FRISCO, Texas — The Dallas Cowboys‘ playoff chances could end Saturday if the Philadelphia Eagles beat the Washington Commanders, but owner and general manager Jerry Jones said that will not impact how the team finishes the season.
“A win is very, very important in the NFL. And a win is important to me. And a win does a lot of positive things. I don’t care when it happens,” Jones said on 105.3 The Fan in Dallas. “We owe it to that mirror, and we owe it certainly to our fans that we want to walk out there and be competitive. We will not try for draft position. We won’t be looking at anything like that. We’ll be out there playing football, and we’ll bring them to play. So that’s a long-winded way of saying we’ll play football under whatever the circumstances are.”
If the Cowboys were preparing for a playoff run, Jones said the Cowboys would consider sitting regulars, like quarterback Dak Prescott, to make sure they were healthy for the postseason. The Cowboys have made that type of decision in the past.
The Cowboys have two first-round picks in next year’s draft with their trade of Micah Parsons to the Green Bay Packers before the start of the season. Presently, they hold the 14th and 23rd picks in the first round.
Disappointed with the 6-7-1 record, Jones has optimism for the future. The additions of defensive tackles Kenny Clark in the Parsons’ trade and Quinnen Williams from the New York Jets has impacted the interior of the defensive line. The Cowboys have a top offense with Prescott at quarterback and receivers CeeDee Lamb and George Pickens. Jones has been pleased with first-year head coach Brian Schottenheimer.
“I love the bones of our team. I love the fundamentals of our team right now,” Jones said. “We’ve got some outstanding players and we’re in good shape with how we’ve structured our salary cap, and I really like the idea that we’ve got some extra picks. I like what we’ve done throughout this year in putting some cornerstones in place that will help us as we go forward. So when I look at our future, our future looks very bright. And again, I think we’ve got key players at key positions. We’ve got some great draft picks ahead of us and we’ve got some salary cap room to pay it. That’s the reason we’ve made some of the decisions we’ve made.”
Pickens’ future has been a big topic all season, with the Cowboys having the possibility of using the franchise tag to keep him in 2026. But Pickens has been limited to eight catches for 70 yards in the Cowboys’ past two losses.
Asked if that has changed the team’s feelings toward wanting to keep Pickens, the normally loquacious Jones had a simple answer: “No.”
As for Parsons, who suffered a torn ACL in the Packers’ loss to the Denver Broncos, Jones said, “I’m sad for Micah. That’s quite a challenge. I wish him the very best on his recovery. I always use what Michael Irvin said when he had his big surgery during his second year with the Cowboys. He said he realized what football really did mean to him. He said the surgery really launched him to the best parts of his career because he got to feel what it might be like to not play again. Micah, I wish you the very best.”
