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As Bills and Jets show Jerry Jones what ‘all in’ means, Cowboys owner grapples with team's uncertain outlook

jori epstein
Senior reporter
·6 min read
45

During his regularly scheduled Tuesday radio interview, Jerry Jones lost his temper and criticized the station hosts.

But the short fuse that left the Dallas Cowboys owner telling his interrogators that tough questions were “not your job” and he could “get somebody else to ask these questions” arguably overshadowed Jones’ biggest logical fallacy of the morning.

Less than 48 hours after his team’s 47-9 home loss to the Detroit Lions, Jones questioned whether the improvements his fans wanted were even realistic.

“Where are you going to get any players? Seriously,” Jones said on Dallas radio station 105.3 The Fan. “Where are you going to go to get any players for the next week against San Francisco?”

The team owner who doubles as Cowboys general manager had already insisted “reshuffling ... is impossible to do at this time of year.”

There was merit to Jones’ argument, just as there has been merit in his defense of the all-in proclamation heard 'round the world. But on Tuesday, the Cowboys’ chief executive picked a faulty day to play victim about how little he could change. Because as he lamented the inability to rebuild or bolster a roster, and the inaccessibility of finding talent upgrades, the New York Jets and Buffalo Bills were completing deals to acquire just that.

The Jets’ trade for six-time Pro Bowl receiver Davante Adams and the Bills’ deal for five-time Pro Bowl receiver Amari Cooper reflect the urgency of AFC East teams desperate to cash in on a Super Bowl window.

The splash moves also reflect a willingness to try something that Cowboys fans are not seeing from their team owner.

Four-time MVP Aaron Rodgers, whom the Jets traded for last year, explained the mindset.

“It’s on us now,” Rodgers said Tuesday on "The Pat McAfee Show." “We’re going all in.”

Somewhere, from his league meeting in Atlanta, Jones shuddered.

If Jones knew in January how far his words would travel, even he would've been floored.

The “all-in” assertion was powerful, in a vacuum.

Were the Cowboys going to make a splash trade to solve the postseason embarrassments that had followed three straight 12-win seasons?

Were the Cowboys going to reverse course on head coach Mike McCarthy’s fate, bringing in a legend like Bill Belichick? How much talent and strategy and, quite frankly, money could the most valuable franchise in sports (albeit in a salary-cap-restricted league) invest into hoisting the Lombardi Trophy for the first time since January 1996?

There was irony in how much stock fans, media and more put into Jones’ words.

Because careful observers of Jones and the Cowboys — and for decades, now, the line between the two has blurred — know that the interview-friendly octogenarian speaks so often and so freely that it’s not unusual he contradicts himself not just over time but even in the same conversation.

In a March interview with a handful of reporters including from Yahoo Sports, for example, Jones discussed his belief that quarterback Dak Prescott can and will win a Super Bowl within minutes of discussing the postseason shortcomings that he would factor into Prescott’s contract extension.

Jones praised McCarthy and his Super Bowl-winning résumé as reason to believe his team could break its deep postseason drought. From the same overstuffed chair, and with the same notepad whose scribbles would also go viral, Jones expressed his belief that his coaches had not maximized their players’ talents.

Taken in a vacuum, any of the four stances had reason to catch fire.

Jones knows that when he speaks on the record with microphones clearly visible. After all, he had given reporters ample time off the record prior, and thus had a chance to refrain from his more savory takes when the recorders started rolling.

And yet, in a fuller context and placed beside one another, they painted a different picture.

A critical reading could dismiss Jones’ contradictions as the ramblings of a then 81 -and now 82-year-old who’d traveled during a long day and was now speaking his mind, at times with circular logic.

A charitable reading paints Jones as extraordinarily well-informed of the factors that will influence his team’s success, and thus must impact his decisions.

Both sides of the coin flashed again Tuesday, as Jones alternated between measured and tempered.

Understanding both in confluence is key.

Jones’ anger, though he defended it hours later, should not be excused.

Threatening his hosts’ jobs borders abuse of power, even if it draws more attention in the way Jones often does.

That best not happen again.

And yet, in Jones’ loss of poise, he provided evidence contradicting one piece of criticism he often receives.

Does every decision Jones makes, on the football and business side, support winning at all costs?

There’s a strong case against it.

Does Jones nonetheless care, arguably as much as anyone in the league, about his results and reception?

Tuesday was a reminder that he does.

The Cowboys’ 2024 season could be headed downhill as fast as Jones’ radio interview did. But in his emotional defense, the Cowboys’ chief executive made two fair if colorful points.

“Idiot things can turn into good decisions, OK?” Jones said. “Smart things can turn into bad decisions.”

Translation: The Bills and Jets are willing to make a splash for the playoffs but their talent acquisition is no guarantee of success. After all, it was Jones six years ago who acquired Cooper at the trade deadline. And while the acquisition injected energy into his offense, an early playoff exit followed by a .500 year led him to a coaching change all the same.

Which leads us to point No. 2.

“If you think I’m interested in a damn phone call with you over the radio and sitting here and throwing all the good out with the dishwasher,” Jones said, “you have got to be smoking something.”

Translation: Sure, the Cowboys’ 2024 run game has yet to arrive, their run defense has been routinely gashed and their three home losses have been as embarrassing as they have been out of sync. But a roster anchored by Prescott, receiver CeeDee Lamb and edge rusher Micah Parsons could turn things around. Jones has seen wilder things happen.

It’s plenty likely the Cowboys see a coaching change this offseason. Schematic, if not also personnel, changes could follow.

Or perhaps the same brand of fortune-reversing that left Jones eating his “all-in” words makes his currently questionable decisions look prescient.

“We have the ability to improve,” Jones said. “We have in place what I think can narrow that gap that we saw out there.”