Green Bay.

And while fans are anxious to just have their favorite players locked in, the Cowboys bean-counters are fine to keep watching and waiting, being cautious to not overpay once again if they don’t have to.

“I can assure you, if we felt like we could get a number that was a good number…?” Stephen asked rhetorically. “Unfortunately, these, as we all know, representatives talk to each other. You don’t think the representatives of [Justin] Jefferson and CeeDee and [Ja’Marr] Chase aren’t talking? And you’d think they’ve got their eye on something really big? Please. Same thing with Micah, same thing with Dak. It’s cat-and-mouse.”

The penny-pinching approach the front office is employing this offseason will no doubt have the Cowboys similarly chasing the big spenders in the NFC, like the division rival Eagles.

That leaves the team exactly where they are today, with their most important contributors wondering about the club’s commitment to their long-term futures while the brass is simultaneously preparing to breathlessly usher in a new batch of minimum-football-wage workers.

“We’re very proud of this roster,” Jones said. “We feel good about the promise of the team that we’re going to have this year with this roster.”

But all the explanations, draft picks, and catchy taglines in the world likely won’t have Cowboys fans feeling any better about how 2024 is currently shaping up.

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Report: Cowboys owner Jerry Jones cited as lure for new Arkansas basketball coach

From @ToddBrock24f7: Jones is one of several power boosters who should be able to help Calipari woo basketball talent to Fayetteville through NIL dollars.

The owner of the Dallas Cowboys has so much gravitation pull within the world of sports that he’s causing a tidal shift within other sports, too.

The University of Arkansas has hired legendary men’s basketball head coach John Calipari away from Kentucky, and Jerry Jones’s status as one of the school’s A-list boosters reportedly helped seal the deal.

Jones attended Arkansas and, as an offensive lineman on the football team, was co-captain of the Razorbacks’ 1964 national championship squad. He remains heavily involved with his alma mater as a donor.

ESPN college basketball reporter Myron Medcalf points out that things had become strained recently between Calipari and Kentucky, perennially one of the nation’s top hoops programs. In Fayetteville, he’ll have access to deep pocketed “power boosters” like Jones, Tyson Foods chairman John Tyson, and the Walton family of Wal-Mart fame, all of whom have deep Arkansas ties.

Donations from Jones and other wealthy supporters will likely go a long way in helping Calipari attract top-tier talent to Arkansas in the new NIL age.

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Calipari’s Wildcats won the national title in 2012. He’s taken his teams to the Final Four six times, been named Naismith College Coach of the Year three times, and was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2015.

The obvious irony is that Cowboys fans have grown well accustomed to Jones repeatedly not being willing to get out his checkbook when it comes to spending for the Cowboys, whether it’s for big-name free agents or longtime locker-room fixtures who are due for sizable new contracts. The Cowboys also fell in several categories on this year’s NFLPA report card, which grades teams and their owners in categories like cafeteria food, training staff, and travel accommodations.

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Jerry Jones told Cowboys fans what they wanted to hear, and got away with it

The Cowboys effectively redefined the meaning of “all-in” to calm the anger within the fanbase but it just means business as usual, says @ReidDHanson.

Following the 48-32, first-round humiliation at the hands of the Packers in the playoffs, Cowboys Nation was in a state of near revolt this past winter. Not only didthe  heavily favored Cowboys lose to a lower seeded Green Bay team at home, but they lost in spectacular fashion, marking the second time in three postseasons Dallas was embarrassed at home.

Roughly 30 years since their last trip to the conference championship, Jerry Jones had to do something to quell the dissent within the fanbase. Things were boiling over in Cowboys Nation and the most valuable sports franchise on the planet had an infuriated customer base marching at the gates.

So Jones said “all in.”

Less than a year after son Stephen Jones spoke on the shortsightedness of an all-in strategy popularized by the Rams, Jerry Jones uttered the words his prized customer base needed to hear.

“It will be going all in on different people than you’ve done in the past,” Jones said. “We will be going all in. We’ve seen some things out of some players that we want to be all in on. Yes, I would say that you will see us this coming year not build it for the future. It’s the best way I’ve ever said. And that ought to answer a lot of questions.”

It sounded like an approach different from previous offseasons. Most importantly it was an approach that stopped the angry mob of fans in their tracks. Jones said “all in” repeatedly. He spoke of “this coming year” and said “not for the future” as a point of clarification. He even commented on the plainness in which he spoke, implying no reading between the lines, semantics, or follow-up questions are needed.

The NFL’s ultimate salesman sold his fans that things will be different in 2024. Some believed it while others did not. But the plain English used nipped the situation in the bud which was exactly as it was intended to do.

Not long after the pitchforks and torches had been returned to Amazon did the younger Jones start to walk back his father’s statements. Suddenly the definition of “all in” was up for debate and the Cowboys’ meaning of the phrase might actually mean the exact opposite of what the entire sports world knows it to mean.

In an unscheduled discussion with reporters, Jerry Jones spoke again on the issue at the annual owner’s meetings.

“We’re all-in,” Jones said as reported by Jori Epstein. “As a matter of fact, this is rolling the sleeves up and more all-in here than we were last year or the year before. It can impact us, in some cases, five years down the road.”

Indicating contract extensions for Dak Prescott, CeeDee Lamb and Micah Parsons will run up to five years into the future and possibly reset the market in the process, Jones effectively redefined “all-in” to just mean work hard and retain the biggest star players on the roster. It’s the same actions every other NFL team takes with their star players and in no way a departure from the Cowboys usual way of treating an offseason.

When Jerry Jones spoke to the media in January, he used “all-in” to sound like things would be different in 2024. In actuality it appears to be business as usual in Dallas only repackaged and rephrased into something misleading.

The Cowboys have lived on the extreme end of frugality most recent offseasons, often justifying it by the high cost of re-signing of their own star players. They traditionally retain their box office hits without flexing for anything extra. It’s been a trademark of theirs. All-in means something entirely different than that. Until now that is.

Redefining a word or phrase everyone already knows to be different harkens memories of Bill Clinton saying “it depends on what the meaning of the word is is” in grand jury testimony, or George Bush prematurely declaring “mission accomplished” on the deck of a carrier.

This is not an aw shucks, Jerry, ya got me again moment. It’s insulting. Not because everyone believed but because the Cowboys expected everyone to believe it and then forget it. It’s almost impossible to look at this as a simple miscommunication. Think back to the fervor in Cowboys Nation at the time of the first “all-in” decree by Jones. Nothing less would have sufficed.  He said what he needed to say. The fanbase demanded it. Maybe words don’t have meaning after all.

The 2024 Cowboys are officially all-in.

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‘Arrow’s really up’ on Cowboys QB Trey Lance, per Jerry Jones, but interest from other teams rumored

From @ToddBrock24f7: The Cowboys are ready for a camp battle at QB2 behind Dak Prescott, if they don’t get a more attractive trade offer from another team first.

The intrigue in the Cowboys’ QB room goes well beyond starter Dak Prescott and a possible extension that may or may not make him the league’s first-ever $60 million-per-year player.

There’s also the question of what the team will do behind Prescott, with longtime backup Cooper Rush and 2023 acquisition Trey Lance expected to battle for the No. 2 spot this summer.

Unless, of course, something were to change dramatically before then.

And, oh, the potential for that is most definitely there.

Lance’s name has been trending in recent days thanks to a post-combine report from Rich Eisen, who said earlier this week that the third overall draft pick in 2021 is “a possible solve at quarterback for the Minnesota Vikings,” based on chatter he heard in Indianapolis.

The 23-year-old Lance is a Minnesota native with just eight games’ worth of NFL experience, but he could be an intriguing project for Vikings head coach Kevin O’Connell, himself a former quarterbacks coach and offensive coordinator who has helped develop Kirk Cousins in both Washington and Minnesota and Jared Goff with the Rams. He also helped guide Los Angeles to a Super Bowl win with Matthew Stafford under center.

With Cousins now expected to be the top passer available in free agency and already thought by some to be primed to sign with Atlanta, O’Connell and the Vikings could be faced with: bringing aboard a new veteran quarterback in free agency, adding a highly-rated college prospect via the draft, or trading for someone currently on another team’s roster.

The Cowboys have already picked up Lance’s $4.25 million bonus, due five days after training camp starts in July. But they’ve also made it known they won’t pick up his far pricier fifth-year bonus for 2025.

That’s like putting out a sign for the rest of the league that the Cowboys are willing to at listen to trade offers, though owner Jerry Jones has raved about Lance and his “unique skills” since giving up a fourth-round draft pick to obtain him in late August.

“The arrow’s really up,” Jones told reporters in Indianapolis over the weekend. “He’s exceeded expectations as a person, as a worker.”

The former North Dakota State product has thrown just 102 NFL passes. He spent the 2023 season in Dallas learning Mike McCarthy’s offense and serving as the team’s emergency third quarterback.

“He’s very much what we had planned on, hoped,” Jones confirmed. “When we gave the pick, we knew we would be paying the bonus right now. That was a part of the same decision. That’s been reinforced by what he’s been with the team and the person he is, potentially the player.”

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And while Jones answered a question about whether he expects Lance to compete with seven-year veteran Rush to be Prescott’s primary understudy with an unqualified “yes,” he would almost certainly at least consider flipping the two-time FCS champion and high-potential project player for an early enough selection in this year’s draft.

Of course, Jones could, at least theoretically, choose to stand pat on all three of his passers. Without an extension for the MVP runner-up, every Cowboys quarterback- Prescott, Rush, and Lance- could be in a contract year in 2024.

Drama in Big D, indeed.

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Cowboys’ Jerry Jones noncommittal on WR Michael Gallup’s future: ‘We need to sit down’

From @ToddBrock24f7: The Cowboys owner hinted that the club and WR needed to sit down and talk soon, but he lauded what Gallup has meant to the Cowboys.

Cowboys fans have learned to rightfully take anything owner Jerry Jones says with a grain tablespoon fully-loaded 18-wheeler truckload of salt.

The club’s seeming willingness to let eight-time Pro Bowl tackle Tyron Smith simply walk out the door (or at least the casual manner in which they’re letting that storyline float around in the ether) after making some nebulous, impossible-to-actually-quantify-but-it’ll-look-great-on-T-shirts-in-the-pro-shop “all in” proclamation is ample, maddening proof.

But Jones is even waffling- at least publicly- on what looks to be, on the surface, the easiest slam-dunk decision of the Cowboys’ offseason.

When asked during his annual bus powwow at the scouting combine about wide receiver Michael Gallup’s future with the club, the 81-year-old was predictably noncommittal.

“[We] Don’t have a decision that we would like to talk about right now,” Jones told reporters. “It’s one that we’ll be going over with him. Nothing that we would say without him being involved. We need to sit down and go over his stuff with him before we talk about what we’re going to do or not do.”

While that’s the fair and prudent thing to say out loud, all logical indications are that the Cowboys should likely cut the six-year veteran following a decline in production that’s now lasted four years, since his only 1,000-yard campaign in 2019.

Gallup is currently slated to count $13.85 million against the 2024 salary cap, but the team could save $9.5 million if they designate him a post-June 1 cut.

The fact that he’s caught just 73 balls for 842 yards in the two years since his ACL injury makes it tough for some to justify even the $4 million he’s due if he’s on the Dallas roster on March 18.

But alternatively, there’s also sentiment that a rapidly-shrinking wide receiver market could make Gallup a trade target for some needy team. He could actually earn the Cowboys something in return if they just hold on long enough… and do a little salesmanship in the meantime.

Jones insisted that the former third-round draft pick has meant far more to the Cowboys than his recent stats suggest. He pointed to the five-year, $57 million contract the front office gave him just three months after his injury as evidence.

“What he means is reflected in his salary and the deal that we gave him,” Jones explained. “And that’s exactly the way we felt about him, feel about him.”

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But Jones knows there is a long list of Cowboys players who are similarly up for review in the coming days, weeks, and months.

And he can’t allow how he felt about Michael Gallup as the 2019 player or how he feels about Michael Gallup as the 2024 person to be the deciding factor in what happens moving forward.

“What we need to do today, relative to what’s available, we’ll have to really consider it. We’ve got to really give that consideration,” the owner said. “We’ve got some other considerations we have to consider right now, too. We’ll go over that with him.”

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$255M salary cap gives Cowboys new flexibility in Prescott negotiations

Prescott had leverage on multiple levels, including timing. The new cap takes some of that away and provides the Jones family with more comfortable chairs at the negotiation tables. Here’s how, from @KDDrummondNFL.

It’s now easier for the Dallas Cowboys to walk away from Dak Prescott. On Friday, the NFL released the figures for the 2024 salary cap, $255.4 million, steamrolling past previous projections. Originally the number was rumored to be between $240 million and $245 million. The actual number comes in $13 million above the median of that range and Stephen Jones has to be ecstatic.

Why? Because it keeps them from being strong armed in the Dak Prescott contract negotiations. Don’t get it twisted, Prescott still has like 80% of all of the leverage here, but blowing things up just became a little bit more palatable for the Jones family. Even if they do end up signing Prescott long-term, the extra room means they don’t have to resolve Prescott’s situation before addressing other needs. If nothing else, the additional cap space buys the Cowboys time.

Prescott currently sits with a $59.5 million cap hit that can be easily reduced in many ways. The most likely way is that the team works out an extension that makes him the highest paid player in league history, but reduces the 2024 impact on the cap. But now, with this extra $13 million in space they can play a little more hardball because it’s not as catastrophic to their offseason to not get space from Prescott’s deal.

 

 

For Cowboys to be all-in, they need to re-sign Dak Prescott

“All in” can mean a number of things but if the Cowboys really intend to make a major effort in 2024, it means they have to re-sign Dak Prescott, says @ReidDHanson.

“The king is dead. Long live the king.” It’s a customary phrase said at the passing of a monarch. It symbolizes the turning of the page as the new king is coronated and serves to immediately shift focus from the past to the future.

For Cowboys’ fans – don’t worry, Jerry Jones appears to be in fine health – it illustrates the front office’s readiness to move on to the 2024 season. After such a disastrous ending to the previous campaign, the Cowboys are eager to pour dirt on the old season and immediate shift into 2024 mode in one fell swoop.

In discussions with reporters at the Senior Bowl in Mobile, Jerry and Stephen Jones wasted no time hyping up the new season, giving just brief homage to the heartbreaking opportunity that was lost weeks ago.

“I think we’ll push the hell out of it,” Owner Jones said describing his level of aggressiveness in the coming offseason. “It will be going all in on different people than you’ve done in the past. We’ll be going all in…”

The, this year will be different vibe, was nothing new from Jones. The Cowboys’ master salesman does this every year about this time of winter, but use of the phrase “all in” was undoubtedly a new addition.

All-in is a strategy fans have been clamoring for, but the Cowboys have been avoiding. All in requires money and resources. It also could come at the cost of future campaigns. For a franchise that’s built on selling hope and hype each season, lean years are something they typically try to avoid.

But with fat new contracts approaching, the biggest window of opportunity appears to be closing. CeeDee Lamb and Micah Parsons will both be moving off their affordable rookie deals and into top-of-the-market territory. If Dallas wants to strike while the iron is hot and resources are available, 2024 is the time to do it.

Still, it’s difficult to hear the Joneses words without a certain degree of skepticism.

What is “all in?”

According to the most recent numbers from OTC, the Cowboys are over the cap already. Their -$22,805,299 in effective cap space ranks them bottom-six in the NFL this year. While most NFL fans know this cap number is highly malleable and not something that would inhibit a team from fulfilling their widest desires, the Cowboys typically paint the cap in a different light.

On countless occasions the Joneses have used the salary cap to explain and/or excuse their lack of activity in the offseason. They’ve used the excuse to avoid signing their own free agents and used it to explain why they didn’t sign good outside free agents.

The salary cap has served an important purpose for them and other owners. In many ways the salary cap was created by the owners to curb their own spending and justify it to their fanbases. It keeps their costs low and their profits high. It was made in the name of parity but used as a way to deflect blame.

When Jerry Jones says “all in” does he mean all that’s available today (which is nothing), a few dollars he’ll free up through restructuring deals in March (which is modest), or is he really talking about maximizing his spending power?

Jerry Jones’ touching gesture for grieving family of Cowboys fan

From @ToddBrock24f7: Jerry Jones sent a care package and a personal note to the family of a fan who passed away just before seeing his first Cowboys game.

The public perception of Cowboys owner Jerry Jones often paints a very specific picture. The glistening stadium. The high-level business dealings and sponsorships. The top-dollar real estate sprawl surrounding the team’s headquarters. Helicoptering in for games. Vacationing on the mega-yacht. Rolling up to the combine in his own luxury tour bus. The nonstop merchandising juggernaut behind the most valuable franchise in sports and one of the most recognized brands on the planet.

But every once in a while, a story comes to light that shows just how much the team- and its legions of faithful fans- really mean to the 81-year-old billionaire.

Veteran Cowboys insider Ed Werder brings us one such story this weekend, sharing via social media what Jones did for the family of a lifelong Cowboys fan who tragically never made it to his very first Cowboys game.

Timothy Washington was a hardcore Cowboys fan who, at 64, had never seen an NFL contest in person. His son, Timothy Jr., sought to change that earlier this month, taking his father to the Cowboys’ regular-season finale, their Week 18 road game versus the Commanders at FedEx Field.

Sadly, the elder Washington collapsed about 100 yards from the stadium on Jan. 7 and passed away.

Back at home in New Jersey after handling his father’s arrangements, the younger Washington received a care package from the Cowboys and a letter from Jones himself. Timothy Jr. shared the letter on his own Facebook page.

“Timothy’s support humbles me, and he is an inspiration,” Jones’s letter read, in part.

“We are grateful to have played a small part in Timothy’s life and appreciate his enthusiasm and love of the Dallas Cowboys!”

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It is perhaps a small gesture in the grand scheme of things, but one that deeply touched the grieving family and perhaps puts the game and the big-business team we all love into a different perspective, if only for a moment.

“Special thanks to Jerry Jones and the Dallas Cowboys for reaching out to our family and recognizing my Dad,” Tim Washington Jr. wrote on Facebook. “He would be so proud.”

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‘We have great confidence’: Jerry Jones makes statement regarding McCarthy’s 5th season as Cowboys HC

From @ToddBrock24f7: Jones promised a “deep review” after the Cowboys’ latest playoff loss but maintains that retaining McCarthy is “the best step forward.”

Cowboys owner Jerry Jones issued a statement Wednesday night shortly after news broke that Mike McCarthy would return for a fifth season as the team’s head coach.

Here is the full body of the statement:

“I believe this team is very close and capable of achieving our ultimate goals, and the best step forward for us will be with Mike McCarthy as our head coach. There is great benefit to continuing the team’s progress under Mike’s leadership as our head coach. Specifically, there are many layers of success that have occurred this season as a result of Mike’s approach to leading the team, both with individual players and with our team collectively. Mike has the highest regular-season winning percentage of any head coach in Cowboys history, and we will dedicate ourselves, in partnership with him, to translating that into reaching our postseason goals. Certainly, Mike’s career has demonstrated postseason success at a high level, and we have great confidence that can continue.

Further, our loss on Sunday is shared by everyone here, not just Coach McCarthy. Our players. Our coaches. Our front office. Myself. There is accountability for our results. I am accountable for our results. The lens we use to view and evaluate Coach McCarthy is holistic. While we’re all disappointed with the result on Sunday and with our playoff record, I am 100 percent supportive of him as our head coach and ability to reach our goals.

We will start our process of review and decision-making regarding everything that impacts our team and roster and, while we’re not going to address specific players and extensions or free agents at this point, it deserves our deepest review and consideration, and it will get it.”

McCarthy, the ninth head coach in franchise history, does have the best winning percentage of all of them… by the slimmest of margins. His .627 mark is just two-thousandths of a percentage point better than Barry Switzer’s .625, compiled from 1994 to 1997.

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Of course, it’s worth pointing out that Switzer’s Cowboys went 5-2 in the postseason over his four-season tenure and won a Super Bowl; McCarthy’s Dallas teams now have a 1-3 playoff record over an equivalent three postseason berths.

McCarthy’s 42 regular-season wins are just two behind the 44 put up by Hall of Famer Jimmy Johnson over his five years with the club. He’ll presumably pass Johnson for third place in both wins and games coached for the Cowboys during the 2024 season.

McCarthy is expected to hold a press conference on Thursday, his annual end-of-season media address.

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