Cowboys Camp: 'We're Not Screwing Around'
As one of the highest profile franchises in all of sports, criticism is not new for the Dallas Cowboys or owner and general manager Jerry Jones.
Many have questioned the offseason moves, or the lack thereof, by Cowboys brass, and that criticism has not fallen on deaf ears.
As we're told before almost each and every training camp by Dallas front office personnel and coaching staff members, the Cowboys' goal is a championship. But if that's the case, why no big changes from last season's wild-card losing squad and coaching staff?
Save for two small changes to the wide receivers coach and a special teams assistant, the coaches remain the same.
Why carry $22.5 million in cap room into the season earmarking those funds to re-sign existing players in future seasons instead of helping the club this year?
Jones addressed the current situation as well as offseason moves on Tuesday at training camp in Oxnard. "We have put a lot out there for the fans," Jones said. "A lot for the Dallas Cowboys out there. And we are not screwing around."
A lot of the criticism facing the team was due to players that were either moved voluntarily or that the team failed to re-sign. The trade of wideout Amari Cooper to the Browns for a fifth-round selection, the release of right tackle La'el Collins, and the inability of the organization to keep defensive end Randy Gregory - not to mention the circus surrounding that ordeal - are all at the top of the list.
"We’ve lost three really high-profile players," Jones said. "Those decisions were made more about availability than ability."
Cooper, Collins, and Gregory missed a combined 12 games last season for various reasons stemming from COVID, suspension, and injury.
"Your standards go up," Jones said. "Your bar is higher. Your conduct is higher. Your attention to the team is higher. Not just your performance, but everything.
"I don’t want to demean any player. I love those players personally. But you have to have the No. 1 thing, is how we win a football game, if you want to be in the top 10. Check ‘I’ at the door. It’s ‘we’ when you go through the door."
Jones repeated the word "availability" six times during his discussion.
Fans and media members also questioned the team's use of the franchise tag, as the Cowboys used it on free agent tight end Dalton Schultz rather than Gregory.
Cowboys executive vice president Stephen Jones discussed the failure of the club to re-sign Schultz to a long-term deal.
"We tried," Jones said. "It wasn’t that we necessarily weren’t talking about a long-term deal it just gets into, not unlike DeMarcus Lawrence, who ended up being a stalwart here, a foundation player for us; not unlike Dak Prescott, we know what we think of him.
"Sometimes when you’re getting your hands around what this team is going to look like not only this year but what this team will look like in the future, then you have to play that hand that way."
The coaching staff was criticized for the Cowboys' penalty total of 127. No team had more in 2021, and only Las Vegas had more penalty yards than Dallas, and it was by just one yard (1,104 to 1,103).
"We want an aggressive, physical playstyle, and we crossed the line too much," head coach Mike McCarthy said. "Our discipline is pulling back. This is not a group that I have to push forward. That’s is very important in how you train and the reality of the mistakes that are made and how we need to tighten it down."
If a championship - or a deep playoff run for that matter - is truly in the cards for the Cowboys in 2022, much improvement is needed, and it all begins now in Oxnard.
Follow Timm Hamm on Twitter at @IndyCarTim
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