BARRY HORN Follow @bhorn55
BARRY HORN The Dallas Morning News Staff Writer
bhorn@dallasnews.com
Published: 18 October 2014 12:24 PM
Updated: 18 October 2014 11:32 PM
We will never know what might have happened had the telephone rang on draft night 2011 just before it was the Cowboys’ turn to select.
The Cowboys had pretty much decided that an offensive tackle was their top priority. Three were deemed worthy. All remained available as their ninth pick of the first round approached.
Certain voices from the scouting department clamored for trading the pick, dropping down far enough to snag the last tackle standing and gaining extra equity.
A smile crossed the face of Stephen Jones, whose titles with the Cowboys include director of player personnel, as he recalled the scene of the night of April 28, 2011.
Trading first-round draft picks was something the Cowboys knew all about. It had almost become their trademark. They always seemed itchy. They hadn’t picked in their earned place in the draft in five years. In Jerry Jones’ tenure as general manager, sometimes trades were made in advance. Sometimes they came on draft night. Sometimes the Cowboys moved up. Sometimes they moved down.
Now eight picks had been made. There was no place to go but down.
As always, the Cowboys were willing to talk but they didn’t pick up the phone. And no team was calling.
No matter. Jason Garrett, marking his first draft in the head coach’s chair, was determined to come away with an offensive lineman for a position he recently recalled as being “under-resourced.”
And he had a favorite.
Protecting Romo
The red-haired rookie in the draft room was convinced the time had come to revamp a unit that was not only aging, but struggling as well. The line included four 30-somethings — Marc Colombo, Leonard Davis, Andre Gurode and Kyle Kosier — all of whom had seen their best days. At 26, left tackle Doug Free was the baby of the unit but he reminded no one of building blocks Rayfield Wright or Larry Allen or Erik Williams.
Owner Jerry Jones and his son Stephen had come on board with Garrett. But other voices in the room had been impressed by a defensive end from Wisconsin and they made a final weak pitch. But what good would J.J. Watt be, Garrett reasoned, if he couldn’t protect the quarterback. Tony Romo had suffered a season-ending broken clavicle seven games into the 2010 season and seemed destined for more bodily injury if immediate help wasn’t procured.
Pre-draft the Cowboys had narrowed their tackle choice to: Nate Solder, a giant 6-8 315-pounder who was at Colorado for five seasons; Anthony Castonzo, a 6-7, 305 pounder and a four-year starter from Boston College whose pedigree included a Rhodes Scholar nomination; and Tyron Smith, who was a mere 6-5 and a relatively skeletal 280 pounds. He played only three seasons in college and left with a year of eligibility remaining. He was also the youngest player in the draft, which some used to deem him not ready.
One voice in the room, Hudson Houck, after months of study argued there was no real choice. He had coached two Super Bowl champion offensive lines for the Cowboys in the 1990s and coached future Hall of Famers Anthony Munoz and Bruce Matthews at his alma mater, USC. He had coached Hall of Famers Jackie Slater with the Los Angeles Rams and Allen with the Cowboys.
No matter what the cacophony of voices wanted or where they wanted to move, Houck was set on Smith, who conveniently also went to USC.
“He had the longest arm-length, which I think is very important,” said Houck, retired and living back in Southern California. “He had speed. His balance reminded me of Larry Allen. He had growth potential.”
And Houck had inside information. He burned up the telephone lines in his office to call back to USC and speak not only to the coaches, but also secretaries and equipment men and trainers and training table supervisors he knew from his days at the school. He even called Pat Haden, the athletic director, who had played at the school when Houck coached there.
About the concern with Smith’s weight, Houck learned that the tackle simply wasn’t “eating right.”
That could be corrected. More importantly, his sources testified to a key attribute that needed no fix. “They all said, ‘This guy will work as long as you want him to work,’” Houck recalled. “They agreed, ‘He’s a slam-dunk kid.’”
No temptations
As the Cowboys prepared to pick Smith back in the draft room, the telephone remained silent.
“We took it all in,” Stephen Jones said. “Jerry, Jason and I listened to the talk. Hudson was certain. He was the voice. Finally, there was no question what we would do.”
At Houck’s urging, Garrett had taken an entire pre-draft afternoon to study Smith. When he emerged from his solitary session, the head coach told Houck he agreed with his assessment.
Still Houck remained queasy.
“I’m sitting there knowing I’m just a small part of the pick,” he said. “I hoped they were listening.”
The Cowboys heard. They did what the organization hadn’t done in the three decades since Tex Schramm and Gil Brandt and Tom Landry took tackle Howard Richards from the University of Missouri with the 26th pick of the 1981 draft. The Cowboys once again took an offensive lineman in the first round.
Tyron Smith, seven-and-a-half months shy of his 21st birthday, was their man.
“In some ways, we were victims of our own success,” Houck said, recalling the moment. “The Cowboys didn’t have one first-round pick start on the Super Bowl teams of the 1990s. Some people around here felt you could piece together an offensive line with free agents and late-round picks.”
Houck was the offensive line coach on two of those teams. He left after the 2001 season and returned from 2008-2011.
The Smith pick opened the floodgates. So began the process of rebuilding the offensive line, the jumpstart to the Cowboys’ running game this season, the assembly of Romo’s protective posse, the easing of the burden on defense, and the road to their 5-1 start as they prepared to meet the New York Giants on Sunday afternoon.
It was a conscious effort to rebuild. Sure the names could have been different and much debate surrounded two of the next four crucial steps — the drafting of center Travis Frederick in the first round in 2013, followed by right guard Zack Martin in the first of 2014. By contrast the signing of undrafted free agent left guard Ron Leary in 2012 and the shift of Free from left tackle to right tackle, a less important place in pass protection, to make room for Smith that same season, hardly raised an eyebrow.
“With Tyron in place, it seemed like we were on the right path,” Stephen Jones said. “Hudson, the most experienced voice in the room, was dead on.”
Undrafted free agent
The Cowboys returned to their old ways at the 2012 draft. They moved up from the 14th pick to sixth. They gave up their own first- and second-round picks for the privilege. With their upgraded selection, the Cowboys took cornerback Morris Claiborne from LSU.
Later, they drafted two linebackers, another defensive back, a defensive end, a wide receiver, and a tight end. They didn’t select a single offensive lineman in a draft in which 44 were taken.
While Smith had settled in nicely at right tackle, left tackle Colombo, Davis, a guard, and Gurode, the center, had been jettisoned before the 2011 season. Kosier remained at right guard. Left guard became the province of Montrae Holland, 32, whom the Cowboys once had obtained for a fifth-round draft choice; Bill Nagy, a seventh-round pick in 2011; and Derrick Dockery, 32, a free agent who had been cut by Washington before the 2011 season. Phil Costa, a free agent whose heart was bigger than his talent, was the new center.
But there had been an offensive lineman who attracted their attention before the 2012 draft. They liked Leary, a 6-3, 320-pounder from the University of Memphis whom they projected as a guard. After undergoing left knee surgery before his senior year, he started every game at either left tackle or right guard.
The Cowboys graded Leary worthy of a third-round pick. But he was diagnosed with a degenerative left knee condition before the draft. All 32 NFL teams saw the same report. His “osteochondritis disseacans,” likely residue from the knee injury, translated into free agent status.
The wily Cowboys hoped to sign Leary immediately after the draft. But when the time came, they learned they had a rival enthusiastic suitor. The Minnesota Vikings had played the same waiting game.
Back and forth they went in a bidding war of sorts. Finally, the Cowboys won by guaranteeing more than half of his $390,000 base salary.
“We saw the diagnosis when we looked at his final medical records,” Stephen Jones said. “We understood that the knee might not hold up at all or it could hold up for eight or nine years. We talked it over and Jerry decided to put up the money because he was worth the risk.”
Leary was hardly an overnight sensation. The Cowboys waived him at the end of his less-than inspiring first training camp. Fortunately, no other team wanted him. They signed him to the practice squad while Nate Livings, a free agent, started all 16 games at left guard.
At center was Ryan Cook, who was acquired from Miami for a seventh-round draft pick, split time with Costa. Mackenzy Bearnadeau, once a seventh-round pick of the Carolina Panthers arrived to play right guard. Free and Smith, switched sides but remained the bookend tackles.
Improved but hardly an inspiring collection.
Leary spent most of the season on the practice squad but did make the active roster for the final game 2012.
A knee injury sidelined him in training camp the next season. This time it was his right knee that needed arthroscopic surgery. No matter, he returned to start every game at left guard during the regular season.
“If we were smart, we would have taken him with our seventh-round pick,” Stephen Jones said.
Instead of Leary, the Cowboys took linebacker Caleb McSurdy with their final pick of that 2012 draft. He suffered an Achilles injury in his first training camp and never played for the Cowboys.
“But if the other teams were smart, one of them could have taken him in the last round, too” he said. “It’s a guessing game. You need to be lucky at some points.”
More first-round gold
Buoyed by their success with Tyron Smith, the Cowboys were determined to do something even more radical in the first round of the 2013 draft. They wanted a guard to complement Leary, whom they desperately wanted to win the right guard position. They owned the 18th pick.
The Cowboys hadn’t taken a guard in the first round since John Niland in 1966, the year Jason Garrett was born.
They targeted Jonathan Cooper from North Carolina and Chance Warmack of Alabama.
To their chagrin, Cooper went sixth to Arizona and Warmack 10th to Tennessee. No guard had been drafted higher than Cooper since North Carolina’s Ken Huff went to the Baltimore Colts in 1975 with the third pick, one pick behind future Hall of Famer Randy White going to the Cowboys and one ahead of future Hall of Famer Walter Payton to the Chicago Bears.
Four tackles also were drafted before the Cowboys’ choice.
With no offensive lineman they deemed worthy of a first round pick, the Cowboys traded with the San Francisco 49ers down to the 31st pick. They also received a third round pick from the 49ers.
Critics criticized the trade for two reasons. The highest-rated player on the Cowboys wish list, Shariff Floyd, a defensive tackle from Florida, was still available and they didn’t get sufficient value from the 49ers in the trade.
When their turn came at No. 31, and with no guard to their liking, they took Frederick, a slow-footed but cerebral center from Wisconsin.
“He was the best offensive lineman remaining on our board,” Stephen Jones said.
Frederick has started ever game since he arrived.
As for that third-round pick, the Cowboys turned it into starting wide receiver Terrance Williams.
The final brick
Undaunted, the Cowboys still wanted a guard in the 2014 draft, the final piece to the offensive line puzzle. They might have taken University of Pittsburgh defensive tackle Aaron Donald but he was already gone to the St. Louis Rams when their pick came at No. 16.
“Ultimately, we had given Tony Romo the new contract and we wanted to keep him upright,” Stephen Jones said. “He had the back surgery in the offseason and he was our quarterback.”
“But then came the great debate,” he said.
The tale has been reported and retold ad nauseum.
Johnny Manziel, the Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback with the mega-watt marketing potential was available when the Cowboys’ turn came.
“We had gone over it many times,” Stephen Jones said. “We decided to go for someone who could protect our investment in Romo.”
But the Cowboys had not figured Manziel could be theirs for the taking.
Much has been written about the Cowboys draft room as time ticked before that 16th pick. Jerry Jones strongly advocated for Manziel and he had his Hallelujah chorus of supporters. Stephen preferred a guard from Notre Dame —Zack Martin, relatively bland but safer.
“Jerry made one last pitch for Johnny Manziel,” Stephen Jones said. “It was a hard pitch.”
But the owner, president and general manager was outvoted. Finally, Jerry Jones relented.
“It’s obvious we don’t pick Zack unless Jerry was good with it.” Stephen Jones reminded.
Jerry Jones earlier last week declared the subject taboo. He said he was finished talking about the decision for now. But he did sound a bit forlorn about making the safer decision, in last speaking to NFL Network:
“I did look over at [Stephen] and said we wouldn’t be sitting here with the Dallas Cowboys if I had made my decisions like that,” he told an interviewer.
So the resurrection plan hatched before the 2011 draft was complete.
“Next the process will focus on the defensive line,” Stephen Jones said. “Although I can’t say we are done with the offensive line.”
BARRY HORN The Dallas Morning News Staff Writer
bhorn@dallasnews.com
Published: 18 October 2014 12:24 PM
Updated: 18 October 2014 11:32 PM
We will never know what might have happened had the telephone rang on draft night 2011 just before it was the Cowboys’ turn to select.
The Cowboys had pretty much decided that an offensive tackle was their top priority. Three were deemed worthy. All remained available as their ninth pick of the first round approached.
Certain voices from the scouting department clamored for trading the pick, dropping down far enough to snag the last tackle standing and gaining extra equity.
A smile crossed the face of Stephen Jones, whose titles with the Cowboys include director of player personnel, as he recalled the scene of the night of April 28, 2011.
Trading first-round draft picks was something the Cowboys knew all about. It had almost become their trademark. They always seemed itchy. They hadn’t picked in their earned place in the draft in five years. In Jerry Jones’ tenure as general manager, sometimes trades were made in advance. Sometimes they came on draft night. Sometimes the Cowboys moved up. Sometimes they moved down.
Now eight picks had been made. There was no place to go but down.
As always, the Cowboys were willing to talk but they didn’t pick up the phone. And no team was calling.
No matter. Jason Garrett, marking his first draft in the head coach’s chair, was determined to come away with an offensive lineman for a position he recently recalled as being “under-resourced.”
And he had a favorite.
Protecting Romo
The red-haired rookie in the draft room was convinced the time had come to revamp a unit that was not only aging, but struggling as well. The line included four 30-somethings — Marc Colombo, Leonard Davis, Andre Gurode and Kyle Kosier — all of whom had seen their best days. At 26, left tackle Doug Free was the baby of the unit but he reminded no one of building blocks Rayfield Wright or Larry Allen or Erik Williams.
Owner Jerry Jones and his son Stephen had come on board with Garrett. But other voices in the room had been impressed by a defensive end from Wisconsin and they made a final weak pitch. But what good would J.J. Watt be, Garrett reasoned, if he couldn’t protect the quarterback. Tony Romo had suffered a season-ending broken clavicle seven games into the 2010 season and seemed destined for more bodily injury if immediate help wasn’t procured.
Pre-draft the Cowboys had narrowed their tackle choice to: Nate Solder, a giant 6-8 315-pounder who was at Colorado for five seasons; Anthony Castonzo, a 6-7, 305 pounder and a four-year starter from Boston College whose pedigree included a Rhodes Scholar nomination; and Tyron Smith, who was a mere 6-5 and a relatively skeletal 280 pounds. He played only three seasons in college and left with a year of eligibility remaining. He was also the youngest player in the draft, which some used to deem him not ready.
One voice in the room, Hudson Houck, after months of study argued there was no real choice. He had coached two Super Bowl champion offensive lines for the Cowboys in the 1990s and coached future Hall of Famers Anthony Munoz and Bruce Matthews at his alma mater, USC. He had coached Hall of Famers Jackie Slater with the Los Angeles Rams and Allen with the Cowboys.
No matter what the cacophony of voices wanted or where they wanted to move, Houck was set on Smith, who conveniently also went to USC.
“He had the longest arm-length, which I think is very important,” said Houck, retired and living back in Southern California. “He had speed. His balance reminded me of Larry Allen. He had growth potential.”
And Houck had inside information. He burned up the telephone lines in his office to call back to USC and speak not only to the coaches, but also secretaries and equipment men and trainers and training table supervisors he knew from his days at the school. He even called Pat Haden, the athletic director, who had played at the school when Houck coached there.
About the concern with Smith’s weight, Houck learned that the tackle simply wasn’t “eating right.”
That could be corrected. More importantly, his sources testified to a key attribute that needed no fix. “They all said, ‘This guy will work as long as you want him to work,’” Houck recalled. “They agreed, ‘He’s a slam-dunk kid.’”
No temptations
As the Cowboys prepared to pick Smith back in the draft room, the telephone remained silent.
“We took it all in,” Stephen Jones said. “Jerry, Jason and I listened to the talk. Hudson was certain. He was the voice. Finally, there was no question what we would do.”
At Houck’s urging, Garrett had taken an entire pre-draft afternoon to study Smith. When he emerged from his solitary session, the head coach told Houck he agreed with his assessment.
Still Houck remained queasy.
“I’m sitting there knowing I’m just a small part of the pick,” he said. “I hoped they were listening.”
The Cowboys heard. They did what the organization hadn’t done in the three decades since Tex Schramm and Gil Brandt and Tom Landry took tackle Howard Richards from the University of Missouri with the 26th pick of the 1981 draft. The Cowboys once again took an offensive lineman in the first round.
Tyron Smith, seven-and-a-half months shy of his 21st birthday, was their man.
“In some ways, we were victims of our own success,” Houck said, recalling the moment. “The Cowboys didn’t have one first-round pick start on the Super Bowl teams of the 1990s. Some people around here felt you could piece together an offensive line with free agents and late-round picks.”
Houck was the offensive line coach on two of those teams. He left after the 2001 season and returned from 2008-2011.
The Smith pick opened the floodgates. So began the process of rebuilding the offensive line, the jumpstart to the Cowboys’ running game this season, the assembly of Romo’s protective posse, the easing of the burden on defense, and the road to their 5-1 start as they prepared to meet the New York Giants on Sunday afternoon.
It was a conscious effort to rebuild. Sure the names could have been different and much debate surrounded two of the next four crucial steps — the drafting of center Travis Frederick in the first round in 2013, followed by right guard Zack Martin in the first of 2014. By contrast the signing of undrafted free agent left guard Ron Leary in 2012 and the shift of Free from left tackle to right tackle, a less important place in pass protection, to make room for Smith that same season, hardly raised an eyebrow.
“With Tyron in place, it seemed like we were on the right path,” Stephen Jones said. “Hudson, the most experienced voice in the room, was dead on.”
Undrafted free agent
The Cowboys returned to their old ways at the 2012 draft. They moved up from the 14th pick to sixth. They gave up their own first- and second-round picks for the privilege. With their upgraded selection, the Cowboys took cornerback Morris Claiborne from LSU.
Later, they drafted two linebackers, another defensive back, a defensive end, a wide receiver, and a tight end. They didn’t select a single offensive lineman in a draft in which 44 were taken.
While Smith had settled in nicely at right tackle, left tackle Colombo, Davis, a guard, and Gurode, the center, had been jettisoned before the 2011 season. Kosier remained at right guard. Left guard became the province of Montrae Holland, 32, whom the Cowboys once had obtained for a fifth-round draft choice; Bill Nagy, a seventh-round pick in 2011; and Derrick Dockery, 32, a free agent who had been cut by Washington before the 2011 season. Phil Costa, a free agent whose heart was bigger than his talent, was the new center.
But there had been an offensive lineman who attracted their attention before the 2012 draft. They liked Leary, a 6-3, 320-pounder from the University of Memphis whom they projected as a guard. After undergoing left knee surgery before his senior year, he started every game at either left tackle or right guard.
The Cowboys graded Leary worthy of a third-round pick. But he was diagnosed with a degenerative left knee condition before the draft. All 32 NFL teams saw the same report. His “osteochondritis disseacans,” likely residue from the knee injury, translated into free agent status.
The wily Cowboys hoped to sign Leary immediately after the draft. But when the time came, they learned they had a rival enthusiastic suitor. The Minnesota Vikings had played the same waiting game.
Back and forth they went in a bidding war of sorts. Finally, the Cowboys won by guaranteeing more than half of his $390,000 base salary.
“We saw the diagnosis when we looked at his final medical records,” Stephen Jones said. “We understood that the knee might not hold up at all or it could hold up for eight or nine years. We talked it over and Jerry decided to put up the money because he was worth the risk.”
Leary was hardly an overnight sensation. The Cowboys waived him at the end of his less-than inspiring first training camp. Fortunately, no other team wanted him. They signed him to the practice squad while Nate Livings, a free agent, started all 16 games at left guard.
At center was Ryan Cook, who was acquired from Miami for a seventh-round draft pick, split time with Costa. Mackenzy Bearnadeau, once a seventh-round pick of the Carolina Panthers arrived to play right guard. Free and Smith, switched sides but remained the bookend tackles.
Improved but hardly an inspiring collection.
Leary spent most of the season on the practice squad but did make the active roster for the final game 2012.
A knee injury sidelined him in training camp the next season. This time it was his right knee that needed arthroscopic surgery. No matter, he returned to start every game at left guard during the regular season.
“If we were smart, we would have taken him with our seventh-round pick,” Stephen Jones said.
Instead of Leary, the Cowboys took linebacker Caleb McSurdy with their final pick of that 2012 draft. He suffered an Achilles injury in his first training camp and never played for the Cowboys.
“But if the other teams were smart, one of them could have taken him in the last round, too” he said. “It’s a guessing game. You need to be lucky at some points.”
More first-round gold
Buoyed by their success with Tyron Smith, the Cowboys were determined to do something even more radical in the first round of the 2013 draft. They wanted a guard to complement Leary, whom they desperately wanted to win the right guard position. They owned the 18th pick.
The Cowboys hadn’t taken a guard in the first round since John Niland in 1966, the year Jason Garrett was born.
They targeted Jonathan Cooper from North Carolina and Chance Warmack of Alabama.
To their chagrin, Cooper went sixth to Arizona and Warmack 10th to Tennessee. No guard had been drafted higher than Cooper since North Carolina’s Ken Huff went to the Baltimore Colts in 1975 with the third pick, one pick behind future Hall of Famer Randy White going to the Cowboys and one ahead of future Hall of Famer Walter Payton to the Chicago Bears.
Four tackles also were drafted before the Cowboys’ choice.
With no offensive lineman they deemed worthy of a first round pick, the Cowboys traded with the San Francisco 49ers down to the 31st pick. They also received a third round pick from the 49ers.
Critics criticized the trade for two reasons. The highest-rated player on the Cowboys wish list, Shariff Floyd, a defensive tackle from Florida, was still available and they didn’t get sufficient value from the 49ers in the trade.
When their turn came at No. 31, and with no guard to their liking, they took Frederick, a slow-footed but cerebral center from Wisconsin.
“He was the best offensive lineman remaining on our board,” Stephen Jones said.
Frederick has started ever game since he arrived.
As for that third-round pick, the Cowboys turned it into starting wide receiver Terrance Williams.
The final brick
Undaunted, the Cowboys still wanted a guard in the 2014 draft, the final piece to the offensive line puzzle. They might have taken University of Pittsburgh defensive tackle Aaron Donald but he was already gone to the St. Louis Rams when their pick came at No. 16.
“Ultimately, we had given Tony Romo the new contract and we wanted to keep him upright,” Stephen Jones said. “He had the back surgery in the offseason and he was our quarterback.”
“But then came the great debate,” he said.
The tale has been reported and retold ad nauseum.
Johnny Manziel, the Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback with the mega-watt marketing potential was available when the Cowboys’ turn came.
“We had gone over it many times,” Stephen Jones said. “We decided to go for someone who could protect our investment in Romo.”
But the Cowboys had not figured Manziel could be theirs for the taking.
Much has been written about the Cowboys draft room as time ticked before that 16th pick. Jerry Jones strongly advocated for Manziel and he had his Hallelujah chorus of supporters. Stephen preferred a guard from Notre Dame —Zack Martin, relatively bland but safer.
“Jerry made one last pitch for Johnny Manziel,” Stephen Jones said. “It was a hard pitch.”
But the owner, president and general manager was outvoted. Finally, Jerry Jones relented.
“It’s obvious we don’t pick Zack unless Jerry was good with it.” Stephen Jones reminded.
Jerry Jones earlier last week declared the subject taboo. He said he was finished talking about the decision for now. But he did sound a bit forlorn about making the safer decision, in last speaking to NFL Network:
“I did look over at [Stephen] and said we wouldn’t be sitting here with the Dallas Cowboys if I had made my decisions like that,” he told an interviewer.
So the resurrection plan hatched before the 2011 draft was complete.
“Next the process will focus on the defensive line,” Stephen Jones said. “Although I can’t say we are done with the offensive line.”
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