Jerry Jones Still A ‘Romosexual’, Believes Cowboys Can Contend In

Jerry Jones Still a ‘Romosexual’, Believes Cowboys Can Contend in 2011

Who would have thought that Jerry Jones would be considered one of the ‘good guys’ by the players during the lockout negotiations. He was though, as players commented on how fair Jones was and how much they appreciated him willing to ‘take the gloves off’ and bargain in good faith. Now it’s back to negotiating the tough task of building a contender in Big D. Jones has always done well when it comes to matters of finance; making smart decisions with his personnel moves has proven to be more of a challenge. Jones joined ESPN Radio Dallas to talk about there not being the same level of national hype surrounding this year’s Cowboys team, if he was disappointed about not being able to sign Nnamdi Asomugha, his reaction to those that think the Cowboys are in such a state of disarray, why he thinks the Cowboys have the roster to compete in, the swagger that Rob Ryan brings as defensive coordinator, Ryan’s brash comments about beating the Eagles this season, the relationship between and different personalities of Ryan and Jason Garrett, what the primary reason is for him retaining his general manager duties over the years, being a ‘Romosexual’, how Romo is the guy to take the Cowboys to where they want to go, and how the Cowboys may not be done just yet in free agency.

On there not being the same level of national hype surrounding the Cowboys this year:

“Well I did this year. And I appreciated the Mavericks. We had come off probably as disappointing a time as you can conjure up last year, and then go right into what was a work stoppage type atmosphere. No, I didn’t want to see us anywhere, and I got my wish. But still, the facts are that really one of the things that we should have as an asset — and you’ve written about it and commented — is we needed to have stewed in the mess that we made last year; it was very disappointing. But I do though think that we’ll benefit from that with just the resolve of the players.”

How disappointing was the that they were unable to sign Nnamdi Asomugha:

“Well we really didn’t think that we would be the hunt as we started free agency. While I’m talking about it, you could drawn up where we ended today with our free agency and with the signing of a lot of our free agent players and told me me where we were going to be last week, I would have high-fived you and said ‘I’ll take it, I’ll take it!’ But as we moved forward, we put (Doug) Free in place, we put (Kyle) Kosier in place, we had Marcus Spears in place, and all of a sudden we thought if everything goes right we could be a player there. And that did happen, we had real good information that we were certainly a team that he might come to. And you can’t get enough corners. I know it was speculated that if we had got him, we might do something with Newman, but that’s neither here nor there. The bottom line is he’s a really top player, we could have made it work and we still could have gotten done what we’ve gotten done today in free agency.”

What his thoughts are about the Cowboys being thought of as such a bad club at the moment:

“I understand it, and I like it. I’ve always liked operating from the bottom up frankly. When you’re riding high, that’s tight-rope stuff and that really usually has some bad consequences. So I like operating looking up. And just specifically, I like what we’ve done with the offensive line. We’ve got some work to do but we’ve got some young guys that are going to play. Hear me when I say that — they are going to play. This time last year we didn’t know if Free was really going to be a quality left tackle, here is one of the top guys in free agency. But we’ve got some young guys, especially the ones that we drafted this year that have a chance and will come in and play. They’ve played well so far, we feel good about them. So I like that, I like really what we’ve done to shore up our safety situation. These guys can come in here and hit the ground, play immediately, and then we have those young safeties behind them. There’s a couple of them that I think certainly are going to be players and players this year. So Randy (Galloway), again, this is the team. When we finished last year, I thought we had the fundamentals in place for three years, possibly four. And of course, the base shook from the season we had last year. And we needed to move on from some of those players, both from a skill standpoint as well as really the productivity we were getting for the money — the Barbers, the Davises, the Colombos, and Roy Williams. So we did need to do that, and you have to do that.”

Does he think the Cowboys have the roster to compete this year:

“Yes I do, yes. We wouldn’t be signing these one-year agreements on these safeties if we weren’t trying to do something this year seriously. So I do think it can. I think what we’re going to do with our secondary will be a little more friendly to Scandrick, it will be a little more friendly to Newman when he gets back out there. By the way, Scandrick is probably having at corner the best camp of all. There’s a fresh look. Rob [Ryan] gives them a fresh look when he sees things that he hasn’t seen because he’s just gotten here. Jenkins is showing some things; he’s going to play Jenkins in a way that’s going to give him a more positive approach to how he plays the game. But all of these things will be a positive for us.”

If he likes the swagger that new defensive coordinator Rob Ryan brings and if he liked his comments recently about beating the Eagles:

“I did. I visited with Mike Holmgren at length about Rob before Jason hired him, and he was talking about said ‘you’ve got to watch him on third down, third and long he’ll get a little out there one; and two, he’ll upstage your coach, the media gravitates towards him like bees to honey. So all of those things, and I’m not smiling when I say this, those are not negatives. And there’s never been a coach that’s aggressive that’s had some third and longs that he’d like to take back.”

On the different personalities of Ryan and Jason Garrett and whether Garrett was upset about Ryan’s comments about the Eagles:

“Well I know this, I don’t want to get in a battle of wits with Jason Garrett, you will come out a little scathed. So I would have loved to be a part of that. But he has such respect for him — Jason does for Rob as a coach. And frankly you’ve to appreciate Rob’s style with the players. He just has that timing that you have when you can communicate with people effectively. He does it well, does it with a lot of humor, it impacts the offense as well. I was talking with Jason Witten the other day, he said was right over there on the sideline and Rob caught a pass on a linebacker, and Rob proceeded to call Jason a very colorful name. And Jason just had to smile as he was going to back to the huddle. It’s infectious. It’s good stuff.”

If he’s ever thought that all those media types who’ve suggested that he relinquish his general manager duties might be right:

“You really don’t want to know how many times I thought you might be right. Again, I guess that’s been there since I got involved with the Dallas Cowboys. The real basis of that…and I’m not sure we’ve really talked that seriously about it Randy…but the real basis of that has to do with streamlining communication. If you look over the years at the numbers of general managers that we would have had to replace around here, as well as the number of coaches we’ve had to replace so it’s just mathematics, it’s just illuminating another decision that you have to make.”

If he’s still a full on [Tony] Romosexual or if he’s lost any faith in him as their quarterback like so many fans seems to have:

“Well I hear it, but I’m like you, I  have to reply to it because I’m like you, one of those. And we need to be. We really need to be. And that is our best shot to be where Cowboys fans want us to be and that’s contending. But I will tell you I have the benefit of getting to see him up close a lot of times, and I see the basic consciousness that he represents, I see him as smart as he is, and I see him completely and totally engulfed when he’s on the football field. Sometimes when he’s playing golf, he’s actually trying to apply that to some of the things he might be trying to do on the football field. Seriously. So I like our shot there and wouldn’t have it any other way. And really in the NFL in my view, it falls off faster than you can put it on if you don’t have the quarterback to build it around. And consequently, we’ve got the quarterback to build it around and you can go out and build around and do other areas of talent acquisition. But he’s worthy of it.”

If the Cowboys are done in free agency, and once more on the national interest level in the Cowboys (asked as NFL Network crews arrive at the Alamo Dome):

“No, we’re not. We still have some things that we potentially want to do. But we are pleased with Hatcher and those guys that we’ve got coming in. But let me say this, one of the things that I got a chance to do was go all over this country meeting regarding these labor negotiations. And it wasn’t the experience that I was having going out there that people weren’t interested or excited about what the Cowboys were going through. No matter where you go, the Cowboys — the great tradition, the kind of interest that’s out here — it just continues to never cease to amaze me. I think that’s always inspired and I think it will inspire us this year.