With all of the news swirling around Tony Romo and his surgery this morning, is it wrong to spend a quality pick on a quarterback? In their 53 year history the Cowboys have drafted a total of 28 quarterbacks. Jerry Jones spoke today on 105.3 the Fan in Dallas about utilizing a pick on the position.
[quote_box_center]”You’d like to every spring pick up a quarterback. I think the real issue and maybe your question would be, ‘would you seriously consider using a significant draft pick for a quarterback?’ That’s early. That’s way too early to do that with the way things are today with my expectation of Tony’s career, which I think will be for several years to come, it’s too early to be drafting a highly ranked or if you will costly quarterback.” -Jerry Jones[/quote_box_center]
It would be under poor judgement to not draft a quarterback with a significant draft pick come May, however Jerry Jones has never committed to drafting them at all. Yes Troy Aikman was drafted number one overall in his first season, but it is of my opinion that Tom Landry would have taken him anyway. The bigger question for Jones is why start now. He has been the owner for the last 25 years and only four quarterbacks have been drafted. One of those (Isaiah Stanback) was never brought in to actually play quarterback.
The other three were Troy Aikman (1st round), Quincy Carter (2nd round) and Stephen McGee (4th round). That would be the recipe for disaster. Aikman had issues with concussions and his back before an early retirement in 2000 at the age of 34, which is the same age Romo will be next year. Until Romo took over in 2006, the Cowboys dealt with quarterback purgatory.
From 2000 to 2006 the Cowboys started Randall Cunningham, Anthony Wright, Quincy Carter, Ryan Leaf, Clint Stoerner, Chad Hutchinson, Vinny Testaverde and Drew Bledsoe before giving Romo the job. Using eight different guys in the span of six years isn’t exactly grounds for success. During that period the Cowboys had only two winning seasons and three consecutive 5-11 seasons. Since Romo was handed the reigns he had only one losing season. Which as everyone should be aware of was 2010 when Romo went down with a broken collarbone.
Jerry is the owner and he will always do things his way, but if he truly wants to win like I believe he does it needs to change. If he continues to do it this way he is living up to the definition of insanity. He is doing the same things over and over and expecting different results. Yes this team has holes and a large portion of them are on the defensive side of the ball. However can Jerry really expect this team to win if worst case scenario, Romo has to retire because of an injured back that has required two surgeries in the span of nine months? Do you feel comfortable going into next year with two 34 year old quarterbacks and an un-retired Jon Kitna who is 41?
Jerry Jones it is time you take a quarterback early for the sake of a contingency plan.
