Jerry Jones said he'd fire any general manager who produced the same bleak results he had in recent years, but the Dallas Cowboys owner isn't about to replace to himself.
On NFL Network
NFL Replay
will re-air the
Atlanta Falcons' 19-13 win over the
Dallas Cowboys in Week 9 on Wednesday, Nov. 7 at 9 p.m. ET.
Jones remains an oddity among league owners in that he doubles as general manager, a role he's come under fire for in Dallas. Protests aside, Jones assured Cowboys fans Tuesday that nothing is about to change.
"We are not structured that way," Jones told KRLD-FM, via The Dallas Morning News. "We didn't structure it that way with my ownership. There's no way that I would be involved here and not be the final decision-maker on something as important as players, and that is a key area. That's never been anybody's misunderstanding. It's been a debated thing, but it's just not going to happen. We've had success doing it this way and we're going to have success in the future doing it this way. It eliminates some very serious issues when you look around the league, as to creating an additional layer that you're continually having decisions, making changes, doing those kinds of things."
Jones runs the ship, so his position is safe, but he can't spin the product on the field. The Cowboys -- the subject of annual hype -- again are a disappointment. There's little to distinguish one Cowboys team from the next; they're haunted annually by mistake-prone play and an inability to turn it on down the stretch.
Breer: Payton to Dallas possible
Albert Breer explains why the idea of Sean Payton coaching the Cowboys is very much grounded in reality. **More ...**
Jones has managed to lure talent and big names to Dallas, but suggesting that a more streamlined organizational model is the engine behind various successes doesn't hold up. What the Cowboys lack is another way of looking at the big picture, a voice with the power to work alongside Jones -- perhaps disagree with him -- and suggest new paths for this franchise.
Jones is certain to agitate frustrated Cowboys fans with his detailed explanation of Sunday's fire-the-GM comments:
"It's real clear. I was asked the question, 'If you were an owner and you had a general manager, would you make a change?' Under those circumstances I speculated that I would probably have made a change, but that's not our situation. To change, I'd have to change myself. People don't do that. If you've got the commitment and you have the investment, and I'm talking about in time, effort, all of those kind of things, you change yourself. You don't change out and have someone else go in there and do it. And that would be misleading to begin with because no one would believe you if you hired somebody at that spot and really believe that he's not sitting there and ultimately at what I want to do. Somebody would say, 'Why don't you just mentally let them go do it.' I'm not built that way."
That might be the problem in Big D.
Follow Marc Sessler on Twitter @MarcSesslerNFL.
